Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

[John M.]

Seems the accepted paint for rear springs has become obsolete! Getting ready to change either entire spring or just the main leaf. Have the complete unit on the way from Eaton which will be uncoated and wondering what others are using to get the original look on the leaves. My shopping trip netted a can of Rust-oleum "cold galvanizing compound" (778530) which claims to be 93% pure zinc. I also have some weld thru primer which is zinc rich but not enough of that to do much in the way of coating all of the leaves. Do any of you have experience/advice on a coating that will suit the purist and provide protection for the bare metal spring? Appreciate any tips or sharing your wisdom as far as an acceptable coating. Thanks much!

[Edward J.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Seems the accepted paint for rear springs has become obsolete! Getting ready to change either entire spring or just the main leaf. Have the complete unit on the way from Eaton which will be uncoated and wondering what others are using to get the original look on the leaves. My shopping trip netted a can of Rust-oleum "cold galvanizing compound" (778530) which claims to be 93% pure zinc. I also have some weld thru primer which is zinc rich but not enough of that to do much in the way of coating all of the leaves. Do any of you have experience/advice on a coating that will suit the purist and provide protection for the bare metal spring? Appreciate any tips or sharing your wisdom as far as an acceptable coating. Thanks much!

John there was a recent post on the coating you want to use, my thought was it was about the only choice as the the light gray primer used by most is just not the true color. Post some pic.s when your done. I myself would like to see and sure others here.

[Tom E.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

What about the Quanta Rear Leaf Spring Grey? I used it and it seems to be holding up quite well. I cleaned, primed and top coated with it about a year ago and it looks the same now as when I completed them.
Tom

https://www.gastanks.com/Rear-Leaf-Spring-Gray-Paint/productinfo/28%2D02A/

[Edward J.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Tom, I have the quanta paint on both my 63 and 72, they went thought the judging ok, it’s just I know the color is not correct since the original color was between the leafs before I restored. I am going to redo both the cars at some time since it’s been 10 to 12 years for both cars.

[Tom E.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Ed,
Your probably right as the original paint was still between my leaves as well and it was a different shade from the Quanta paint . I just figured it had aged as has the rest of the cars finishes.
Thanks Tom

[Gary C.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Ed,

FWIW, springs are painted an assembly, not individually.

Gary
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[Larry M.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Ed,
Your probably right as the original paint was still between my leaves as well and it was a different shade from the Quanta paint . I just figured it had aged as has the rest of the cars finishes.
Thanks Tom

Original coating was not paint. It was a zinc coating applied with mitt or brush to help prevent rusting and to provide lubricity. It was called Ionaklad.

Larry

[Gary C.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Larry,

Ionaklad was only applied to the exposed services after the spring was assembled per the attached screenshot.
Inoclad Grey Color Rear Spring Coating Instruction.jpg

Gary
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[Patrick H.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Gary,

Two items,

First, I don't see anything in that screenshot about applying after assembly. As we have yet to see one where the paint was applied post-assembly with paint covering the plastic liners, I don't believe that is correct.

Second, that spec is an early one mentioning that it was applied to the tension side and the edges. I believe this was later revised so that all sides received a coating.

Patrick

[Gary C.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Patrick,

It's very possible that I'm not correctly recalling at my advanced age. LOL

Franz Estereicher, who has great knowledge about the rear leaf springs, shared that info with me 20 years ago.

Interview with Franz https://www.eatondetroitspring.com/f...e-suspensions/

Gary Chesnut
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[Patrick H.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

I've had conversations with Franz as well.

[Gary B.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

???Second, that spec is an early one mentioning that it was applied to the tension side and the edges. I believe this was later revised so that all sides received a coating.??

Patrick,

The GM engineering drawing for the ‘80-‘82 HD rear spring states:

“Apply 3793118 primer (Ionaklad 200J or equivalent) on tension side of leaf #1 and sides of all leaves (can be applied to all leaves) min coating .0015”

Now, what does “sides” mean? Top side and bottom side? Versus the thin “edges”? Regardless, I suspect what the workers did was whatever could be done most quickly. If sprayed, then I suspect everything was painted. And I agree that the spring was not assembled when painted/coated. For the life of me, I can’t imagine the coating was applied by hand with a mitt to hundreds of thousands of springs.

Gary

[Alan D.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Gary,
Thanks for that link. Yet another mitt shot down!

[Don S.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

Posting these photos for John Murphy, this posts originator. See post number 1.

6CDC468F-B36F-4CC0-B0F8-7506438A77F0.jpg3E5861D6-7F4C-497E-ADAF-617C3C6A2059.jpg26BD1B69-0866-4915-AB8A-6E5DE1274D3A.jpgCCD629B7-3FF8-4F5C-9B5C-B5DA65333897.jpg

[John M.]

Re: Correct coating and color of rear spring leaves?

The springs pictured in the preceding post are an attempt to duplicate the spring coating mentioned by Franz in his interview concerning the two companies that manufactured C2 springs for GM. This represents those manufactured by the company who used a wallpaper brush to coat the tension side of their product with Ironclad Zink coating. The actual coating used here was Rustoleum Cold galvanizing coating. Hope this answers any questions from this thread, and thanks to all of you who responded. The spring pictured was from Eaton, and was uncoated with anything when it arrived so there was no cleaning of whatever they formally put on their springs to protect them and was difficult to remove. Just a light glass beading was given to these so the coating could adhere to the spring as well as possible. We sprayed them first and than brushed over the last coat to look as if a brush had been used as per the recording in this thread.