I have dropzone struts and springs. I jacked the front end of my car up today and heard a loud bang. I looked and the left front spring was broken. It has one complete coil broken off on the bottom and it looks to be broken on the top also.

I have to work this afternoon and there are no other cars to drive. My mom's Xterra is being fixed and my dad is out of town with his car. Is there any way I can put the stock springs in without any special tools??? I need to be able to drive it to work.

My mom drove my car yesterday and hit a pothole on that side, but that shouldn't break the spring. I am really starting to hate my car.

 

you can go to Auto zone and do the rent a tool program.....rent the Strut Spring compressor.....this is the only way I know you can get your stock spring back on in the least amount of time.

 

Damn

-1 for Dropzone

 

^^^ I agree,

either that or towing to a shot and telling them you need them to work on it now, but I'm sure they'd try to charge you a ridculous amount, but an Idea none the less

 

Yeah towing would be alot for me, I live about 15-20 miles from where I would need to get it fixed. When I had my car towed before, it was $45 to tow it maybe three miles.

Is there any way to compress the spring without a spring compressor, I have no way of getting into town.

Now I need to find some good spring with a 2" drop.

 

Oh yeah I have been hearing clicking while turning over bumpy sections, I've been thinking it was the exhaust making the noise because it is loose, but I guess not. I looked again and it actually has 2 coils broken off on the bottom and one on the top. That means the spring is in 4 pieces

 

thats not safe to drive on, I dont know if the struts themselves are strong enough to support the car without worry, they might be assuming point A to Point B is a compleltely bumpfree surface.

you might need to take today off or take a cab, I'm not sure if rush job on replacing the springs is any safer than driving on broken ones.

 

I don't know whether I should go with Tien S or Sprint now.

 

I tried to get the strut off and It wouldn't come off. The bolts were it mounts on the suspention arm (bottom part) were starting to round off even with the right size wrench. The shop must have put them on real tight.

I was able to get through to my dad after a couple of hours and it looks like he will be back in town in time for me to get to work! He is downstate at an auto auction getting a suburban to pull the snowmobiles with. The Xterra just doesn't have enough power. So that means that while my car sits waiting for parts I should be able to drive his Maxima and he drives the suburban. Here is the car I will get to drive



At least theres one benefit to my car breaking

 

wooowww. the pic of this dropzone spring should be a sticky!!
thats dangerus!


BTW that blue maxima is hot!

 

Your dad has a nice Maxima

 

Does anyone know how I could contact Dropzone? I tried to see if they have a website, but all I could find where stores that sell their stuff or skydiving sites.

 

how long have you had them?

You should contact them and tell them their POS springs rusted and snapped.

 

That sucks!!! I guess you get what you pay for.

 

I've always said, cheap springs have poor ride quality and believe it or not, poor handling characteristics. That break now shows how poor quality can lead to a very dangerous situation. Imagain if that broke while you were driviing.

The springs are a very important part of your cars suspension system. Good quality springs are not very expensive, therefore I can't understand why people don't spend a few extra bucks and use a quality spring over a cheaper spring that makes the car look good. Looks / drop over quality and performance doesn't make sense.

 

Dropzone =

 

Wow! From the pic it looks as though the spring just rusted right through. Definitely won't be using those springs any time soon!

 

And from that pic, there is no argument that can be made to suggest that these springs are quality. The cheap metal used leads to the cheaper price. That's just crazy.

 

What's that have to do with anything? Those are both quality springs...

 

 

WOW. How long have you had that setup on your car? It doesn't seem like it's super old or anything, just crappy.

 

Those springs were on my car for nine months. Not very long. I got a number to contact dropzone, so I'll call them this afternoon and see if I can get my money back or something, but I bet they will probably just want to send me new springs.

I liked the ride quality my setup had, but this really pisses me off. Even though it is a cheap spring, it should not break. It would have been really dangerous if I didn't catch that.

 

Wow I've never seen that before. I've heard of mid and late 80's hondas often breaking a spring coil after like 10 years, my old honda even had one, but for a lowering spring to rust through after 9 months is rediculous. Probably just a bad batch of metal, or a defect confined to that single spring, but it shows alot about their quality control either way.

BTW are those Advan Kreuzer V's on your dad's maxima?

 

Wow, that's bizzare... sorry to hear about that.

I see there's a little line of rust that runs along one face of the springs though... is it possible the coils were binding up and maybe that's what caused the failure (crack/fatigue-->rust-->break)?

 

I got ahold of the company and they said email a picture and proof of purchase and we'll send you new springs. Looks like I'll be running dropzone again. Hopefully is was just a defective spring and wont happen again.

Nealoc187 - I'm assuming your talking about the wheels? Those are HSR, they are sooo light weight, it is shocking.

 

Is your dad a member?

Neal, I agree that its an imperfection in the metal. Still, my opinion of the low quality of Dropzone remains.

 

no he's not a member. He's too busy to spend time on here or working on his car. I usually end up washing it for him and doing all his maintence stuff.

 

lol jk

good thing you werent on the road when this happened or else you would have really been

to get the bottom bolts off its a size 17mm i believe or 19?? i jsut know its not a even number sized bolt. try an impact wrench, if you cant afford to get one go to like home depot or sears and buy an electric one, use it then return it

 

Your dad's 4th gen is the mad hotness. Damn...

 

The bolts are 17mm and the nuts are 19mm.

 

brokezones

 

That is what happens when you buy springs made in Miami, FL

 

Wow..


Same thing happened to my stock FR spring while I was going about 20MPH 45 seconds from my house. Got lucky on that one. Atleast it justifed putting in Eibachs.

 

Forgot to mention that if you would've boughten spring compressors when you originally did the install you'd have no problem fixing it now. Instead you spent money renting them the first time, now the second time, and eventually more. Buying tools to due the job right is imperative. Unless it really is a one-time tool.

 

WTF. AutoZone rents spring compressors for FREE. All you gotta do it pay a deposit so that if you run off with them they wont lose money, when you return the tool you get that deposit back.

 

Well, we don't have Autozone around here. And if you have a situation like this you'll obviously have to bum a ride to the store. Besides the rented ones are always in bad shape. If you really plan on never touching it again buying isn't warranted. I admit, I thought I wouldn't need them again but my intrest really grew. When I needed them again I went out and invested the $35 in a quality set of Sears spring compressors. They'll last me forever and they work much smoother than rentals. Good tools truely are investments.

 

I actually didn't install the suspension, a shop did it for me. I came home from spring break and my car was lowered. My stuff came in and my dad had it installed for me as a gift. I will probably rent a spring compressor this time to do it myself and not pay anyone.

Should I get an alignment after I get it fixed? It will be the same drop, but could the spring breaking throw off the alignment?

 

yes you should get an alignment, any time you remove struts and springs you'll be in need of an allignment

 

OK, I got the shock off, just stuck a 4ft pipe on the end of the wrench. The bolts were seized on, but they broke loose with enough force.

Now my problem is that I can't figure out how to get this black triange shaped piece off the top. It seems to be stuck and I can't figure out how it comes off.


If I took the strut to a shop, could they tell me if it is blown or not? I don't want to put it all together just to find the strut needs to be replaced too.

 

If you do maintenance for your dad, did you also install the VLSD tranny in his car, or did he buy it like that?

And is that a stock color for a '97 or is it a paint job?