Thread: re-arching your leaf spring tech

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Cold arching gives you a temporary "fix", but to get it more permanent each leaf is annealed to remove hardness and the "set" of the spring, re-arched as needed, then re-tempered to "set" the shape memory back in the metal. Gotta have an oven to do it hot, or you can mess up. How long does your cold arch process generally last before the spring starts working back?

Hi Roger,
I'm a bit low $,always have been, a do it your self type FOR THE PASSED 70 YEARS. Was thinking there is a few out here in hot rod land that may not of ever seen this done. We had a guy at the race track that would redo your springs with big fricking hammer on a peice of RR rail right there in the pits,but ya didn't wish to stand anywere near him as he did that. He's nick name was "Jimmy The Leaf" at Hialeah Speedway in the 1960's.
Going too far though can mess things up,like with most anything we do!
I've built hotrods and raced stock cars starting in the late 1950' and it was done this way then,under race condishtions cold rearch would last pretty well,but to put a time exactly is a bit hard. I never had a spring go back completly to were it started,but they do settle kind of just like a brand new spring dose for first 50 or so miles+ and kind of stops and holds that for some years.
Yes ,hot and retemper is engineering right way in the books,but costly high tech way that works only if some one knows how to retemper ,other then a pro spring place/shop.