While prepping the trailer for the Tour of the Great Northwet, I saw that the leaf spring on the right (passenger) side of the trailer had some issues.
From all appearances, the longest leaf on the passenger side spring had slipped out of the stack and moved toward the rear of the trailer. I suspected that the bolt that holds the stack of leaves in the center had rusted away or had come apart in some other manner.
Driver side spring showing position of last leaf
You can see in the picture that it extends beyond the eye and is bent upward. Inspection of the spring on the drivers side showed no such slippage.
Passenger side spring, showing location of last leaf
So I decided I had better do something about that before it got any worse. “Do something about it” entailed dropping the suspension from under the teardrop, removing the springs from the axle and having replacements made. While I was about it, I figured I’d replace the shock absorbers.
My biggest worry was the 65 years of rust and corrosion holding those nuts onto the bolts. I could just see simply not being able to break them loose and having to cut them free with a cold chisel or “nut buster.” I posted my concerns on the TnTTT forum and got lots of tips, ranging from torch them off, to use a penetrating oil. Two penetrating oils were recommended, all the machinists recommended Solvoil, and all the auto mechanics recommended PBBlaster. A trip to my local hardware store found that they had PBBlaster in stock. I’ll take that, thank you.
I followed the recommended protocol, spray the rusty bolts and let them sit a day, spray them again and let them sit another day, and spray them a third time and apply the wrench. To my amazement the bolts came loose with no problems. That’s not to say it was easy. I used a 6-point impact wrench socket on a 26″ breaker bar and all my strength. But it worked and eventually every bolt came loose.
Here’s the suspension on the garage floor after removal from the teardrop.
Suspension removed from the teardrop
Once all the bolts were removed, it was time to get the offending spring on the bench so I could measure it. I found lots of sites on the net that would make new springs for fairly reasonable prices, all I had to do was sent the measurements and specs.
Spring bracket with shocks in background
Once I got it disassembled, I realized that the spring was intact, the bolt was OK and there was no sign of looseness of the leaf or any problem I could detect. I decided I should compare it to the driver’s side spring. They were simply different. The teardrop, when it was built, was made with two different leaf springs.
I decided that I’d use the existing springs as is, but would replace the shock absorbers. One shock was just a piston sliding loose in a cylinder. There was no damping or resistance of any kind. Turns out that wasn’t as easy as I hoped.
I took the shock to the oldest auto parts store in Fremont. They shook their heads and referred me to the largest auto parts house in town. There I found a young counter guy, who after many questions like “what year car is that from,” “and when was the trailer built” got a ruler and we measured the compressed and extended lengths and he set about finding an equivalent in the paper catalogs. I haven’t seen paper catalogs in the auto parts store in decades, but these guys had them and this guy knew how to use them. Unfortunately his search was futile and we didn’t find an equivalent. We found a couple where the lengths (compressed and extended) would work, but they were rated for five to eight times the weight of the teardrop.
So in the end, I opted to reassemble the suspension and leave the shocks out completely. They were serving absolutely no purpose except adding weight so I figured that it would be the same as no shocks at all.
I tested my hypothesis but towing the teardrop up to a friend’s house near Jackson CA, over some bumpy twisty roads and the trailer handled exactly the same as it had when there were non-working shocks installed.