Well, I have gotten both the old leaf springs off, the new ones in (multi-leaf) put the tires back on and went to torque the bolts down and discovered I have huge gaps between my shock mount/leaf spring plate and the cradle for the springs (that is welded onto the axel). Both the old springs and new ones are 5-leaf but the new ones I bought from Classic Industries are about 3/8" thicker than the ones I took out. I bout the OER springs and spring replacement kit from C.I but either the rubber pads are too thick that came in the kit or the 3/8" difference between the old and new is too much. I'm sure someone who has replaced their leaf springs from Classic Industries has ran into this before and i was looking for suggestions. I overtorqued the shock plate trying to get it to 60 ft/lbs and bent the s#$t out of the plate because of the gap...and the fact I wasn't paying attention. Any suggestions? ...does anyone run with one or both rubber pads out? do I accept the gap and not torque it to 60 ft/lbs?
I don't have the upper either, but I also have lowering blocks with a tapered protrusion at the top to act as a locator into the bracket. Don't think the spring center bolt has a large enough diameter at the top to positively locate the leaf in the bracket. Maybe take the metal bushing out of the pads and put it over the top of the pin before you drop the rear over the springs.
They are meant to quell vibration, but most do not notice a difference without them. They probably don't do squat anyways once they decay, so shouldn't be worse than what you had before.
P.S. If you remove the upper pad altogether, it will raise the car the thickness of the pad. The lower will not affect ride height.
I had the same issue with my car & found through my PHS docs that my car came with the sport handling package. These came with 4 leaf springs instead of 5. I installed the 4 leaf springs & everything bolted up perfectly. I also purchased the 5 leaf springs from CI.
