Just recently, my friend lowered his car to a perfect drop height. By it's looks the car looks great! But the drop wasn't done by coil-overs or lowering springs, or cutting the springs. As a matter of fact, he kept his stock springs. It was done via flame torch. The stock springs were heated, to where the car weight slowly decompressed the springs giving the car a new lowered look. I know this is bad for the suspension but what exactly is happening to the springs? Cryogen, you're expertise would be greatly appreciated or anyone else who did or know anyone that did this. Thanx.
__________________
'96 Honda Accord. My Final Project.
That is just as bad as cutting the springs. After the metal is heated it does not have the same spring rate. You need stiffer springs on a lowered car. The car will not ride right and most likley will blow the shocks out soon.
__________________
Deceptive Team Racing
Co-Founder
est:2002
Well...I don't know the physics behind it exactly, but he's basically re-tempering his springs without any metallurgic knowledge at all.
Since your life is riding on your suspension, that was a rather stupid thing to do.
He's probably fucked up the spring rate in some way, and since cooling by air is faster than cooling in an annealing oven, the odds are quite high that he has also made his springs more brittle than they were before.
I'd be willing to bet his ride is a little stiffer and harsher now?
I also don't really want to think about what would happen to a car if it's springs were too brittle and shattered while driving... :eek:
Tell your buddy to start saving for some real springs.
90 CR-X Si
158.1 hp 112.0 tq (with i/h/e) (lost its life in a horrible accident...rest in peace)
Gone...but not forgotten...
I'm not even going ot beat around the bush with this. 50% of the people on this board dont know their asses from a hole in the ground and it pisses me off sometimes..
Originally posted by ScSiLude I saw a guy at the track have his front driver side spring explode out the side of his Mustang, turns out he lowered the car by heating the springs.
Oops....did I do that???? I guess he will learn next time I hope.
your friend is an absolute moron....his car will be in the junk yard in a couple months....it will change the grain structure of the metal and the mechanical characteristics which were previously "set" through a temper and anneal process by the spring manufacturer. Annealing eliminates all internal stresses which weren't previously taken care of by tempering. Heating the spring again will cause the internal stresses to reappear. This fatigues the spring and it will most likely snap under heavy loads.
I agree with Madtownhonda. No offense man, but you're friends' a Jackass.. Wouldn't you think the integrity of the spring will be affected by that?? Tell him to do it right, shocks/springs/coilovers, etc. :
new way of lowering car???
:
:
Linear Mode
