Rear spring refurb

[rossybrown]

Hi all,

I recently acquired, via ebay, a swing spring, longer halfshafts and front arb to upgrade my Mk3. I want to know what i can do to refurb the leaf spring? Do I get it bead blasted and repaint it? Does it need oiling?

As you can tell I've not done this before! :)

Cheers,

Ross

[Paudman]

Wire brushing and repainting certainly; the rubber buttons between the leaves will require replacing and maybe some of the nuts and bolts on the clamps. Replace the end bushes as well, very cheap from eBay and easy to replace. I reassemble mine with plenty of grease between the leaves and then wrap tightly with Denso tape for extra protection.

[Clive]

beware, the front arb may need attention to the mounting holes to get it to fit (slotting works fro me!) as the clamps are a bit bigger.
Re spring bushes, if they are solid enough don't change them, I suspect the originals may well outlast the "new" ones as quality is a bit suspect. Put a long screwdriver in the bush, see if it is soft. If it is then replace. (sorry Paudman, too often I have replaced parts with new, and a while later put the old part back on)
I am wondering if an "uprated" button is available in something better than rubber, maybe nylon or PTFE? where the button rbs wants to be smooth too, ideally polished and shiny to allow smoooooth sliding :)

Hmm, off to search for ptfe rod, must be available on fleabay....or is ptfe too soft?

[Paudman]

cliftyhanger wrote:

I suspect the originals may well outlast the "new" ones as quality is a bit suspect.

All depends on who from, and what exactly, you purchase. NOS bushes abound which is why I recomended eBay rather than current suppliers.

[rossybrown]

Thanks all,

Cliftyhanger - we use PTFE for various jigs at work and it comes with different percentages of 'Glass Fill' so there should be one specification that's hard and wear resistant enough............