Yesterday morning I happened to glance at the car in the drive and spotted something on the floor underneath it. I popped outside, picked it up and it appeared to be a horseshoe shaped piece of plastic tubing. I couldn't see any obvious place it could have come from and it could have been detritus from the street. Our driveway slopes down to the house from the road and we often get stray rubbish blown onto the driveway.
I goes to work on me bike and later that day wifey phones me to say 'the car's making an awful sound like something's rubbing and there's a smell of burning', in that way they do.
She takes it to the local indie who diagnoses a broken coil spring. The tyre was damaged as a result so I'm now £219 poorer. I'm just so glad it didn't happen at speed. We're due to head up north soon for a holiday and the thought of it shredding a tyre at 70 whilst loaded with kids and luggage on the A1 doesn't bear thinking about.
In addition to oil, brake fluid etc I think I'll be checking each corner carefully although its doubtful I would spot a broken spring without removing each wheel.
Ahh the joys of car ownership!
Last edited by: VxFan on Thu 21 Jul 11 at 00:14
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Was the other side checked ?
I noticed when pounding the streets in pursuit of census targets that I came across dozens of broken coils in different places, usually not far from speed-bumps.
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Check how many cam belts you see as well!
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No, I drive everywhere now !
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You can still see them!
I was stuck in a long very slow moving jam on the A3 once. In the central reservation I could have built a complete car from the bits, I even spotted a complete gearbox.
Last edited by: Zero on Wed 20 Jul 11 at 22:23
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They did check the other side but gave it the ok.
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What car is it? Renault? Ford?
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I thought it was best practice to replace (suspension) springs in pairs, as age will tend to have made the older spring sag a bit.
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Its a ten yr old Pug 406 estate.
I too wondered if they should replace both springs.
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I think you would bet money the other is not long for this world.
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Get the other spring replaced ASAP.
Springs and dampers (shock absorbers to give then the common but wrong name) should always be replaced as a axle set.
They do suffer ageing, ie they get weaker, so you will have the new one slightly stiffer.
also.... 'The tyre was damaged as a result so I'm now £219 poorer. I'm just so glad it didn't happen at speed. We're due to head up north soon for a holiday and the thought of it shredding a tyre at 70 whilst loaded with kids and luggage on the A1 doesn't bear thinking about.'
Ones gone, and took a tyre with it.
Chances are, given the other one is the same age, it will follow.
Last edited by: VxFan on Thu 21 Jul 11 at 00:16
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>> Ahh the joys of car ownership!
As this is a quite old car.... ahh the risks of older car ownership? One of the risks?
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>> They do suffer ageing, ie they get weaker,
What about active dampers. I am getting this... in three years the car will have about 40k miles and could be tempted to buy it,
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French car !!! European springs are notorious. Our C3 broke it's front nearside at 14K
Fortuately SWM was doing a U turn 25 yards up the road and I drove it home, gingerly but noisily. Didn't touch the tyre but scraped round the steel wheel on it's journey
I'll hazard a guess that your's was a nearside. They take a lot more punishment with all the ups and downs caused by gutters and grids and also get more of the salt water in winter.
That was the final straw...coupled with the hated Sensodrive, it had to go...and it did !
Ted
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>> French car !!! >>
Not just French.
My brothers 7yr/130,000 mile old E-class estate broke a front spring recently - they are renowned for it apparently.
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Probably will have started to deteriorate, but normally all wear pretty much the same.
the problems become apparent when one part is replaced, and so the suspension becomes unmatched/balanced.
many people don't notice any imbalance, but the car will react differently and can be an issue in extreme circumstances.
Where's NC when you need a decent explanation? ;-)
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I have had 2 springs go on my Vectra 1 at the front that made a hell of a sound, like a gun shot really made me jump - however luckly did not intrude into the tyre, so I was still able to get the car home - didnt effect the ride (through town).
The rear one, didnt even know until MOT time, where I was shown and sure enough the rear sprng had snapped clean in half.
Car has only done 40k miles - cheap nasty steel I think.
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I actually bought a car with a broken rear spring and didn't realise. It sat level and didn't make any noise. It was only when my mechanic had it on the ramps a week or so later that he found one of the rears broken right at the bottom seat inside the cup.
I had it changed, but it made no appreciable difference. This failure appeared to be corrosion related.
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Yes many broken springs found at MOT time with owners unaware... across all makes.
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I was only aware the front springs had snapped because the snapped bit was rattling on the cup. If the spring breaks near the bottom then the only affect is really a lowered spring.
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>> I was only aware the front springs had snapped because the snapped bit was rattling
>> on the cup.
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If the spring breaks near the bottom then the only affect is really a lowered spring.
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Not so!
I was aware that a front spring had snapped ( while by car was parked in my drive over night) when I tried reversing out.
I felt a strange juddering through the steering. The car would move in reverse but not forward.
The bottom of the spring had snapped and the end had jammed on the tyre. A flat bed truck was required to transport it to my indie.
