Welcome to the UK Window Cleaning Forums

Starting or own a window cleaning business? We're a network of window cleaners sharing advice, tips & experience. Rounds for sale & more. Join us today!

Suspension snapped

WCF

Help Support WCF:

For some reason springs these days just seem to snap. Seems to have nothing to do with weight as many cars are snapping springs too. I wonder if the process of manufacturing them has changed due to some environmental or H&S reason. 

Luckily they are fairly easy and quick to replace. 

Sorry to say but they don't make things like they used too ?
Cheap parts maybe?

 
For some reason springs these days just seem to snap. Seems to have nothing to do with weight as many cars are snapping springs too. I wonder if the process of manufacturing them has changed due to some environmental or H&S reason. 

Luckily they are fairly easy and quick to replace. 

Sorry to say but they don't make things like they used too ?
A lot of vehicles have plastic suspension springs sounds mad but it’s true 

 
For some reason springs these days just seem to snap. Seems to have nothing to do with weight as many cars are snapping springs too. I wonder if the process of manufacturing them has changed due to some environmental or H&S reason. 

Luckily they are fairly easy and quick to replace. 

Sorry to say but they don't make things like they used too ?
Oddly not so easy on older cars though - at least not the expensive ones. I have an old renault - one of several and the springs on that are still good. To be fair they are kinda like lorry springs lol but they were the same on the other cars i had.

I think these days manufacturers are not interested in quality. The lower the quality the more they sell with more frequency.

It may be but most are manufacturer fitted springs!! Maybe they are cutting parts quality to boost profits but it wouldn't help their reputation!
The thing is as one company lowers its standards the rest can then follow and once that happens the quality of parts slips too. The customers have a limited choice as to who they buy from so if they all drop their manufacturing standards it doesn't matter does it. Decades ago cars manufacturers were on a mission to prove themselves to their customers. These days they seem to be on a mission to ramp up the turnover and the lower the quality of parts, the more they sell.

If the engine remains reliable people don't tend to moan about everything else around it that need replacing.

 
The potholes I've seen on the west side of Scotland are way bigger than the usual potholes they let the things get really big before  repairing them some must have been up to 50cm in diameter. 
West side doesn't have a motorway so the main roads take a battering which the tourists realise. Working on a dual carriageway all round the perimeter of Scotland but it can cost £10 million a mile so it will take a long while as the focus is on the A9. Anyway I'm away out catching out on my windy run, have a nice day all.

 
We didn't have coil spring breakages in Africa and some of those roads were 100 times worse than the roads here.

Citroen started to have coil spring failures in 2003. If the spring broke at the bottom it slipped over the shock mount and damaged the tyre. So Citroen UK did a recall and fitted spring arrestors to some models, the Berlingo was one but only covered limited chassis numbers.

My son has them on his 2002 Citroen Berlingo. I've just replaced a broken front driver's side spring on his van. I need to turn the van around and replace the other side as soon as weather permits. I'm sure the reason for his spring breakage was the top mount bearing had seized.

Our motor factors has a shelf the length of his store room devoted to replacement springs. 20 years ago he never carried a single spring. He said that the main spring manufacturer was in Scandanavia and the quality has dropped due to mass production. They blame the harsh winters and bad roads for the problem. Citroen's (and presume Peugeot's) problems were with new vans, maybe a couple of weeks old, so the harsh winters had nothing to do with corrosion and failures. In fact, we had a few brand new springs replaced under warranty fail a second time - genuine parts.

My son has my old Citroen Xsara estate. I had that car for 5 years before passing it on to them. I replaced both front springs twice. In 5 years I didn't even do 10k. Last spring breakage was in Sheffield. I had to trailer the car back home as the broken spring was sitting on the front tyre. I had roadside recovery with a company using Green Flag. I didn't know the company had gone into liquidation a few days before and my roadside assistance wasn't worth the paper it was written on.

2 years ago the wifes car was waiting in the MOT parking bay when both myself and the MOT inspector heard a bang. He said that's your car failed MOT then. Yes, it was our car I had completely checked over and prepared for its MOT test the previous day. Apparently it wasn't the first time it happened.

