MORRyde Upgrade - Spring and Equalizer Hanger Width

[StephenO]

Hello All

I tried searching for this information on the forum, but came up dry....

I was reading a discussion on the 'old forum' about after doing the MORRyde upgrade, finding that the spring hangers are wider than the springs themselves. The discussion went on to saying that if you don't compress the hanger with a C-Clamp before doing your final torque, that you may not have actually torqued the nut properly to the shoulder of the bolt. As @Cate&Rob pointed out in that post (assuming that the Cate&Rob 'over there' is the same as 'over here' ) that the nut torques to the shoulder of the bolt and not the hanger.

So my question is, what is the proper measurement that the hanger should be 'compressed' too?
- Should the outer width be the length from the shoulder bolt head to the threads, which according to the spec sheet below, borrowed from the Grand Design parts lookup page is 2.32"?
- Looking at spring hangers you can order online, the inner width between the hangers ends is 1-7/8", so is that the proper measurement?
- Should I just measure the outer width of the hanger before taking the spring out, and just compress the hanger back to that measurement? (This is my current plan BTW)

Thanks all!

[Cate&Rob]

Hi Stephen,

The spring to hanger fit is "sloppy" at best on most (all?) trailer suspensions. Comparing this to how these parts are properly fitted on vehicles . . . is discouraging at best.

I have never heard of compressing the hanger with a C clamp . . . but then again . . . I have not be on the "old" forum since I was a moderator there, several years ago. By the time the nut gets to the shoulder of the shackle bolt it will have easily compressed the hanger to its final width. This is still far from being a proper fit to the spring/bushing, but it-is-what-it-is.

This can get more complicated if you are installing reinforcements (called V clips) inside the hangers because if this is not done correctly, the hanger will not compress enough to let the nut torque against bolt shoulder . . . but, I don't think this is part of your plan.

BTW, the nuts are very unique. They are torque retaining "crunch" nuts with a smooth surface on the flange side. This is specifically so that they torque against the bolt shoulder and not the hanger. Similar looking nuts with a serrated surface on the flange side will torque against the hanger and be unwound and long gone after a few miles. Also, torque retaining nuts should only be used once.

This is definitely the "abridged" version of this discussion. As you have found, there is much more on both forums . . . but if you have any questions on anything posted in either place by "Cate&Rob", best to ask it over here .

Rob

[StephenO]

Thanks Cate&Rob for clarifying that. With your additional information, I will likely just take a pre install measurement of the hanger width, and after everything is torqued down, measure again to ensure I am in the same ballpark.