[SirAlec]

Delphi's are pretty reliable. i have used them till 85k kms.
its likely you were conned.

Was it ready to use or assembly type? If it was latter then the mechanic had poor skills in assembling them.

[msupercool]

finally i came to know what the problem was! it ware the coil springs. I replaced all 4 springs and its running fine now. There was a difference of almost 4inches in height between the old and the new ones.

[Chewbacca]

Originally Posted by msupercool

finally i came to know what the problem was! it ware the coil springs. I replaced all 4 springs and its running fine now. There was a difference of almost 4inches in height between the old and the new ones.

4 inches or 4 cms? It simply cannot be 4 inches.
Did you keep the old and new side by side and measure it?

[dhanushs]

Originally Posted by Chewbacca

4 inches or 4 cms? It simply cannot be 4 inches.
Did you keep the old and new side by side and measure it?

Should be in inches, as the shocks were 'bottoming' out and he could feel every bump, but the ride height should have also gone down.

Originally Posted by msupercool

No the height has not dropped down.

[Chewbacca]

Originally Posted by dhanushs

Should be in inches, as the shocks were 'bottoming' out and he could feel every bump, but the ride height should have also gone down.

Yes, the ride height should have also gone down too and that's what confuses me as well.

4 inches shorter = 10 cms = 100 mm shorter??? Let me tell you something about coil springs out of experiance. A soft suspension can be made hard by removing and coil springs and heating them in a furnace to almost red-hot temperature and then drop it in water. This reduces the flexibility of the coil springs and the suspension becomes hard which is much suited for high speed driving.
However this procedure does not increase or decrease the overall height of the coil. Even if the car is 10 years old the coils should stay the same length (+/- 1 cm is ok) It's more of the elasticity that changes with ageing. If coil springs were to reduce in height then all cars older than 5 years would scrape their bellies.

[Mr.Boss]

Originally Posted by msupercool

finally i came to know what the problem was! it ware the coil springs. I replaced all 4 springs and its running fine now. There was a difference of almost 4inches in height between the old and the new ones.

4 inches? man that is a huge difference. I hope the new one are stock size & you haven't intentionally chosen a bigger one.
4 inch difference in free state --> approximately 2~2.5 inch difference when fitted in the vehicle. So, nearly 50mm reduction in ride height. IIRC the actual ground clearance is 170mm, with the old springs it should be 120mm with this your vehicle should have kissed almost all humps.

BTW how much did you paid for the springs? OEM?

[msupercool]

Originally Posted by Mr.Boss

4 inches? man that is a huge difference. I hope the new one are stock size & you haven't intentionally chosen a bigger one.
4 inch difference in free state --> approximately 2~2.5 inch difference when fitted in the vehicle. So, nearly 50mm reduction in ride height. IIRC the actual ground clearance is 170mm, with the old springs it should be 120mm with this your vehicle should have kissed almost all humps.

BTW how much did you paid for the springs? OEM?

yes that is a huge difference. i checked the springs before buying and confirmed it with the retailer, they are original Accent1.5 gls springs. i was annoyed looking at the difference. The height of my car has increased now, ill put up the pics soon so can makeout the difference.
front springs costed me 850/piece and rear 950/piece.Yes these are OEM

Originally Posted by dhanushs

Should be in inches, as the shocks were 'bottoming' out and he could feel every bump, but the ride height should have also gone down.

yes the ride height had gone down but couldnt make out much because the car is mostly single driven and it has low profiles.

Originally Posted by Chewbacca

4 inches or 4 cms? It simply cannot be 4 inches.
Did you keep the old and new side by side and measure it?

It is around 4inches my friend i forgot to click a picture of the 2 springs side by side

[IndigoXLGrandDi]

Originally Posted by Mr.Boss

4 inch difference in free state --> approximately 2~2.5 inch difference when fitted in the vehicle. So, nearly 50mm reduction in ride height. IIRC the actual ground clearance is 170mm, with the old springs it should be 120mm with this your vehicle should have kissed almost all humps.

Same happened with our Indigo XL Grand Dicor.
While going over a bridge just after a slope (not incline), the car's belly scraped at the speed of @ 30 kph. I did not reduce the speed much thinking that the uneven road will not scrape the underbelly of the car. The Shock Absorbers were OEM which I replaced (only Front) after that incident. The car had run 1,26,000+kms then.

Now the car has run 1,31,000+kms.

EDIT:
The Ride Height (Read Ground Clearance) gets reduced as the Shock Absorbers get old due to usage.

[msupercool]

All four coil springs have been replaced with OEM's. im a bit confused now, the height of the car is more at the front, so it looks up from the front and down from behind. The front springs are taller than the rear ones. I asked the guy from whom i got them and he said it is supposed to be that way. i thought maybe after the engine weight the springs will get compressed little bit but the car is looking taller at the front also the gap between the tyre and body is more compared to rear. I need some help out here, im going crazy! my mechanic said it should get down to normal in a few days. just check out the pics and tell me. Is it that the coil springs are new that is why or what? also the front wheel is banging the ground when it goes in a pothole or over a speed breaker. PLEASE HELP guys

Note from Support: Not more than 2 smilies per post allowed.

