Though many semi trailers today feature air suspension, the vast majority still use a suspension technology that predates the internal combustion engine—leaf springs. Yes, leaf springs were in use on the horse drawn wagons that are the distant ancestor of your rig’s trailer.
Leaf springs have endured for two primary and interrelated reasons:
1) leaf springs are mechanically simple and easy to manufacture, and
2) they are cheap because of the first reason.
At Ainsworth Trailer Repair of Denver, we routinely see the downsides of leaf spring suspensions on all manner of semi trailers, mostly related to both of the reasons above. It seems that because leaf springs are mechanically simple that everyone feels qualified to “eyeball” them, even when a mileage or maintenance log declares they should be replaced, and secondly, leaf springs tend to break because they are cheap, with many of the replacement parts out there made overseas.
If your trailer is sagging under its rated loads, or even lighter ones, if it lists to one side with an evenly distributed load, or if it bounces a lot under braking or bottoms out under load, even if you haven’t overloaded it, it’s past time to look at replacing your leaf springs.
The consequences of a catastrophic leaf spring failure are not worth deferring such a basic semi trailer repair. At Ainsworth, your safety comes first. We are not going to recommend helper springs for a worn out spring stack, or try to replace the worst looking leaf in the stack, or reuse your old U-bolts. Remember, leaf springs are relatively inexpensive wear items, and worn ones will be developing metal fatigue, micro-fracturing, spalling, and developing hidden corrosion—and the assembly should all be replaced at the same time.
Even if you are an owner/operator who has to watch every penny, Ainsworth Trailer will treat you just like you were the largest fleet operator we service. With 13 full time mechanics, 10 service bays and thousands of OEM parts on hand, we will keep your downtime to a minimum. We also extend credit to qualified customers.
With a convenient central Denver location, with easy access from either I-25 or I-70E, there is no longer any reason to delay one of the most basic semi trailer repairs there is. Contact us today.
