The Stovebolt Site Forums The Parking Lot '60-'66 Trucks Rear Coil Springs

Hello All-

I am removing the coils springs from the rear of the truck. One of them is really worn out, so I am replacing both. The floor of the bed is totally removed so I have access from above and underneath. Armed with a jack and jack stands, what is the safest way to go about removing these? I know this could get dangerous so your help is appreciated.

Not a real dangerous job like front coils can be. Just support the frame ahead of the axle and use your jack to hold up the rearend. Do one side at a time. Spray lots of penetrating oil on the bolts first. The bolts that hold the brackets on could be rusted in place. Mine were. I used new bolts and bracket kit from CPP along with new springs on my 67 gmc. Nice to install your new springs with new hardware. If your bracket bolts are really stubborn you could cut the old springs and brackets out with a gas ax or angle grinder. Oops. Almost forgot. Pull off the shock on the bottom mount. It'll let the rearend hang better and take the tension off the spring. Have fun.

Just did this job. I used a nut splitter to crack the old rusted nuts off of the bolts and then used a hammer to whack out the bolts. Gotgasd is totally correct....go to ACE hardware and buy some new Grade 8 bolts and nuts, about $1 for bolts maybe $0.5 for the nuts...what's on there now has to be nearly rusted ruined.

I swapped the springs in my Suburban in about 15 minutes.

I spent over an hour trying to get the spring bolt out of a truck in a junk yard... it was rusted INTO the trailing arm, and wouldn't budge. Strangers felt so bad for me THEY took turns swinging the hammer!

Front springs are dangerous because they're captured, and one of the sides won't move (the top of the pocket) and it wants to force the lower control arm down, and are always under tension.
Rear springs aren't captured: when you put jack stands under the frame rails and the rear tires are off the ground, the coil springs are being stretched--there's no stored energy there.
Jack the truck up and put jack stands under the rails.
With the jack under the axle housing, apply enough lift to the housing so that the springs aren't stretching any more. Put just a liiiiiitle upward pressure on them, so that they are very, very slightly compressed, and remove the bolts. The upward pressure will keep the bolt threads from supporting the rear end housing as you remove them--it just makes taking the bolts out easier.
once the bolts are out, slowly lower the rear end housing--it'll just lower from the springs... no muss, no fuss.

-Brad