How the heck am I to strighten this thing?

[irnsrgn]

to cold work a leaf spring to either re arch or de arch takes a press capable of overbending past center over a narrow block made special for that purpose with emphasis on using a spacer under the center to control the amount of overbending. Over the years I have re arched and de arched thousands of springs for car dealers, truck and trailer repair places and car builders, restorers and a lot of other applications also. I use old D-8, D-7, D-6 and D-4 caterpillar springs for press blocks to span the bottom of my hydraulic press table, with 80 tons of pressure a 1 1/8 by 6 inch D-8 spring will flex 3/16 of an inch in the 10 inch opening between the lower table channels, I just had to be careful when it was cold , altho I never did break one of the D-8 springs.

[Alan B]

Luke,
For my power hammer I inverted one spring on the other and clamped them tight. Then put a hot collar on each end to hold the springs together. This straightened it out about 80%.

[tecnovist]

A Big Hammer Works

[Little Forks Forge]

Originally Posted by tecnovist

I have straighten a lot of leaf springs some 60mm wide by 6 or 8 mm by useing a BIG hammer 13 pound and a real large Block of hard wool 700mm high 600mm wide--- have some cord / rope to stop the spring from going onto orbit. if you hit it worng or it brakes in 2 ---
--I then sharpen about 6 inches of the side of the spring steel tool that is 600mm long to make a hammer slasher for cutting cars up ---I hit them with a 4 pound hammer to cut panal steel and the like ---I tip water from a plastic coke Bottle onto the hot part to stop up setting the temper..as i sharpen them with a 7 inch grinder.. I have the gringer in one hand and the water Bottle in the other.... I have a Roveing Vice on one 44 gallon drum and another 44 gall drum to put the grinder on.. I have Holes slashed in the top of the drums , some were for the water to go stops me getting wet--

--to add ,,Make shore eveyone has a hard hat on ---

I have a mental picture of this that is way far out!

[Neal L]

I went to a spring shop once an saw them arch a spring using a hydralic press bending a short section at a time. Maybe one could be straightened using the same method. I also remember them heating the spring to punch the hole for the center bolt. They let it air cool in front of a large squirrel cage fan

[bruce wilcock]

to resett heavy loco springs the spring smiths used to warm them in the tempering ovens back to the tempering heat then hammered the bend into them over a slot in the swage block then dropped them into the oil ,same if a spring was wanted flat

[stretch]

Actually you can staighten a spring by hammering only on one side. Make sure that when you hammer that the under side on the anvil is flat so the blow is solid with no bounce. They used to recurve springs by hammering them only on one side. Springs used to straighten out with use so they had to recurve them. A lot of the old blacksmith shops had forms that they had to be recurved to. I have done it on some planer blades and it works. Have not tried on springs because have never had to staighten them without heat. It is loud and might take a few minutes, it does work though.

[Blackbeard]

Hmm seems to me it would be easyer to heat and straighten and then forge and retemper it isnt all that hard to temper 5160.
Bb

[stretch]

I tried my method today and here is a 1/2" X 2" hot rolled steel bar hammered on one side 50 times. A couple times it wasn't right flat on the anvil when I hit it so it jarred me a bit, so this is not all it would do with 50 hits. If I had hit square 50 times it would have been more. It is deflected 9/16" . It went faster than I thought.