gfnk357

I'm going to be going through my suspension doing repairs and have a couple questions about springs. The stock gxe springs on my car have 224,000 miles on them, the ride is pretty harsh (bad struts and bushings), and the car is about 1.5 inches low at each wheel from what it should be. I don't know how long the springs should last but I'm thinking about replacing them, my first question is about the length of the springs when they are on the car. I had the front drivers tire off to repair a flat and measured the spring to be about 9 inches long, this seems pretty short to me since they should be about 16 inches when disassembled. Does anybody know how long the springs should be when the struts are assembled and there is no load on them? My second question is about my extra set of springs, they are used gxe springs with about 130,000 on them. The coating on the ends of the springs is coming off and there is some rust on where the coating has come off (it appears superficial). Is the rust something that I can just clean off and recoat or is the rust a safety concern and I should just get another set of springs. Thanks for the help.