My driver side leaf spring broke at the eyelet Sunday night so I'll be purchasing two OEM springs tonight and installing them this weekend.

Will I be removing the fuel tank? It's been raining and I haven't had a chance to crawl underneath to look things over, but from what I can see, there is a protective plate of some sort on the driver side that will prevent removal of the forward leaf spring bolt.

Thanks

 

You will have to remove the gas tank skid plate to have enough room to slide the bolt out.

Don't torque the bolts until the rig is sitting on the grouse on its own weight.

 

True that, except you can have it sitting on the ground instead of flattening a grouse, sometimes they are hard to find and convincing them to get under your tire is difficult.

 

Thanks Tainter.

And thanks Doc Olds. GM's stock of grouse is depleted with no anticipated refill date.

 

We replaced the left side on mine too. I think we cut the bolt and then put a new one in from the outside so not having to remove the tank.

 

The tank does not need to be removed, just the skid plate that covers the tank. There is a pocket molded into the plastic fuel tank for accessing the leaf spring bolt.

 

We used a wafer wheel to cut through the front bolt of each leaf spring. The right side bolt rusted to the spring, but not the frame. The rear bolts broke loose but I decided to replace those as well.

Part of me thinks I should have put never-seize on the shank of the replacement bolts.

 

Sorry, forgot to mention the anti seize.

 

So my 2006 H3 passenger leaf spring snapped where it wraps around front "eye bolt" or hanger thingy. Right rear wheel is now set back about 3" further than normal and tire is just barely rubbing the mudflap.

I'm tempted to replace both leaf spring stacks myself, how bad of job is it? Should I just go with OEM or is there a better option? Will they line back up or do I have to worry about alignment? I'm fairly competent mechanically but would it be better to just tale it to a shop?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Kevin

 

It's pretty easy to do, but being a spring there is always a risk of getting badly hurt if done incorrectly. It's not hard at all. (Unless completely rusted up)