Thought these were almost a thing of the past but rudely reminded of the fact it can still happen. So does anyone have a good guide to replace a front spring or at least get the shock off before I just start taking things to bit :-)

Thanks in advance,

Fitz.

Hi

It happened to me with a MKIV Golf. I think it's common enough if you keep them long enough. Rust is what kills them I hear.

There is a good guide here http://www.myturbodi...t-Jetta-TDI.htm

Some of the web site requires registration but there is plenty of worthwhile stuff there.

HTH

Edit: for grammar.

Edited 12 September, 201213 yr by FriendlyFire

I hope you have access to some decent workshop equipment - you will need a spring compressor and depending on the age of your car the ARB drop links will be a pig to get undone if they are rusted up. If I were you I would get new ones just in case and cut the old ones off.

The strut can be a pain to get out of the hub as well - ideally you should use a press, or you will need a big hammer and give the hub some welly (not really recommended as the correct way to do it).

If it was anything like mine, the long bolt that goes through the hub and the retaining flange on the strut will be quite rusty as well - I am going to replace these bolts when I fit the B12 kit in a couple of weeks.

I was told it was down to the open lower end causing a stress concentration in the spring and it was common. Had one go on the 1U.

One of mine snapped at the top, it went with a right bang

Mine seem in pretty good condition on inspection.

They'll be coming off shortly when a new suspension set up is fitted, so depending how long you want to be without the car, there could be a few sets of springs in good condition going cheap from the people in that GB.

Thanks everyone for the tips. Well I have jacked the car up and its not a pretty sight. The spring has snapped about half way down the coils length and the lower half has dropped below the bottom cup and is wedged onto the wheel. There looks to be quite alot of cosmetic damage in and around the bay area so I think i'll be dropping it off at a garage in case there is any more items that need replacing. Gutted is not the word as the actual spring itself is in really good shape (apart from being in two pieces) with no rust what-so-ever.

fitz.

Edited 13 September, 201213 yr by Fitz323

Any pictures of your spring?

It'll look just like yours! Only in two bits. (Note no ha ha).

Getting hold of these isn't too easy either. Not in a hurry anyway. All the motor factors etc just have the "normal" 2.0TDi springs. A few places have also mentioned they don't hold them and they are police spec!!!! Does that mean that police forces who run non vRS cars have these springs on them for all the weight they carry about?

It looks like the spring may have been snapped for some time too as the picture shows some rusting on the coil where it has snapped.

Edited 13 September, 201213 yr by Fitz323

I did this job over the weekend. Was my first time doing anything with the wheels off apart from 'doing the brakes'. 

 

The job was a PIA but regardless I'm glad I did it. 

 

However, to try and save someone else some time I will try and give a few pointers. This is a long and winding post, but 10 minutes reading this might save a relatively inexperienced person a few hours of grief. 

 

My first mistake: thinking I had all the necessary bits and pieces - I went to start the job and realised I did not have the 24mm socket for the dodecahagonal axle  bolt (12 sided). So it was off to the motor factors for that. 

 

The following Saturday I started out in earnest again, following these two guides:

 

http://forums.vwvortex.com/showthread.php?3043490-Springs-installation-DIY-for-06-07-Rabbit-!!!

 

and 

 

http://forums.vwvortex.com/showthread.php?3012010-2006-MKV-GTI-suspension-install-DIY-with-pics-%28fronts-only

 

Pretty quickly I made my second mistake: to remove the droplink you will need an M6 Spline bit which is held in place while you loosen a nut using a ring spanner or similar, at first I used a torx bit, then after finding the right size spline bit I was turning the spanner on the nut, while turning another wrench with the spline connected at the same time. The result was that I stripped out the the spline opening on the droplink (strut to anti roll bar link). I then spent an hour with a grinder and a dremmel getting the droplink off. Luckily Mrs RJ was in town at the time and picked up another droplink from the motor factors.

 

Long story short: hold the spline bit stationary and let the spanner do the work - be patient. 

 

Do not be tempted to do the job without a trolley jack to help with the weight of the hub, if possible have a friend give you a hand. 

 

Also, you will need torque wrenches to cover 15NM to 180 NM

 

Torque measurements can be found here

 

http://furmanka.blogspot.co.uk/2006/11/spryny-instalacja-springs-install.html

 

You will need the tools outlined in the above guides or similar. For the top of the strut I used a long 7mm hex bit/allen key, I also used 21mm spark plug which needed a 24mm spanner to turn it (I used a crow's foot spanner so I could get the right torque setting). If using a spark plug make sure it has notches for a spanner - seems obvious but my toolkit came with 3 spark plugs - one with notches, two without (i.e. the other two are completely cylindrical, so you can't get a spanner on their bodies).

