Alright I put some OEM replacement springs in and they are way to high. I've let them settle for two months and I just can't stand it. Can I use an angle grinder with a cutoff disc to remove part of the coil? I want about an inch or an inch and a half lower, so I was thinking a third of a coil is what I was going to try, but I have no idea. Any input welcome.

 

Yes that would work, however, I cut a little the cool with water, cut a little, cool with water, etc.

Another thing you could do is take several paper towels soaked with water and wrap around the part of the coil you do not want cut. Leave at least 1" between the cut and the paper towels. I would not use a rag, just incase you get too close, the paper towel will shread, not wrap around your grinder like a rag would.

The wet paper towel will take up the heat as long as it stays wet, the latent heat of vaporization should keep it near 212 * for a while, however, once the water is gone the heat will skyrocket.

 

I ended up cutting a whole coil and it worked out really well. It looks like didn't index them right before either. Thanks for the advice on the water, novass, it worked like a charm.

 

im glad someone posted some help here. im going to be putting on new brakes and while im at it i think ill cut my lowering springs. it still sits just a little too high for me and id like to take maybe 1/2" off my ride height. my lowering springs were a 1"drop where should i start cutting, 1/2 coil, 1/4 coil???? and is it REALLY bad if you cut them? i dont see how if it is kept cool like you mentioned

 

As long as you keep them cool, I see nothing wrong with cutting them. Removing a whole coil on new OEM springs dropped mine about 2". I would say around a third for yours, but I really have no idea.

 

well i think im going to start at 1/3 coil and go from there, dont wanna screw this up. im probably going to keep a cold rag on the spring while i cut too to keep it cool.

 

For the front springs, the common math is if you want XX amount of drop, cut half of that from the free height of the spring. In Camaro's case, you need to cut 1/4 inch from the free heignt of the coil to get a 1/2 inch drop when installed.

 

Be conservative on the front springs....I went a 1/4 coil at a time. If you use a good high speed cut-off wheel, you don't have to worry about heat build-up. When I finished cutting mine I could grab an inch away from the cut and it wasn't even hot.

 

Remember when you cut coil springs they become stiffer and affect ride quality.

Auggie

 

i personally hate this topic and think its very dangerous the spring rate changes when doing this. also i did this on my volvo and drove around for a couple months before the spring shot out of the holder on the strut/shock and went through my tire. the springs have a special design on the bottom to fit properly cutting this off makes it not fit properly just my two cents.

 

AlbertaFbody...sorry to hear about your bad luck with the volvo While I am not familiar with that car, I can tell you that cutting the springs on an F-body is completely safe as long as you cut the right end of the spring. You are right about the changing spring rate.

 

Which end of the spring should you cut?

 

It's been so long, I'm trying to remember......If you take the spring out you will notice that one end of the fronts will have a flat ground on them...cut the other end. On the rears, the bottoms narrow down to fit on the perches of the axle, so you have to cut the tops. Make sense?

BTW.... Hello fellow Grand Rapidian

 

Hey whats up, GR in the house...

Your right about the fronts. One end does flaten out (top) a little and rests on a rubber isolator, but I think the bottom end narrows down like the rears. Do I cut the end that narrow then? I had the springs out not too long ago so I'm pretty sure about that.

 

On the rears you would cut the larger end, not the part that loops inward. I'm tired I hope that makes sense.

 

The fronts do not narrow down...they are straight.

 

There are formulas for figureing out exactly what the spring rate will be after cutting. If I get time I'll try to dig them up and post. If I remember correctly a full coil off of 89 IROC springs took them from 600 ppi to 780 ppi. Bout right for auto crossing my monte, a little too stiff for every day, but then again it was so low I was constantly hitting the bump stops. Ended up going with 500 ppi with a revised roll center. But thats a whole nother topic.

 

To the best of my knowledge cutting a spring won't effect the spring rate unless you are cutting progressive wound springs. True it will be shorter, duh. The spring rate is determined by the diameter of the coil and the winding. Standard springs are wound uniformly, progressive springs are wound differently.

 

The reason for cold cutting a spring is to keep the spring rate. When metal is heated above a certain point it starts to anneal. This means the metal becomes more maulable and looses many of it's original properties. You'll hear welders say they're stress releaving the metal, this is basically the same thing.
If you cold cut the metal it's elastic properties remain the same and won't "sag". You can lower a spring by just heating up the whole spring really hot and cooling it slowely (stagnent air flow is enough). This will lower the car and change the spring rate!
Cold cutting is THE way to do it. Not that everybody has the facilities but if you know of a place that does waterjet cutting they can usually cut your springs for like $20 without putting any heat into the part, not even localized .

 

John Milican,

The spring rate does go up. Think of a coil spring as a long rod. If you make the rod shorter it will be harder to bend. The diameter of the wire used is the most important factor of your spring rate, but over all length still has a large effect.

I cut my stock monte springs and took them from 400 ppi to just over 500 ppi by cutting one coil, this also happened to lower my car 2 inches which is what I was looking for. You need to do the math before cutting but 9 times out of 10 half to one coil lowers your car nicely and firms up the ride enough to help handling without making your car ride like a panel wagon.

 

Correct, don't know what I was thinking, lol. Maybe I wasn't, I was more concerned about the temperature of the cut than his comment about shortening won't change spring rate.
Springs are rather complicated devices for having such a simple design .
I was going to copy the equations from my materials book but instead I'll just point to you a good online calculator.
http://www.engineersedge.com/calcula...ring_k_pop.htm
Adding coils effectively lowers the spring rate because the spring will compress more with less effort (each coil compresses the same ammount).
Since we aren't changing the pitch, just removing coils, the spring k always increases , no way to keep it the same unless you anneal the spring and change the pitch (which changes the uncompressed length).

 

I stand corrected. I totally understand it now. Good class on springs. Will there be a test?

I'm glad I said "to the best of my knowledge" when I mistakenly said spring rate will not go up when cutting springs.

 

coils on the front?? what coils?? i dont have coils on the front of both of my camaros!

only the shocks, but no springs! did i miss something here?

 

LOL, your thinking of a normal macpherson (sp) setup where the coil springs go over the shock. On your camaro they are down lower between the lower a-arm and the frame, they're down there trust me