Insight rear springs

[julian]

Standard Insight rear springs allow bottoming-out on roughish roads.

Daewoo Matiz rear springs are a direct drop-in replacement. Same free
length, slightly stiffer.

If changing to them, make sure you also swap over the rubbery plastic
sleeves that slip over the bottom few Honda spring coils. (Otherwise
there's lots of boooiiiinnnng noises!)

Rear of car rides a little higher (perhaps 20mm or so) but bottoming-
out is substantially reduced. Here in Australia, springs were AUD$30 a pair
from a local wrecking yard.

The improvement in handling from the slightly stiffer rear springs is
quite pronounced. As expected, less understeer. There's a smidgin of
throttle-off oversteer but it's small.

The trade-off in ride comfort
is zero - the stiffer rear springs might be expected to give a worse
ride but without the rear bottoming-out, in fact the ride is far
better than standard. The rear dampers could now be a touch stiffer
(the car feels a little under-damped)but the standrad dampers are
quite acceptable.

Julian Edgar

[b1shmu63]

Wow Julian, thanks for that find. Does the car ride higher, perhaps a tad?

[tubesguy]

This is great info, but for us in the States, it looks like there is little hope of finding the springs. I googled Matiz, but it's a small car that doesn't appear to have ever been marketed here.

I'd beg someone in the appropriate part of the world to scrounge a pair for me, but the shipping costs would probably be prohibitive.

Again, though, thanks for the heads up. - Pat

[Insightful Trekker]

Indeed Daewoo came and left the north American marketplace very fast.

A call to your local recycler (junk yard) is likely to be hung-up on beliving it to be a prank call.

HTH!

[The Citrus Smoothie]

For information, Daewoo were taken over by General Motors and the cars are now badged Chevrolet in Europe. Nevermind...I doubt they are selling them next to the standard Chevy's in the USA...if you want a quiet chuckle see:

http://www.chevrolet.co.uk/

[julian]

I think that the piece of the springs plus shipping to the US would still be quite low compared to other approaches.

[IamIan]

well I recomend running the numbers....

Porky <rangeman1@verizon.net> had some custom springs made for his Insight to do the same thing, but were made specifically for the Insight by a company that does this all the time they increased the spring load / rear weight by 35% and do not change the ride height at all...

In April of 2006 Porky was still selling them for about $250 total for the custom made spring including shipping anywhere in the U.S.

We know the cost of the brand new custom made spring..... What is the Number of U.S. Dollars for the used Daewoo Matiz alternative??? Crunch the numbers and see what the actual difference is.... A Quick search on line I was not able to find Daewoo Matiz Rear Springs anywhere to buy... So I can't crunch that until I find a Price for them and shipping.

Just an FYI unless you know a much much much cheaper way to send the springs....

FedEx estimates if sent Monday Oct 9 could get a 10 Lbs package from Australia to the U.S. by Oct 16 for ~$225 .... With custom made brand new spring being shipped anywhere in the US for $250... after the shipping cost that leave ~$25 to buy the springs with before you just break even with getting the brand new custom made ones.... so the ONLY way it would make any sense at all is first if you can find a much much much cheaper way to ship them.

[julian]

[shrug]

Using Australia Post, and giving myself AUD$10 for the trouble of going to the wrecker, I work out the following amounts, which include both freight and the price of the springs:

Australia Post International Post - US$91
Australia Post Air - US$87
Australia Post Sea - US$65.

I don't want to tell you guys which end is up but I would have thought that US$65 was a lot less than US$250.

Work it out for yourself:

http://www1.auspost.com.au/pac/int_parcel.asp
http://www.xe.com/ucc/
Wrecker spring cost: AUD$30 a pair
My fee: AUD$10

[tubesguy]

Julian -

Wow, and I didn't end up having to beg ... hardly at all. Sign me up, if you would please, and let me know how to work out the details with you. You can PM me, if you'd like, or reach me at: tubesguy _at_ gmail _dot_ com.

Again, thanks for doing the homework on this and being the guinea pig. - Pat

[julian]

I've emailed you, tubesguy. There seems to be a bit of a rush on Matiz springs at the wrecker but I think that right now there are two pairs there.