Looking for suggestions on new leafs

I plan on running caltracs on this 72 I am building but they will be homemade... One thing I considered was running a piece of hose over the sleeve that contacts the leaf spring - idea being give it some sort of cushion vs metal to metal... Will have to see how that all comes together once I get them built and mocked up, may not be necessary if they have any preload. Have not heard of them being an issue banging around or being noisy...?