Rear spring spacer/insulator question.

69427

The Artist formerly known as Turbo84
Joined
Mar 30, 2008
Messages
2,972
Location
Clinging to my guns and religion in KCMO.
Anyone know the specifics of what the spring insulator material is between the batwing and the spacers above the spring? I don't have either the spacers or the insulators, but the spacers look easy enough to fabricate. I'm mainly curious what the insulators are. I've kicked around using some stainless shims for insulation, but I'm just curious what the factory used.

Any help is appreciated. Thanks.
 
Apparently, if I understand correctly, whatever the original insulator shim was it's no longer available. So, any suggestions for a somewhat durable material that will withstand the compression of being sandwiched between two pieces of aluminum (the batwing flange and the spacer)? Stainless steel is my fallback material if something better doesn't pop up.

Thanks.
 
when you buy a VB and P fibreglass spring for a C3 you get two pieces of a black plastic to replace the thickness of an original steel spring . One goes hard up against the bottom of the diff housing so they must be ok with the heat .

I would try maybe seeing if vb and p could sell you some or at least try to find the equivalent ???

its way lighter than stainless !!!!!
 
when you buy a VB and P fibreglass spring for a C3 you get two pieces of a black plastic to replace the thickness of an original steel spring . One goes hard up against the bottom of the diff housing so they must be ok with the heat .

I would try maybe seeing if vb and p could sell you some or at least try to find the equivalent ???

its way lighter than stainless !!!!!

Well, the two stainless shims are only going to be 1" x 2", and about .060" to .080" thick. Ounces at the most.
 
The VBP urethane spacer on top of my VBP plastic spring is about 1/2" thick and 4-5" long and about 4" wide sounds like just cut one in 1/2 and done....:thumbs:
 
Finally occurred to me that I've got some insulators in the C4 suspension under my '51 Chevy pickup. The truck's torn apart at the moment so I decided to borrow these parts, and just replace them (with something) down the road. The insulating material looks similar to bakelite, or something along those lines.

IM002558_zpskznv9rvd.jpg
 
Additional thermal resistance?

I'm doing some rearranging of the rear spring aluminum spacers seen in the picture in the above post. While I've got them out, I'd like to somehow increase the thermal resistance/insulation of the shims. I've thought of giving them a coat of flat black barbeque grill paint, top and bottom, to give several interface layers of reduced heat conduction ability. I'm open to other better suggestions though. I'd like to hear other ideas if available.

Thanks,
Mike
 
Some BBQ paint or header paint may be your most economical choice. It seems the higher temp rated ceramic paints don't come in very small quantities and are quite expensive. We've experimented with some in the past here at work and they don't have much shelf life either. ITC Coatings makes some high temp ceramic paints, but you're looking at about $50 a pint.
 
Some BBQ paint or header paint may be your most economical choice. It seems the higher temp rated ceramic paints don't come in very small quantities and are quite expensive. We've experimented with some in the past here at work and they don't have much shelf life either. ITC Coatings makes some high temp ceramic paints, but you're looking at about $50 a pint.

I looked around the garage, and found some VHT header paint. On the front label it had ceramic in big letters. I thought, Hot Damn, I'll try that. I put a couple layers on the spacers, and right before the last coat I was looking at the small print on the back, and it said its "special formula" helps dissipate heat. Well shit, I'm not interested in dissipating/conducting heat, I'm interested in insulating from heat. I sat there for a moment, thinking what dumbass would formulate header paint to efficiently conduct heat? The only thing that made sense was that the desription was purposely stupid/erroneous so that the casual buyer would interpret it to mean this paint helps "dissipate" heat out of the engine compartment (by insulating a major heat radiator). But, not knowing which definition the label was supposed to mean, I said screw it, and put two layers of bbq black paint over the header paint. So, whatever the final insulative value ended up being, I'm reasonably sure it was better than the bare aluminum of the spacers.
 
A ceramic by nature is an insulator, so I think you're correct in their marketing jargon being a bit off. I hope it works well for you, you could always verify what it's doing/not doing with an IR thermometer.

This reminds me that I need to take apart my gas Weber and clean/respray the inside to re-insulate it to protect the finish on the outside...
 
Top