I've not yet had the pleasure of removing the main spring from a girder fork. But can anyone answer a couple of questions please?
What is the free length, and how can I tell if it has a permanent set? I don't even know how compressed it is when on full rebound.
The WD manual looks like the entire fork must be removed and taken apart to change a spring. Is that so?
I have two girder fork Nortons. When parked in the shed, the springs both measure close to 7 inches. I don't know if that tells me anything about the free length.
Tired Spring
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Original Length
I have what I believe to be an NOS WD16H spring - it is 'Service brown' with a dab of red paint at one end...Free length is 8.5"
With the bike on the rear stand, I measure 'about' 7" too. It extends a little if the front is lifted.
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Thanks both. I'll leave them…
Thanks both. I'll leave them for now...the fact they measure 7" confused. I have other things to do.
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Rebound springs.
Bearing in mind what a fight it is to get the rebound springs on...or the other way round, it's probably not surprising that the spring has a lot of compression when resting. The critical change is probably how much it settles under the weight of the bike.
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A really tired spring will cause the mudguard to hit the bottom of the steering damper under full compression. This was happening to my CS1 when acquired a few years ago. I couldn't find any spring data either but after talking to Paul Savage in Redditch decided to have a new spring made with a free length of 222mm (8.75" near enough). I don't know if that is correct but it worked for my bike. Paul used to advertise in OBM but I haven't seen any of his ads recently. There are other spring suppliers in the Redditch area. I have forgotten the detail but I don't recall removing the forks to change the spring. Certainly wheel and mudguard off, followed by removal of the upper spindles & links. I think the top clip had to come off to release the spring, in which case I must have devised a way to prevent the forks dropping out of the frame. If you want to carry on using the bike while you have the new spring made I would be happy to lend you my old one as a pattern.
Cheers, Ian McD