Strangely enough, the majority of spring failures, (not all) occur when the vehicle is stationery - parked up. For us most of the springs that broke were on the driver's side, whereas it was the nearside droplinks that failed first. Strange.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Oddly not so easy on older cars though - at least not the expensive ones. I have an old renault - one of several and the springs on that are still good. To be fair they are kinda like lorry springs lol but they were the same on the other cars i had.

I think these days manufacturers are not interested in quality. The lower the quality the more they sell with more frequency.

The thing is as one company lowers its standards the rest can then follow and once that happens the quality of parts slips too. The customers have a limited choice as to who they buy from so if they all drop their manufacturing standards it doesn't matter does it. Decades ago cars manufacturers were on a mission to prove themselves to their customers. These days they seem to be on a mission to ramp up the turnover and the lower the quality of parts, the more they sell.

If the engine remains reliable people don't tend to moan about everything else around it that need replacing.
I don't think it had much to do with the manufacturers either. I believe its because the quality of engine oil has improved so much.

In Africa we used to do high mileages. An engine would start to smoke at about 80,000 miles. It was usually rebored and put to work again. No one expected more than 40k from a Mini engine. Most mechanics blamed the engine and gearbox using the same oil. The last car I had in South Africa had 160km on the clock and the engine was still spot on. That was a Ford Sierra 2.0 and I bought it across to England with me.

Springs. The spring is formed when the material is red hot and then should go through a process of slow cooling to temper the springs correctly. Apparently this major manufacturer of springs, which supplies a lot of motor industries, has been speeding up this tempering process to reduces costs. It could also have to do with the quality of the steel they use. British Steel used to produce some very high quality steel, but since they don't exist now, the source of the steel is no longer available.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
@Den since you posted about this I have been a bit spooked and loan behold I heard a bit of noise from the front drivers side so went to my local garage they put it on the ramp and the spring is snapped he said it looks like it's been like that for a while,

Strange you say that I said as about 5 weeks ago I did a turn in the road then parked up and looked down the road and there was a piece of coil spring in the road,

dread to think what would have happened if it went whilst driving at speed fully loaded, soonest I can have it done is Wednesday. 

 
@Den since you posted about this I have been a bit spooked and loan behold I heard a bit of noise from the front drivers side so went to my local garage they put it on the ramp and the spring is snapped he said it looks like it's been like that for a while,

Strange you say that I said as about 5 weeks ago I did a turn in the road then parked up and looked down the road and there was a piece of coil spring in the road,

dread to think what would have happened if it went whilst driving at speed fully loaded, soonest I can have it done is Wednesday. 
Glad you noticed in time ? dread to think what potentially what could have been. 

Had both my front springs done about 18 months ago. 

 
Glad you noticed in time ? dread to think what potentially what could have been. 

Had both my front springs done about 18 months ago. 
Years ago when I worked in a garage we went out to a breakdown the front coil spring had broken and gone through the tyre good job they weren’t driving fast at the time .

 
Years ago when I worked in a garage we went out to a breakdown the front coil spring had broken and gone through the tyre good job they weren’t driving fast at the time .
This happened a few years ago to my wife’s fiesta again pulling off my drive ?

 
The outside is tarmac and my drive is flat with lean shingle think the pothole and badly maintained rural roads that heavy farm machinery use is more of the culprit ?
I was just joking ?

Just goes to show across this post, that coil springs are iffy and we can be driving around completely unaware that are cracked or snapped we could all be driving around for weeks totally unaware, 

I am tempted to go out today and potter on with some jobs with just half a tank, although we are due heavy rain for most of today and tomorrow, but I don't want to create a bigger job which will be more money to fix or end up having an incident and having to get the van recovered. ?

 
Are you guys overloading your vans?I've never heard of anyone snapping a coil spring....

I did snap the torsion suspension bar on my old kangoo going over a speed bump too fast...I'd only had the van 2 days!I'd not even put a tank in it!ended up buying a back axle online and got my local garage to fit it....

 
Are you guys overloading your vans?I've never heard of anyone snapping a coil spring....

I did snap the torsion suspension bar on my old kangoo going over a speed bump too fast...I'd only had the van 2 days!I'd not even put a tank in it!ended up buying a back axle online and got my local garage to fit it....
Not overloading but near to the mark most mornings but obviously gets lighter during the day plus I fill up in the morning literally just before we leave. 

 
Back
Top