Rear spring replacement

[TexasT700]

I used the floor jack with 3 straps. Dicey, but swapped spring twice this way. Used vice grips on straps to secure. 2nd time, used neighbors jack with saddle removed, more secure cup to hold end of shock.

[kainic]

What to make sure I have the plastic retainer rings installed correctly with RR sping?  

[Hibobb]

@TexasT700 The vice grip holding the strap was the icing on the cake! I just have to tease you!

 

 

 

 

[winddown]

I've bit the bullet and ordered one of these Wilbers 640 roads, it has a bigger piston than the factory shock and a few other bonuses.  Being 105kg I didn't want to mess around and the shop I go to said that a rebuild of the factory one would cost nearly that much anyway.  No remote preload but hell, I never change that anyway.

 

[TexasT700]

Rofl! Sort of falls in category as to why women live longer than men!

I agree the vice grips sounded like a risky idea, I pretty well expected them to slip.

But, I lived thru it!!

Just for the rest of the story, the second time I switched from the 85nm to the 95nm, using a neighbors floor jack. His was safer in that the shock was secured better on this jack than mine, but, BUT, his jack slowly leaked down. To get the spring retainer out, my neighbor kept jacking the jack to keep enuf pressure on it to compress the spring.

I am very grateful that the 95nm spring is perfection for my weight and I don't have to live dangerously like that again.

[TexasT700]

1 hour ago, kainic said:

What to make sure I have the plastic retainer rings installed correctly with RR sping?  

If I recall, the thicker one goes on bottom, thinner one on top, so looks correct to me...

[AZJW]

I too had used two ratchet straps with my floor jack on my first rear spring change. As others have said, sketchy, but it worked.   My son just picked a new T7 and his first mod was a rear spring upgrade, so I ordered some Tusk spring compressors to do the job more safely.  They did fine getting off the weaker OEM spring, but wouldn't even get close to compressing the new 90NM RallyRaid spring before they started twisting/distorting with the compressor frame starting to twist. 

You can see the frame of the Tusk compressor has bent on the left side with the distortion of the metal being much worse under load.

 

Since we already had the OEM spring off we improvised and used the ratchet strap/ floor jack method,  but this time with 3 straps, which worked much better and less white knuckle moments than the 2 straps I used last time.  A big thumbs down on the Tusk Compressors and if I do this job again,  I'm going big like @Murska posted on page 1 of this thread.

 

[yaman]

+1 ... and yes it was sketchy AF

[Liquidape]

2 hours ago, AZJW said:

I too had used two ratchet straps with my floor jack on my first rear spring change. As others have said, sketchy, but it worked.   My son just picked a new T7 and his first mod was a rear spring upgrade, so I ordered some Tusk spring compressors to do the job more safely.  They did fine getting off the weaker OEM spring, but wouldn't even get close to compressing the new 90NM RallyRaid spring before they started twisting/distorting with the compressor frame starting to twist. 

Just curious did you lubricate or grease the screws in the Tusk spring compressors or run them dry?  I thought the key to getting those to work correctly was to make sure the threads were well lubricated. 

2 hours ago, AZJW said:

 

 

 

 

[AZJW]

10 hours ago, Liquidape said:

Just curious did you lubricate or grease the screws in the Tusk spring compressors or run them dry?  I thought the key to getting those to work correctly was to make sure the threads were well lubricated. 

 

To answer your question,  yes, the threads were well greased along with the washer as recommended.   They worked fine until the tougher spring was tried, then they twisted like the cheap pot metal that they are. Not a good design IMHO.

[Liquidape]

Good to know. Thanks.