Spring assistors

[Netti_374307085]

The back end of my car really sags when it's towing, and that's with a very light caravan, unloaded and thus with a very light noseweight. It will be 20-30kg more when fully loaded. I had the car in at the garage today but it looks like they are unable to compress the heavy duty towing springs I supplied as they couldn't compress the springs enough to fit them. The only thing they could reccommend was taking it to a sports specialist with a more powerful compressor but that would probably be prohibitively expensive for what the car is.

I have seen the spring assistors both advertised and in caravan shops, that seem to thread through the springs of sorts. Has anyone else used these on a normal family saloon? Do they work? And do they increase the rear end height under normal circumstances or only when towing? And finally, are easy/difficult are they to fit? I urgently need a plan B before our first full trip next week.

Many thanks.

 

[Lutz]

From your description of the problem, that the back end sags already under very little noseweight, it certainly sounds as though the rear springs on your car are suffering from general weakness and need to be replaced. Spring assistors are not a good alternative to try to correct a shortcoming elsewhere. If anything. they should only be used to give an existing good spring some extra support under heavy load conditions.

Otherwise, it would be like two wrongs trying to make a right.

You certainly went for the better alternative of trying to have heavy duty springs fitted. Frankly, I wouldn't have much faith in any garage that is unable to compress car springs, even heavy duty ones, so I would try another one. The extra that they may charge should still be less than buying and fitting a set of spring assistors. It shouldn't be necessary to go to a sports specialist. Therefore, as you already have a new set of springs, I would continue along those lines.

Anyway, having said that, it depends on the design of spring assistors whether they raise the back of the car when it is unladen. Also, badly designed spring assistors can reduce the amount of wheel travel, resulting in early bottoming out of the suspension. That's why I'd always prefer the option of having new springs fitted.

 

[Woody3]

We faced the same problem. We have an Octavia 1.9TDi SE 130 that comes with 205/55-16 tyres which, being very low profile would make the ride rather hard. Skoda in their wisdom have thus softened the rear springs to improve the ride. Put our Bailey Pageant Majestic on the ball with 57Kg download (max for this car is 60Kg) and the ball drops about two inches lifting the front end and making it a bit wild to control.

There are two makes of additional springs, Mad who are Dutch, and Grayson Engineering, with about

 

[Lutz]

Lifting the back end of the car by fitting harder springs or spring assistors won't put more weight on the front axle.