Leaf Spring Help ASAP !!!!

[SamRiley]

Friday night I was filling up an empty tank with E10 and on the way out of the station found that I had lost two leafs off of one of my leaf springs. Barely made it back in the driveway since the wheel was grinding against the inside of the wheel well. Here is the kicker, I just replaced these springs last season. What I did back then was call the marina (3A Marine), give them the bolt to bolt measurement, spring configuration and leaf count. In speaking with the same tech (who I trust completely) he has never seen anything like this before. We are now thinking of putting in a heavier set of springs just to be safe. Any thoughts on this or my situation in general? I am getting way too good at getting my rig on blocks :(

[Jim Miller]

Wow Sam!
Lucky you didn't dump the rig on the highway. :eek:
I've had the bands, that hold the spring plates, rust out. I had them replaced when I noticed. Not sure if the spring plates would of fallen out or not.
Glad to see you caught it .... before something really bad happened. ;)

[moxie]

Hi Sam, Good thing you saw the problem when you did.
I have replaced a few sets of springs, and I have never seen this
mounting method. The "U" bolts should have faced up, around the axel,
and the plates over the springs, sandwitching the springs between the
axel and back-up plate.

MOXIE

[SamRiley]

Well the new springs are in and have 200 issue free miles on them. Good catch on the bolt orientation moxie. When I replaced them last year I was sure to put them back exactly as they had been installed by the previous owner... blind leading the blind :rolleyes:

Problem was the plate didn't quite fit on top given how the axle was mounted. Small bump with the grinder to the plates fixed that though and they are now installed on top, keyed in to the springs.

The other old spring looked fine and I don't see how the plates could have had anything to do with the failure and neither did the distributor. These springs were rated 4,200#, well beyond the weight of my rig, including the trailer.

Fingers crossed...