leaf spring difference

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mtandrews

mtandrews

beware the Ides of March
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is there a difference between the springs of /6 and V-8 cars? My car is a /6 car that's being transformed to a V-8 car (as we speak) with the leaf spring relocation kit to boot. Are the spring rates different? Does it really matter on a 100% street car?
 
mtandrews said:
is there a difference between the springs of /6 and V-8 cars? My car is a /6 car that's being transformed to a V-8 car (as we speak) with the leaf spring relocation kit to boot. Are the spring rates different? Does it really matter on a 100% street car?
Click to expand...

Not per say, The 340, 383,440 cars usually came with 6 leaf springs and I guess you could order HD springs on models back then but I'm not 100%.
 
I agree with Cammando66... if you order the 6 leafs you will have to drill your front mount to a 5/8 as the heavy duty comes with a larger diameter bushing in the front. Not a big deal and you will need the larger bolt also.
 
I have a related question. I have an early 64 Barracuda. It's a factory 273 2 bbl. 4 spd car that came with a 7 1/4" rear & 9" drums. Basically it's like a 6 cyl. car with a V8 put in it at the factory. Waaaay back in the mid 1970's one of the leaves on the right broke so we went to the salvage yard & got a set off of a '65 Barracuda that had a Commando V8 & heavy duty suspension, but wasn't a Formula S. After swapping them onto the car we noticed the car sat higher on the left side. We found that the front segment of the main leaf on that side was bent. We disassembled the spring pack & replaced that leaf with the main leaf from the set (non heavy duty) that had originally come on the car. At the time, as far as I can recall, the spring sets looked the same except the heavy duth set had 1 more leaf than the standard set.

So....the car now has a set of '65 heavy duty leaf springs except the main leaf on the left side is from a standard set of '64 V8 springs. What is the chance that the main leaf from a heavy duty set & a standard set would have the same spring rate? I never noticed any problems but I was only 16 at the time so I probably had other priorities.
 
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