Flat Springs on a 2019 377

[Overtaxed]

Finished up today. Nothing much to report, 2nd side went well. One of the bushings was totally gone on the 2nd side, I couldn't believe how much play was in the suspension when I lifted it and had the tires off. I could move it at least 1-2" just with hand force. Short version, it was more than time to do this (around 15K miles on the RV at this point).

Some pictures of the process, if anyone has questions, happy to try to help.

[Overtaxed]

[Redapple63]

Pictures are awesome. Great job. That is on my list as my rig has sadly suffered from this as well. But o gotta do one project at a time. In the middle of my electrical upgrade, but, I digress.

The very first picture your spring hanger looks crooked to me. Could just be the picture angle, but worth taking another look at.

Bill

[Overtaxed]

Thanks Bill, hope it helps others to get the right parts without a ton of searching.

I will tell you, those u-bolts, while absolutely ridiculously priced, are really nice bolts. They probably weighed double what the originals do.

I'll take a look, I see what you're seeing. I didn't notice it when I was under there, so hopefully it's just the angle of the picture. I wish there was an easy way to reinforce those hangers. I can't put any more x-braces in, I have stuff in the way (sewer) on the front/rear locations. I'm thinking about welding a brace in, but I'm not exactly sure how to do it (what to tie is back to).

I'll be curious to see what your bushings look like. I simply could not believe how bad mine were (and they were the "upgraded" brass bushings already). I'm going to pump grease in more often now, hopefully I can get some more time out of them. But 10-15K miles until you need to pull basically the entire suspension, press in new bushings and then put it all back together? That's a lot of work. I honestly wish they would put a really hard bushing in (stainless, for example) and let the wear wind up on the wet bolt. It's a heck of a lot easier to change a worn wet bolt than a pressed in bushing. I could do a wet bolt on the road under the RV in a park pretty quickly. Changing a bushing, I'm not doing that without access to a real shop.

[Hoopy Frood]

Looks good. I don't know personally, but I have heard that the Lippert Never-Fail bushings don't wear, and don't require grease. Maybe too good to be true? I've not read but one report about them, and they said they worked very well. I guess it's just a matter of old habits die hard.

[FlyStar]

Question: Did you “need” that hydraulic press to get the bushing in? I put one in using a c clamp. But I’m wondering if sometimes the eye hole would be too small for that and the bushing could end up out of round or something. Or maybe push it in with a wet bolt in it to help hold shape.

I’m thinking ahead to someday upgrading to heavier springs/axles and hopefully can pull it off without a hydraulic press.

Also. When replacing a wet bolt that would not take grease I discovered that there was no bushing at all in the spring eye. This is the one that I pushed in with a c clamp. So. Kind of planning one day to drop the other 3 spring attach points to see if any other bushings are missing. And would hope to be able to get them in the eye hole with my c clamp.

[Overtaxed]

Question: Did you “need” that hydraulic press to get the bushing in? I put one in using a c clamp. But I’m wondering if sometimes the eye hole would be too small for that and the bushing could end up out of round or something. Or maybe push it in with a wet bolt in it to help hold shape.

I’m thinking ahead to someday upgrading to heavier springs/axles and hopefully can pull it off without a hydraulic press.

Also. When replacing a wet bolt that would not take grease I discovered that there was no bushing at all in the spring eye. This is the one that I pushed in with a c clamp. So. Kind of planning one day to drop the other 3 spring attach points to see if any other bushings are missing. And would hope to be able to get them in the eye hole with my c clamp.

While I didn't do any without the press, it certainly didn't seem like they were in THAT tight that you'd need 20 tons to push them out. I have one, so I used it, and it did make the job really easy, but I'm sure you could do it without one.

If you were going down that route, I'd go to Lowes and get a bolt the same size as the wet bolt (9/16's?) around 3in long. I'd use that bolt to drive in the new bushing with the c-clamp. The wet bolts work, but up by the head they have those teeth that tear up the bushing. My workaround for this was using the shackle, but an easier way would just be to have the right sized bolt available. Also, since a bolt from Lowes won't have a zerk on it, would be much easier to get a c-clamp (or hammer) on to push it through. The press made it a super easy job, I pressed them all in <10 mins. But no question it's not necessary for this job, just a nice to have.

Definitely do not push those bushings in without something supporting them internally (either the wet bolt/shackle or as above, go get a bolt of the right size). It's a soft metal, you'll bend it out of round, no question, if you try to push it in unsupported.

The bushings in the equalizer, that's a different story. I did one of them yesterday, it was pretty torn up. "Maybe" it's doable without a press, but it would have been a job. It wasn't easy with the press, those are in there much, much tighter than they are in the springs.

The more I think about this, the more I think this is just a poor design. There are lots of joints like this on farm equipment, they are never brass/soft bushings. They have a hard surface (steel) and the pin is another surface (more steel). They depend on external lubrication instead of a joint designed to wear. I really think that these should probably be the same way, steel/steel vs steel/brass.

[BadDogPSD]

I've had good luck putting bushings in the freezer for a couple days prior to install. Shinks them down just enough to make installing much easier.