broken o/s/f spring

[bat30]

Im not a happy bat today!,last night some little oink ripped the rear wiper arm off the car! and of course it caused damage to the whole unit which meant a trip to the dealer this afternoon!,that cost me 40 quid in total!.However worst was yet to come because i asked them to give the car a visual health check whilst it was there and the car dissapeared into the service bay,(for two hours!!!).When it came back again there was play in the osf tie rod and the osf spring was actually BROKEN!!,great,the dealer wanted to charge me a total repair cost of £336.95p!!!!!,and thats just boggo vauxhall springs! because they only change them in pairs the repair bill seems to be gargantuan!,does any body else know where i can get it done cheaper and do you have to change springs in pairs or are they just trying the rip off tactics that dealers are known for?...

[marky2027]

I presume the car is not in warranty then?? I had one snap a few weeks ago and had both front springs and shockers changed under warranty. Common problem unfortunately and they are usually replaced in pairs. Some people on here swear by Eibach springs which you can buy from LMF to replace VX springs.
If you do end up getting the dealer to do it make sure they order the correct springs because my local dealer fitted the wrong ones and it looked like I had my ride pimped. Took a lot of persuasion and help from this club to get them changed!

[bat30]

no the warrantys ran out its a 54 plate,to be honest i thought id broken something back in december when i drove into works yard one morning and over a speed bump something went crack and "doing doing",since then the cars been through an mot and all over the uk with no problems!,it does wallow around though so i suppose the dealer just confirmed my fear!

[Dan_BlackSRi]

As above, they should be replaced in pairs - its not a difficult job to do yourself, you can save yourself loads that way - a full set of sports springs, £100 - £150 and a tie rod end is about £15 - fit yourself, then get it aligned at a garage, that's over £100 saved straight away, plus your car will look/handle better and you won't have to worry about the springs breaking again !!

[Turbo Gav]

I had 2 broken fronts and one broken rear yesterday when I lowered mine..... took about 1.5 hours to do all 4

[Hideous]

Exactly the same as mine recently, came back from service and the exact same parts as yours had gone.
I would have got "Eibach" springs, but they lower the car further. I'm not interested in that, because Sri is low enough as it is for me, and when you lower it you often don't get very good life out of your tyres due to negative camber. Been there done that.
I just got the Vx Sri springs for £140 and skipped vx labour rates I just hope the new set are better than the first junk that was on there.
I had no idea the spring was broken by the way - was driving fine with the broken spring :S

[Readster]

I had 2 broken fronts and one broken rear yesterday when I lowered mine..... took about 1.5 hours to do all 4

Is that the record for spring failure on one car?

[brifen]

Im not a happy bat today!,last night some little oink ripped the rear wiper arm off the car! and of course it caused damage to the whole unit which meant a trip to the dealer this afternoon!,that cost me 40 quid in total!.However worst was yet to come because i asked them to give the car a visual health check whilst it was there and the car dissapeared into the service bay,(for two hours!!!).When it came back again there was play in the osf tie rod and the osf spring was actually BROKEN!!,great,the dealer wanted to charge me a total repair cost of £336.95p!!!!!,and thats just boggo vauxhall springs! because they only change them in pairs the repair bill seems to be gargantuan!,does any body else know where i can get it done cheaper and do you have to change springs in pairs or are they just trying the rip off tactics that dealers are known for?...

Like whats already been mentioned, Vx springs are shockingly BAD!! Find the 'Poll' on the site asking who has had broken Vx springs and you'll see (iirc last time I looked it was sittig at about 72% had ) So if you do pick up new Vx springs you can just expect the same. They should be changed as pairs too.

You can lower the car without any detremental effect to tyre wear, all you need do is get a quality 4 wheel geomitry alignment done (about £60), well worth doing a week or two after fitting to allow new springs to settle in. You can also get these LINKY! to help.

These springs here LINKY! come highly recommended by lots of people on the site inc myself. If you want to go the whle hog and do the shocks too then these LINKY! Blistien B4 front and rear are highly recommended. The springs will lower normal card by about 30mm but will only lower sports suspension cars (SRI) by a 15mm as the SRI's sit 15mm lower as standard.

My advice would be to get some new springs (atleast) then have a local garage fit them, probably 2 hrs labour any more and they are milking it. Would expect a good garage to only charge 1hr as it is not a hard job.

When I read your post I took it that it was your inner tie rod that has gone and not the tie rod end?? If it's the tie rod end you'll be looking at about £12 - £15 and if it's the inner tie rod then Vx do a kit for this for about £40. Although not an necessity but if changing the inner tie rod then you may want to stick a new tie rod end on too.

HTH,

Bri.

[Johnsdutton]

Try eurocar.com for parts, I have just had Bilstein front and rear shokers delivered for 16£166:38.
I reckon I saved about £100 compared to other quotes I had.

[Hideous]

The vx replacement parts are often better than the originals fitted. They do learn from the failures.
I wouldn't worry about it happening again if like me, decide that the OEM parts are the best bet.