Fellow Knucklebusters,
Keeping all the helpful advice in the back of my mind I tackled the
front spring shock change last night. It all went as smooth as predicted.
After getting the first spring out I placed the compressor on just tight
enough to take all the loose threads out and compress the assembly slightly.
Even though the clamps were as close to the end as possible there is still
alot of spring left. Just as someone mentioned when the nut came off the
shock, the rubber went flying to the ceiling but the spring went no where.
When doing the other side I put a considerable more compression on the
spring before taking off the nut to the shock.
As pointed out by Mike the new springs did not need any compression as
they are basically the same size as the shock. This is good as the
uncompressed original spring is over 2 inches taller when measuring the free
length. I was glad not to have to squeeze all that back down using the
cheezy but effective VW compressor ($16). It will be much easier working on
these in the future as no compression tools will be required!
Of course I had to check it out last night and went to the old test road
near my house. It's a winding hilly road crossing several streambeds and
lots of 30 mph curve signs. Most of it has trees overhead so at night its
like going through a dark tunnel never knowing when a deer will be in the
path. The car never felt better. With the 330# springs on the front and the
Koni's at 3 (front and back) there was very little if any body roll. Going
downhill into corners the nose did not drop and get that GT6 feel like the
back end might pass you. Now it seems glued to the road. I was hitting some
of the dips pretty fast and even though the front end is lower the 175's
were not hitting the wheel wells. In fact at speed I was not bottoming out
as I did with the old setup.
I would highly recommend offing the stock springs to anybody with a GT6
as the handling is so improved you won't believe it's the same car.
Thanks for the tips,
Richard
71 GT6 MKIII KF166L
ps Loosening the trunion does make that last bit of clearance easier to
find.
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