Julian Daley wrote of driver's side sag on his Spitfire.
We had the same problem on our '77 1500. Apparently the Spit transverse
springs are notorious for losing their 'spring". We've been through
(I think it's) three of them. This is characterized by sagging, usually
on the driver's side as that gets more weight than the passenger side
(don't jump on me for that. Sometimes you don't *have* a passenger and
therefore have no weight on that side, but you *always* have a driver.)
and ever increasing negative camber. If you run wider than stock wheels and
tires this will eventually result in the tire fouling the fender well and
peeling off long spirals of rubber from the tire's shoulder. Not recommended.
The fix is to replace the spring with a new one, or to have the old one
re-arched at a competent spring shop. We went with the latter route as
new springs are over $120 (US) and re-arching the spring was $35, which
means I can do this three times before it costs more than buying new.
I had the shop put a half to three quarters more arch in than stock. Made
installation a little more difficult but not impossible and the extra
arch isn't really noticable in ride height or handling. It does give a
slight increase in stiffness but again it isn't noticable through the
seat of your pants. Does help when I plop my 185 lbs in the driver's
seat as opposed to Vicki's considerably lighter frame.
While your about it, you should think about changing all the bushings
in the spring & trailing arms and look at the shocks. Make sure they're
good. A very little play in each bushing can translate to a lot of
negative camber by the time it gets to the road wheels. While you're
there check the U-joints too. You're 3/4 of the way toward taking the
half shafts out anyway so it's a good time to replace the u-joints if
they need it.
Our Spit felt a little loose in the rear end around tight turns and the
re-arched spring and new bushings made it tight as new. Time and money
well spent. I wish I could take credit for all this advice but I asked
a similar question about two months ago and the above advice came from
Gary Meboe and a couple of other SOLers. Thanks guys!
Hope this helps!
Rik
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Rik Schlierer "Weekends don't count unless you
RGS03@HEALTH.STATE.NY.US spend them doing something
NYS DEPT OF HEALTH, ALBANY NY completely pointless" (Calvin)
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