Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Maintenance & Servicing Replacement Rear Springs +4

Well I can only pass on my recent experience with my +4. Make of it what you will…..

My car was in for warranty work just before Christmas so I had the original saggy springs replaced with 4 seater 4 leafs based on the recommendation that they could afford me extra ground clearance. That was appealing to me and given that the spring rates between 2 and 4 seater UK manufactured springs are the same so the ride quality should be the same too. On the face of it this made good sense. However I only managed a single 20 mile drive with 4 seater springs fitted before having them replaced.

Well I guess the recommendation was good from one perspective. They do offer extra ground clearance but unfortunately I’m very picky and found the ride and handling compromised. The car spent too much time sat on its rebound rubbers for my liking. Those are the rubber strips bolted to the chassis under the axle.

The difference between 2 and 4 seater UK springs is really just the camber. The extra chamber does give the extra height but it has another effect too. It increases the suspension’s bump travel which might be perceived as a good thing on a Morgan but at the expense of reducing the extension travel. And that for me on my car was a bad thing and compromised the suspensions performance. I believe on a Morgan around 10mm is the recommended min extension clearance at static height between the rebound rubbers and axle. On inspection with the 4 seater springs there was zero clearance on my car. I couldn’t even get a .025” feeler in the gap. There was another issue too. The axle u-bolts nuts were able to contact the chassis at full extension. Not something you would necessarily notice without checking nor something I wanted as I have read that the long term hammering effect of the nuts on the chassis has been associated localised chassis cracking. Whether true or not I didn’t want to take the risk.

The first image is of the new 4 seater spring fitted. You can see the result of the extra camber by the proximity of the u-bolt nut to the chassis return compared to the image below of the final replacement 2 seater springs with less camber.


After road testing this is me trying to poke in a .025” feeler between the axle and rebound rubber at static height with the 4 seater springs. A larger gap would mean that the u-both nuts could significantly bash the chassis on bumpy roads.


Hope it helps and good luck with whatever route you take.