Left Lean

I replaced the rear springs on my B on Sunday using the BritTek rear spring kit (job went well, took about 2 hours), however, my B still seems to have a left lean. Although the car sits much better than it did (doesn't need a gun rack anymore) with the crappy aftermarket springs that had beem on the car, the car is still 1/2" lower on the drivers side rear, and 3/8" lower on the drivers side front. (Note: front springs are about 2 years old) After searching the archives, I was unable to find anything to address this issue. Should I try switching sides with the new rear springs in a few hundred miles when I would be re-tighting everything anyway? Is this more likely a bent or twisted shell of some kind? Any other ideas on how to level the B out?

Drive it awhile and see what happens. It will take some time to settle.

You can try switching the front springs, if it's like my car it will still lean to the left after switching springs on both ends. If you empty the fuel tank it may not lean, I noted the amount of fuel in the tank made a small difference when I was trying to remove the lean.

Clifton

There are three things that are most common for this problem. It could be one, two or all three of them so solving the problem does take some fiddling, and sometimes it can't be completely remedied.

The most common problem is rear springs. New springs are typically of poor quality. Engle Imports probably has the best springs right now. The first thing you should do is swap them left to right and see if it makes any difference. If so, return them and get a set made by a local spring shop, or have your current springs re-arced.

The next most common problem is front springs. Press down on one of the front corners of the car and you will see the opposite, rear corner go up. Switch the front springs left to right, and if one of them was sagging then you should see a difference in how the rear sits. In this case replace the front springs or leave them swapped left to right if the car is now flat.

The other problem is chassis misalignment. This is possible due to crash damage, improper sill replacement or chassis repair, an old weak unibody or even factory error. There is little to nothing you can do about this. The best solution here is to get it as close as you can with springs, and then install a "helper spring" under the lower rear corner. If the problem is one side being too high, then instead of the helper spring you can use a lowering block on the high side. This isn't my preferred method but it's better than having the car sit too high.

Good luck!

I'd be curious about what might happen if you swapped both, front and rear. What are you measuring to, bumper, bumper brackets, top of wheel wells? Often bumpers get bumped and knocks them a little cockeyed.

JMoore Wrote:

I've always believed that a spring shouldn't need to "settle". When the cars came out of the factory they never had to "settle" so why should they now? It takes 20 years for springs to sag an inch, so I'm not sure where the belief came from that they will settle 1.5" in a few hundred miles.

I installed a set of springs on a car and left them for years and they never settled even a fraction of an inch. I feel it is more likely that the car "settles" because the bushings are too tight or the holes they go into are old and rough.

Generally the springs from Bob have had a very good reputation for being at the right height from the start. Let them sit for a bit and look at the fronts. I wonder as well about the whole body alignment issue.

Thanks for the advice!

I will probably leave it until I put 500 to 1000 miles on it to see what happens, when it will be time to retighten everything according to the instructions from BritTek.

I measured from the garage floor to the bottom of the chrome strip at the center of each wheel to determine how much it was leaning left.

The new springs from BritTek do not sit too high, in fact the front to back measurement is very close and it looks like they will settle in to a nice almost level height front to rear. The problem is just the left lean, which is happening on both the front and the back.

The old springs on the car had been there about 5 years, and the rear passenger side on those springs sat significantly (3"+) higher than the drivers side spring originally. They did settle somewhat and ended up being about 1 3/4" higher on the passenger side. I then put a 1" lowering block on the passenger side along with new shocks all around to level it out more and drove it around like that. I finally got tired of the rear end looking like it had been jacked up and got the new spring set (with all new hardware) from BritTek based on advice posted on the board.

Overall, the car is much better as is, and the BritTek springs are great as the car sits much more level front-to-back! If the car still has the 1/2" left lean after some "break in" miles, then I'll try the switch to see if that makes any difference.

Again, thanks for the advice, and I appreciate any other tips/advice anyone else may have!

My (okay fine, OUR) '66 has leftlean too, significantly lower on the driver's side. I found the most simple fix for this is to never let Chuck drive, only ride on the passenger side.
:devil:

It is generally better to measure from the center of the wheel hub to the bottom of the chrome trim strip than the floor to the chrome strip in case there are undulations in the floor...differences in the tires, inflation, etc....or at least that is what most of us do when measuring ride height.

You can also try storing a few hundred pounds of whatever you have in the trunk while the car is in the garage. If there is a bushing or something else binding up, this should be enough to straighten it out.

I swapped sides on my fronts and it did the trick. Paul

My 66 does the same thing, leans left. It probably still has the original springs. There has been discussion on this "driver's side lean" in the past, I think here and elsewhere, over the years of torque being applied to the light weight unibody.