coil or leaf

[gavinc]

hello gyes just wanted some opions on what is a better set up coil or leaf spring which flexs the most and so on

[bogged]

Coils.

[ORSM45]

if you wanna hit bumps all day long as hard as you can. go reverse shackle front end (leaves)

other than that go coils.

[gavinc]

iam thinking off building a comp car and i look at doing leaf with drop shackles but i see alot off comp cars with leaf in front and coils in rear i just thought that you could do a alot more to a leaf sprang car to get some serious flex any opion would be great

[sierrajim]

drop shackles and comp car?

What sort of comp car? It may be worth doing a search on these shackles. not too much success with them from what i've read.

[Fieldsy]

coils

[gavinc]

drop shackles and comp car?

What sort of comp car? It may be worth doing a search on these shackles. not too much success with them from what i've read.

yes that is a problem with them if you do not have the right leaf springs thats what i have got so far with the research that i have done.
and to what sort of comp i dont no yet

[ISUZUROVER]

Coil springs systems will (if designed correctly) always be better in terms of offroad travel and ability of the wheels to follow the terrain than leaves.

Coils have none of the interleaf friction that leaves have, so are able to react much faster to keep the wheels on the ground more of the time. Correctly designed linked coil setups can give enormous amounts of travel.

IMHO drop shackles are a waste of time - especially in a comp. All the comp rigs these days seem to prefer fully retained coils rather than silly amounts of uncontrolled flex - drop shackles are much worse than an unretained coil system.

And of course coil systems can have far less front and rear overhang than leaf systems.

[bagsy]

coils are bloody fantastic....

[Utemad]

Since you are in Brisbane if you ever want to drive it on the road, extended shackles are illegal in Qld.

[Camshaft1]

Go coils mate. heaps more flex for heaps less bucks. 4inch raised coils drop shitloads more than raised leaves. and are generally a quarter of the cost. You can get some good leaf spring Nirvana but youv'e got to spend lots of time and money to do it.

[RockhamptonZOOK]

Leaf Springs? Been there done that, never going back.

Coil Springs? Ohhhh Yeeeaaahhhh!!!!!

[AussieCJ7]

the answer is both

each have their advantages and disadvanges my personal preference is a mix of both

goil front leaf rear or leaf front coil rear I am undecided on wihich is best


the main reason for both is they way each loads and unloads seems to complment each other and makes the rig more balanced

coils mostly will flex more but are far more complex to set up and design

[RB zook]

go coils

[grimbo]

Leaves can be just as flexy, they have added benefits of simplicity.

[RockhamptonZOOK]

Since you are in Brisbane if you ever want to drive it on the road, extended shackles are illegal in Qld.

Even 'slightly' larger than standard tyres can be illegal- live a little

[Shorty40]

I have leaves and they do the job just fine. They flex unreal and they are much more stable than coils that are not retained. Plus I dont need to worry about link geometry and so forth ..........

Leaf springs - Simple system for a simple bloke

[Roctoy]

Leaf springs - Simple system for a simple bloke

i agree.




















































you are simple Dan!!

[Shorty40]

Leaf springs - Simple system for a simple bloke

i agree.

you are simple Dan!!

Hey

I resemble that remark

[Utemad]

Since you are in Brisbane if you ever want to drive it on the road, extended shackles are illegal in Qld.

Even 'slightly' larger than standard tyres can be illegal- live a little

I never said I wouldn't do it. As you can see in my signature I have 31in tyres. Way more than the allowed 15mm increase. I just think someone should know what they're getting themself into before they spend the money

[Gwagensteve]

I do not believe that retained coils have more travel than leaves. Both types of spring have a working range and there will be very little difference between the working range of either.

I think that adequate travel for you application can be obtained using either type of spring. IMHO regardless of the spring design, avoid unretained springs/folding shackles etc as they lead to unpredictable/unwanted movement in some situations and poor body control.

I am a big advocate of rear 3/4 eliptic for "extreme" (I hate that word) recreational use, but I think that it is no substitiute for more travel, softer pring rate or lower roll stiffness in the front. We are playing with cable locking and/or preloading the rear 3/4 on some of the stuff I have been playing with to get better balance and to be able to use more throttle on big climbs.

Most of the comp cars inthe rockcrawling series inthe US have much less travel than you would imagine and quite firm springing, along with VERY firm rebound damping. Mega travel and that kind of spongey soft suspension that many of us were playing with over the years do not really equate to more capability or traction.

