Coilover Springs/Towing a trailer engine wear.

[jacobcallaghan]

Hello,

First off i would love to give a huge shout to Jeff at GemVW. So far the engine has been amazing. He built me a stock 1600 and it cruises nicely. So far have gone 5k miles no worries

Second. I just purchased a motorcycle today. A 1980 honda xl500s. It weighs about 300 Pound. I plan to tow it with a small harbor freight trailer. This leads me to two questions.

My bus is an early 1970 sundial hightop conversion. It has a little bit of but sag and with the added weight of the trailer i thought it might be nice to add coilover springs. Im confused on whether this is a good idea. I have read through some threads and it seems people have mixed results. Will it be to much wear on my mounting points? I would like to have my but sag fixed!

Second question is about engine and towing. I expect my trailer set to be around 500 pounds. Will this tax my engine heavily and wear my bus substantially over time? I baby the bus and drive quite slow not working the engine too hard. I plan to do the same with the trailer.

Thanks for the help!

[vwwestyman]

The proper way to fix your sag is not coilover springs (I cannot really comment on whether they will be good to use in general or not) but to readjust your rear torsion bars. Get a set of fresh bushings to go along with it.

I'd tow the trailer and not worry about it. It might cause a little more wear. (Though probably not really a ton over the life of the motor, pushing a high top brick down the road will be the biggest cause of wear!) But so what? Does it increase the fun of all those miles? Then it is probably worth it! I say what's the point of owning these things if we can't have fun driving them?
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Dave Cook

President, Wild Westerner Club

1978 Champagne Edition Westy, repowered to '97 Jetta TDI
1973 Wild Westerner
My Thing

[busdaddy]

[Abscate]

You can roughly estimate the increased engine wear by the drop in gas mileage. I guess it will be in the 10-20% range at most, not worth worrying about and easily worth the Zen
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.ssS!

[Manfred58sc]

There is nothing wrong with the coil overs, I prefer that ride over altering the spring plate position ( and the fore mentioned squirrely-ness ). If you over load the inside of the Bus with coil-overs on you could rip the upper shock mount, otherwise no issues. You can tow a 500 lb load safely, its already slow so you won't notice much. Get a tach and make all RPM decisions based on that information. I keep it at 3300 as much as possible, with occasional "rap ups" to 3800-4000 when accelerating.
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Fat chick owner/operator

[WhirledTraveller]

I ran coilovers for a while then re-indexed the torsion bars when I switched to Koni's.

Didn't notice a big improvement doing it "the right way", the coilovers worked fine, but it was nice to check and replace the bushings while it was apart.

Incidentally, they are now gathering dust so PM me if you want some lightly used ones for cheap.
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1977 Westy, Automatic. Big Valve heads, CS Cam.

[SGKent]

considering the number of folks here who get the torn-sheet-metal-where-the-top-rear-shock-mounts syndrome, I would be hesitant to rely on coil overs for ride control. That syndrome is a real PITA to repair.
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“Most people don’t know what they’re doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.” - George Carlin

[TomWesty]

[SGKent]

[TomWesty]

[danfromsyr]

some pics of a torn rear shock bolt

https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=685886&highlight=torn+shock+mount
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[Manfred58sc]

I blew out both sides before I put the coil overs on, I was hauling heavy,heavy stuff for work on regular basis long distances. I'm sure I over loaded it dozens of times. The fix is not easy, I super reinforced and double sleeved it. I've run coil overs on stock set ups that were not so abused and they did not blow out the top shock mount. Trail bashing is hell on the rear suspension, period.
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Fat chick owner/operator

[SGKent]

[WhirledTraveller]

Those pictures are not a result of running coilovers. They are a result of bottoming the shock *absorber* running over a loose railroad track, transfering a tremendous shock load (no more absorbing). One might argue that coilovers with their added spring rate *might* have prevented the shock from bottoming out and saved the mount.
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1977 Westy, Automatic. Big Valve heads, CS Cam.

[SGKent]

[Manfreds78bay]

I re-indexed and put coil overs on with good results. I was towing a small trailer 3k miles and had no ill effects thus far.

FYI i have a 2.0L. She sits perfectly. I would listen to the guys and not depend on coil overs to fix a saggy butt. However, i think the coil overs are a great idea with a trailer and high top setup.

If you are worried about excessive wear on the shock mount, I would swap them out when you are done with your towing.

However, i think that you could only benefit from the coil overs with the extra weight of a high top.
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1978 2.0L FI Campmobile

1982 AMC Eagle SX4 4.2L FI

[TomWesty]

[mattlockwood]

[Abscate]

[NASkeet]