[Aroy]

Originally Posted by msupercool

All four coil springs have been replaced with OEM's. im a bit confused now :. . . . Is it that the coil springs are new that is why or what? also the front wheel is banging the ground when it goes in a pothole or over a speed breaker. PLEASE HELP guys

If by "banging" you mean that the wheel lands hard, then it is a case of stiff shock absorbers.

In case the shock absorbers are dysfunctional (jammed), the front will remain higher, as the shock absorbers are acting like a bar and not a movable piston.

The best way to test is to push the front down hard (or sit on the bonnet) and then release it (jump off the bonnet!).
- If the front stays down and then slowly comes up, then there is extra stiffness. The front should come up fast and smooth without any overshoot or oscillation.
- If the front does not go down at all, you have jammed shock absorbers.


People do not realise that modern car suspension is a relatively complicated, and all the parts - spring, shock absorbers and bushes have to be in sync with each other to work. Any one component failure will drag the others down.

I suspect that the original problem was springs, which damaged your shock absorbers. Now that you have changed the springs, you may have to change the fresh shock absorbers damaged by the old springs.

[jeeva]

That's a neat Accent. Loved the alloys and wheels.
Quick questions:

1. Do you have spacers fitted at the rear/front?
2. Do you have an LPG tank at the rear?
   
   If the answer is a "no", then I too fail to understand how the height remains the same, inspite of busted coil springs. The coil springs do have a long life, unlike the shocks. I too own an Accent of similar vintage and had noticed something similar. The rear is sort of really low, when compared to the front. The suspension bushes, shock absorbers were all fine. Finally, I had to resort to 1 inch spacers at the rear to get equalize the height.

[sgiitk]

Originally Posted by msupercool

Oh yes it is a 2000 Accent GLS. But could you tell me what the problem was exactly? and what all did u replace then?

The problem was repeated damper failure. The last set did not even last 100km. So I complained, and the dampers were under warranty (3 months). After the complaint the dealer asked me to being in the car, Mr Khanna who is 80+ is arguably the best in town, his garage before Hyundai dealership was accepted as the best. So with the permission from Hyundai, he stripped the rear suspension and totally replaced all the parts. The removed parts were sent to Hyundai. I also got the front end dampers changed since they were also going (at my cost). I never could find out what exactly was wrong.

Drifter who was the founder of the ACI forum (and id now with another magazine) had stated that older Accents did have rear suspension problems. I could not locate the thread on ACI so cannot give you a link.

[theMAG]

There is a possibility that those were spurious parts. OEM parts generally do not fail this quickly, and in a batch.

[rjstyles69]

msupercool can you please post a proper side profile picture of the car. From the looks of it I don't see much of a gap between the tires and the wheel arches. Most cars do have a nose down stance, check the baleno in my garage. I dont know if my eyes are playing with me , just cant seem to make out much of a difference/ rather any difference at all.

Originally Posted by theMAG

There is a possibility that those were spurious parts. OEM parts generally do not fail this quickly, and in a batch.

maggie he picked up Delphi shocks when the OE one's went bad.

[msupercool]

Originally Posted by rjstyles69

msupercool can you please post a proper side profile picture of the car. From the looks of it I don't see much of a gap between the tires and the wheel arches. Most cars do have a nose down stance, check the baleno in my garage. I dont know if my eyes are playing with me , just cant seem to make out much of a difference/ rather any difference at all.



maggie he picked up Delphi shocks when the OE one's went bad.

Nice baleno dude. Yes even your baleno looks up from the front like mine. I will click a side pic and post it soon.

Originally Posted by jeeva

That's a neat Accent. Loved the alloys and wheels.
Quick questions:

1. Do you have spacers fitted at the rear/front?
2. Do you have an LPG tank at the rear?
   
   If the answer is a "no", then I too fail to understand how the height remains the same, inspite of busted coil springs. The coil springs do have a long life, unlike the shocks. I too own an Accent of similar vintage and had noticed something similar. The rear is sort of really low, when compared to the front. The suspension bushes, shock absorbers were all fine. Finally, I had to resort to 1 inch spacers at the rear to get equalize the height.

Thanks, there are no spacers and no LPG tank fitted in the car.Rather than height im more concerned about the wheel banging the ground, it makes a pretty hard noise after a pothole or a speeedbreaker. I guess il have to open the front shocks all over again

Originally Posted by Aroy

If by "banging" you mean that the wheel lands hard, then it is a case of stiff shock absorbers.

In case the shock absorbers are dysfunctional (jammed), the front will remain higher, as the shock absorbers are acting like a bar and not a movable piston.

The best way to test is to push the front down hard (or sit on the bonnet) and then release it (jump off the bonnet!).
- If the front stays down and then slowly comes up, then there is extra stiffness. The front should come up fast and smooth without any overshoot or oscillation.
- If the front does not go down at all, you have jammed shock absorbers.


People do not realise that modern car suspension is a relatively complicated, and all the parts - spring, shock absorbers and bushes have to be in sync with each other to work. Any one component failure will drag the others down.

I suspect that the original problem was springs, which damaged your shock absorbers. Now that you have changed the springs, you may have to change the fresh shock absorbers damaged by the old springs.

The rear is now absolutely fine the only worry is the front. you might be right on this that the shocks might have got damaged because of springs. But what if i replace my front shocks and the problem does not get resolved.It is like taking a chance. My mechanic had checked the shocks when we opened it up and he said its fine but i think we'll have to open it again. Im so confused.