It is much more complex (and expensive) to design a functional and stable coil spring car from scratch due to lots of design and fab of links, mounts etc, and a good knowledge of chassis design/suspension set up will be required.

I imagine that If you are asking this question (coil v leaf for a comp car) that you will be on a very steep learning curve to a build a well set up coil car- you may be better trading off some approach/departure angle for the simplicity and lower cost of leaf suspension

I agree though that the spring rate can be much more accurate with a coil car and you get better characteristics for high speed work.

[N*A*M]

for a comp truck, go coilovers

[MY45]

for a comp truck, go coilovers

Or Fox Air Shocks

[Gwagensteve]

I agree, but I suspect that if gavinc is not already aware of the advantages of coilovers/airshocks and the work involved in fitting them, he might be better of sticking to the far simpler leaf set up, esp. as most of the comon starting points for this type of project are leaf, and as he is in QLD, it might allow some degree of road drivability.

PS Gavin, you didn't specifiy waht sort of competition, what your budget is, what cars you are thinking about starting with, and what level of experience you have, or if you can (or wish to)fabricate. This info makes it far easier to answer this sort of question. Especially what sort of comp you want to do, as if you have to comply to OBC type rules, yo will have trouble doing much "conversion" type work at all.

[gavinc]

well iam a boiler maker bye trade so doing fab work is not a consern.
what sort off car i was thinking a suzuki or a lux because off the leaf springs being easys to work with but then i thought what about coils so now i do not no what to go for.
for my first comp car i did not what to go all out and sprend big bucks just kept it simple.
To what sort off comp i had a look last night and i thought off giveing the short course a go [the modified of course] but it limits alot off things i was thinking off and the xtreme rock crawling looked good but i think it is a bit full on when starting up in the comp scene.

[ISUZUROVER]

If you want to compete in the ASCC or other events like that on the cheap, I think the easiest way to start would be to buy a cheap rangie. You get a reasonably powerful 3.5L V8, almost unbreakable 4sp box (if a pre '84 model), long travel coils and discs all round - with a reasonable link setup that can be improved easily and cheaply. The only downside is the axle strength, which you can fix by fitting toyota diff centres and custom mcnamara axles to the rangie housings (search this on the rover board).

All you really have to do to start competing is do the axles (and lockers), and do a small bodylift/cut the wheelarches to fit larger wheels. The rest you can do bit by bit.

[gavinc]

thanks ben that sounds like a good idea simple and not very costly i think that it sounds like coils are the go.
but can some one me tell y this is.
after a day run to ormeau with my 4wd club we went back to bayside 4x4 where one of our menbers work and they had a RTI ramp set up the gye that work there had a 7 1/2 lifted mav lwb with 35s he went up the ramp and then a patrol lwb leaf sprang 2inch with 33s went up the ramp the same distances how the f*ck can that happened

[-Mick-]

after a day run to ormeau with my 4wd club we went back to bayside 4x4 where one of our menbers work and they had a RTI ramp set up the gye that work there had a 7 1/2 lifted mav lwb with 35s he went up the ramp and then a patrol lwb leaf sprang 2inch with 33s went up the ramp the same distances how the f*ck can that happened

What do you mean Coils aren't the be all and end all man there is link designs, shocks, individual suspension setups and heaps more to consider. Then there is wheelbase, track width, tyre pressure, balance of travel f - r all of which affect them on the ramp

Don't write off leaf suspensions cause lots of GQ owners said they're the shiznit IMO coils are ultimately better but leaves can be made to happily equal most any factory link design which is always comprimised to maintain road manners for soccer mums

I'd suggest you hang out around the comp scene for a few months before diving in Might save you $ and headaches

[gavinc]

i see where you are coming for mick all i was trying to say was this gye work at a 4wd store you think that it would have been set up right or what is the use

[ISUZUROVER]

First of all,

(1) just because someone works at a 4x4 shop doesn't mean they know what the are talking about or know anything about the best way to modify a 4x4.

(2) RTI has not much to do with 4x4 ability "wheel travel is overrated" and does not have much to do with how a 4x4 can perform in actual situations.

(3) Swb vehicles score better on RTI ramps than a LWB (everything else being equal).

(4) Lift is bad, not good. You want the minimum list to fit the tyres in and give you a high enough belly clearance. More lift raises CofG and makes a vehicle unstable. 7.5" of lift probably meant it had no down-travel unless everything was set up properly.

(5) if you just want a ramp queen it is easy to get lots of travel with any suspension system. A leaf sprung swb with wide axles and really soft springs could easily be set up to score 1000 on most ramps.