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With my Corsa the only indication was the rattle, even looking at the spring installed you couldn't tell, it was only when the springs were removed you could see where it had snapped.
Didn't seem to have any effect the handling but I got them changed before the 300 mile round trip.
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>> I actually bought a car with a broken rear spring .............. This failure appeared to be
>> corrosion related.
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I suspect that most road spring failures are the result of a fracture propagating from a point of external corrosion. Springs are tested for durability by both the spring and the car manufacturer to deflections and number of cycles far beyond anything experienced during normal use for an uncorroded spring.
Last edited by: L'escargot on Thu 21 Jul 11 at 15:04
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I've never had a spring snap on a car, even on my Renault Laguna's (which had a wonderful ride) but this Vectra seems to be a waiting game on when a spring is going to go.
Is it a cheaper steel that is now used?, one wonders.
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>> I've never had a spring snap on a car, even on my Renault Laguna's (which
>> had a wonderful ride) but this Vectra seems to be a waiting game on when
>> a spring is going to go.
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Not sure why they snap, presumably it is underspecified material or dimensions, but Vectra Cs certainly do have a reputation for spring snapping. I had one go on cavalier Mk3 at about 150K and an Omega at about 170K.
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>> Not sure why they snap, presumably it is underspecified material or dimensions>>
I read a while back that it was due to the chemical rutproofing treatment being banned by one of the bunches of do gooders that ban all things useful these days. The stuff used now is nowhere near as good.
Last edited by: Old Navy on Thu 21 Jul 11 at 17:28
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I heard it was due to the spring ends not being tapered where they sat in the cups ... to save money at the request of the accountants.
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The springs are breaking because they are suffering from fatigue failure. This means that there are small cracks growing in the metal, and, when one of these cracks becomes big enough to be critical,..... BANG.
This explains why so many springs break even when the car is stationary.
If you find a broken spring within hours of the break happening, you can see interesting detail in the fracture surface. Typically, you'll find a small thumbnail shaped area, maybe 2mm across, which is brown. This is where the crack began, and the brown is rust. The remainder of the fracture surface will be freshly broken, and so will have no rust on it.
In this regard, bumps in the road are simply the event which finally makes the largest crack become critical - the bumps themselves are not the root cause of the problem.
The idea of it simply being the end detail of the spring which is at fault is extremely simplistic, and easily shown to be nonsense. Pig tailed springs fail with shocking regularity too. However, a certain hat wearing motoring journalist has been perpetuating this myth for a long time.
So, the question needs to be more focussed. Why are these cracks beginning to grow? Why are they growing large enough to become critical and cause spring breakage?
I simply do not buy the idea that this is because of a cost cutting drive by manufacturers. If this were true, the problem would be limited to those manufacturers only. It's a widespread problem.
I also cannot entertain the explanation that the spring design is poor or incorrect. Manufacturers have known how to design long lasting coil springs for many years. It's incredible to imagine that they have all forgotten at the same time.
So, for spring failure to suddenly afflict a large group of manufacturers, the best explanation I can come up with is that some material or process which was traditionally used has now been banned or has become prohibitively expensive.
The candidate which leaps out to me is the banning of cadmium plating which protects the surface of the spring, and would be effective in preventing the cracks being initiated in the first place.
I don't have any absolute proof of the cadmium plating idea, but, it fits the facts better than the lazy explanations of "accountants", or "pig tailing".
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Could a contributing factor also be the deterioration of road surfaces, and the increase in recent years of speed ramps? It seems to me that a car's suspension has to work a lot harder on today's roads than it did even a decade ago.
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I agree that bumps and holes in the road aren't helping.
Where I grew up there were still a lot of cobbled streets, and spring failure wasn't epidemic!
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I still think the design of the suspension has an effect too, spring failures on Pandas seem very rare for example and they have a very simple suspension.
I would imagine modern sports suspensions with limited travel probably put a lot more pressure on the springs, but I am guessing.
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At the last but one service on my W124 Mercedes, the dealer noticed a broken front spring. Can't say I'd noticed any effect on the driving characteristics. Both front springs replaced for 250 Euros by the Merc dealer. Was a bit annoyed, but the car was 16 years old at the time.
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>> I would imagine modern sports suspensions with limited travel probably put a lot more pressure
>> on the springs, ...........
Springs don't get pressure put on them, they get load (or force) put on them.
Last edited by: L'escargot on Fri 22 Jul 11 at 09:14
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I still think the design of the suspension has an effect too..........
My last 2 BXs have not had a spring failure yet! :)
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The composition of road salt has altered from when I was young.
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>>Springs don't get pressure put on them, they get load (or force) put on them.
> The composition of road salt has altered from when I was young.
Oh well, if its pedantic morning then.
The source of road salt may have changed but not its composition, its currently not a composite.
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How - I thought it was rock salt?
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The stuff wot they put on our roads!
Some councils add molasses I understand.
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I do pity the poor moles!
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East Northants council appears to spread badgers on theirs.
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Spring has sprung - R.P.
