Reversing eyes on rear leaf suspension?

[DriftworksJames]

Hi All,
I've been reading for a while, but this is my first post here

I'm the proud owner of an RT104 Corona 2000 and so far I'm loving it
It currently looks like this:


but I'm on a mission to get it looking something like this

and hopefully without it costing too much

Anyway, I've been doing a bit of digging and it seems a good cheap way of lowering the rear of a car with leaf springs is to reverse the eyes, but I've got a couple of questions and I'm having a bit of trouble finding info on this...

Is reversing the eyes a better solution than using lowering blocks?

How is reversing the eyes done and is it a job for a well equiped home mechanic who's not afraid of welders and big hammers?
Is the leaf with the eyes on flipped over and refitted or are the ends heated and bent or cut off and rewelded?

Any info you can throw my way would be much appreciated

For now I'm just going to cut a couple of coils from the front springs, then wait till a set of front shocks and springs appears for the right money....

cheers all,
James

[slapper]

> Is reversing the eyes a better solution than using lowering blocks?

much better .. you retain the original arch of the spring, you retain the same spring rate, you retain the hanger geometry ... and you don't increase the likely hood of "spring wind-up" that moving the diff away from the spring with lowering blocks does.

> How is reversing the eyes done and is it a job for a well equiped home mechanic
> who's not afraid of welders and big hammers?
> Is the leaf with the eyes on flipped over and refitted or are the ends heated and
> bent or cut off and rewelded?

don't even think about doing it yourself! spring steel is tempremental stuff ... even just heating it can change the properties of the metal enough to ruin it. Take the leaf pack apart (save yourself a couple bucks there) and take the main leaves to a spring shop (I use industrial springs in Adelaide). They'll heat them, reset the arch in the other direction (it may help to draw a copy of the existing arch on a long piece of cardboard), and cool them (they need to be quenched if I recall correctly).

Pay your money, stick the pack back together - Bob's your Aunty Mavis on Tuesdays for BINGO.

cheers,
Slapper

[hi-ace]

First up I'm no metallurgist. But if you try heating your back springs and reversing the eyes you will wreck them. Just use lowering blocks, they can be taken back out any time. I personaly am not in favour of cutting a couple of coils of springs as they are made to be proportional on their compression. and the ends are made to sit correctly on the spring seat, cutting them will lead to problems, have them re-set.

[styler]

ok, you want to lower your leaf spring suspension.

there are many ways to do this -

lowering blocks are nasty and arent good for the suspension $80

reversing the eyes is a good way to get it a lot lower but does
need a specialist which costs a fair bit for reversing eyes. $200?
the ends are heated and bent over. no cutting / welding, no flipping as the arch would be facing upwards not downwards.

reset the leaves any amount within limits, also needs a specialist but is cheaper and keeps the pack almost like it was. $140

flip leaves over, the zero cost way, it can be done but changes the spring pack and makes it softer i would imagine. $0

remove leaves, not recommended but it has a lowering effect so it still is a method. $0

get a new pack made up to your specs or a stock spec from a spring replacement company. $300 stock $450 custom

any work done if you remove the pack out yourself will be a lot cheaper which are the prices shown.

probably do the bushes whilst its out. $100?

and add a leaf if you like from a stock pack $20? or custom $60
you can usually add 1 leaf to a stock pack as it will fit in ok.

[styler]

dont cut the coil springs ffs. get lowered springs for about $140 pair.

cutting a stock spring = a short soft spring with no proper seat end.

also i dont recommend superlow lowered springs for a street car, maybe a show car or someone who know what they are doing whith their suspension setup.

[slapper]

...
reversing the eyes is a good way to get it a lot lower but does
need a specialist which costs a fair bit for reversing eyes. $200?
...
reset the leaves any amount within limits, also needs a specialist but is cheaper and keeps the pack almost like it was. $140

I'd be surprised if they charged you more to reverse the eyes than reset ...
Reversing the eyes *is* just resetting the leaf ... just resetting it so much that it has the original arch in the other direction.

I did a bunch of research a coupla years back and came to the conclusion that reversing the eyes was the best option for lowering leaf springs. A lot of the detail of what I read has now exitted my head, but "spring rates" features heavily in the reasons (as I recall). A leaf spring has a progressive rate ... and there are really good reasons why semi-elliptical springs curve *up* at the ends and the spring hangers are vertical at rest.

Let me see what detail I can remember ...

One bad thing about resetting leaves to make the spring pack flatter is that you reduce the amount of travel the pack has - you should never deform a leaf spring beyond flat. When you do, you start to bring the leaf end points back in again (toward the axle), which decreases the spring rate ... so, the more you compress the spring, the softer it gets.

You also need to keep an eye on what the spring hangers are doing too. As they swing past vertical (either in or out), they also change the spring rate.

Most professional "lowered leaf spring kits" are just reversed eyes ...

However ... most things in roadcar modification are a matter of balancing compromises. If all you're after is looks and/or spring wind-up due to acceleration is not an issue, then lowering-blocks can be fine and dandy.

When all was said and done, lowering and stiffening the rear of my KE25 consisted of reversed eyes, an extra leaf and adjustable shocks.

wibble,
Slapper

[styler]

the only reversing the eyes i have heard of is under heat and bend the eyes the other way over so far...

yeah i had thought about flipping the leaf over and resetting it in the other direction as another option but hadnt seen much info or people doing it. i thought that it would be pretty extreme to have it the arch reversed, and that it may be too much change for
the leaves to stay in that position. but if it works then so much the better!

i see your point of spring travel as the reveresed eyes method, the eye leaf sits higher up so therefore can have more travel and the leaves will be more arched compared to the reset leaves method where the eye leaf sits normally and has to be more flat with less arch, both methods achieving the same lowered car height but the reversed eyes method allows more arch and more travel which is better.

yeah i have heard of people complaining about flat leaf pack issues

[DriftworksJames]

Thanks for the input guys, that makes things much clearer now

I'm no stranger to lowered cars, but it's been a long while since I had a car with leaf springs, and even then I just left them well alone

This car is a daily driver for pottering around in, I don't need it to be a track monster, I already got one of them. I want things to be safe, but this car will be done on a very tight budget where possible.

I think there's a local spring specialist to me, so I'll give them a shout and see what they reckon to either moving the eyes round, or reversing the curve on the leaf, so that leaf can be put back into the pack but sat upside down to give the same curve and spring rate, but with the eyes the other way round.

I know cutting the front springs is far from ideal, but I'm in the UK where knowledge and supplies for the Corona are piss poor at best (the Local Toyota dealership asked me if I was sure a Corona was a Toyota car as they'd never heard of one before)
So I'll keep an eye out for a set of proper springs, but I'll just chop the standard ones in the meantime and deal with the consequences.

thanks again,
James