 

As shown towards the bottom of the page here (someone else demonstrating how to do it)

 

http://forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?t=387469

 

I used hub puller, as opposed to knocking the axle out, which I thought had less risk of damaging the splines inside the wheelbearing housing and keeping the hub puller on the hub, with its handle connected, seemed to make the hub a bit more manoeuvrable during the job. 

 

To get at the strut you will need to remove the windscreen wipers to remove the plastic cowling - you will need a windscreen wiper puller -  I had a 'heavy duty' that  looked like a claw/fair ground candy grabber and it snapped while doing this job, I replaced it with a laser 1793 ball joint separator (not sure if I can name a particular brand according to briskoda rules?) anyway it did the job superbly.

 

OK so once everything was off, and the strut disassembled and reassembled with the new spring on, and the spring compressors removed, I took the following approach (after much time scratching my head and realising that 'reassembly is the opposite of assembly' wasn't working for me at all): 

 

I had the strut resembled and tightened as much as I could while the strut was not on the car, but then put the strut back into the car to torque up to the correct spec - be aware that you must tighten the nut at the top of the strut sufficiently before decompressing the spring (removing the compressors) having the spring explode or the top of the strut mounting explode could be life changing, so get it as tight as you can using hand strength before decompressing. 

 

I had the hub connected to the control arm by the three bolts - not with nuts tightened.

 

I had to remove my hub spreader tool which was a big bolt on type, as it was getting in the way. 

 

I used my trolley jack to lift up the hub slightly and manoeuvred the hub to just under the strut - I then had to put my spreader tool back in (you may have a less bulky tool that does not require being removed and put back in) I then tried to lift/jack the hub (bearing housing) up further onto the strut with no joy.

 

So I got some WD40 and sprayed where the strut needed to go into.

 

Then I unscrewed the strut from its mounting to the car body and dropped it quite easily into the wheel bearing housing. 

 

I removed the spreader tool and torqued up the pinch bolt to its correct torque.

 

Then I put the trolley jack under the hub and raised the hub sufficiently so I could pull the control arm down and release the hub from the control arm (i.e. pulled the 3 bolts way).

 

I then moved the hub out the way (towards me), keeping the trolley jack  a few inches under should I not be able to support its weight. 

 

While the hub was pulled towards me I pulled and centred the axle at the back of the hub, ready to go back into the hub/bearing housing. I then raised the jack a little to take the weight of the hub once I had let the hub go back towards the car. 

 

I then raised the strut back up so I could mount it to the car body, take your time and check the three strut mounting holes are aligned with the holes in the car  body. I didn't raise the strut all the way, just enough so I could get the bolts through the openings under the bonnet/cowling and get them to meet with the openings in the strut - you can;t raise the strut too high or there is no wriggle room to align the bolts and holes - this is where a friend comes in handy, trying to hold the strut in place from underneath while put in the bolts from the top was awkward. Anyway I connected the strut back up to the car body.

 

Now this was where I was concerned - it didn't seem as though the splined bits of the axle end would go back into the spline opening of the bearing housing/hub. 

 

I did not want to force it and damage the splines. This was my first time doing this, so I was a bit cagey. 

 

I went and consulted the internet and came back to it. 

 

I removed my hub puller so I could see what was happening by looking through the hole in the middle of the hub. I cleaned the splines - they will need to be clean, any gunk will make life difficult. I got the angle as best as I could offering up the axle from behind; pulling it towards the hub - not with great force. Then even though it didn't look as though the axle was coming through, I looked through the hole in the middle of the hub while rotating the hub. I could see that the splines on the axle were rotating in place with the hub, meaning they were 'caught'. I then pulled the axle from behind as much as I could (which didn't seem to do much) but then I pushed the hub with both hands and the axle seemed to come through a bit, I pushed again and the axle came through a bit more - with a few pushed it seemed to be flush. 

 

Then reconnected the control arm to hub by the three bolts - it looked like the bolts would never line up when the control arm arm was lowered away from from the hub, but once I put the trolley jack under the control arm and levered it up, they aligned just nicely. 

 

I then connected the droplink - very carefully!

 

I put the cowling back, and reattached wiper. Double checked everything was torqued up correctly - including the axle bolt (which required Mrs RJ to apply the brake while the car was jacked up (actually on axle stands) and once the car was down on its wheels, the axle bolt got another half turn. 

 

Car taken for test ride, didn't fall apart. 

One of mine snapped at the top, it went with a right bang

 

Happened to me, massive bang. Just the top of teh coil that went but it fecked the top bearing as well.

 

You're supposed to replace them in pairs btw.

 

I didn't but then I knew I was selling the car.