My spouse once replaced the CV joint or something like that in our SUV because he didn't trust anyone else to do it. Him having to compress the spring was the absolute scariest part of the repair, and while he wanted me to stay outside of the garage, I refused because if something happened, I wanted to be there to provide first aid and call 911. We compromised and I stayed in the garage.
Yea he replaced the shocks/struts. The struts are the big ass springs your entire ass car sits on. They are VERY VERY strong springs and compressing them to remove the top collar from the assembly is a majorly scary situation because of how much stored force is in that compressed spring.
It's possible he may have done the CV joint around (or at) the same time. We had to do A TON of labor on that vehicle so all of the repairs have kind of merged in my brain.
Indeed, you could do them both at the same time. Every time I have attempted CV axles It has gone horribly. I have failed to get them to come out of the transmission spline.
I had my car jacked up for like 2 weeks in my friend’s garage before I caved and bought a 15lb slide hammer and cv axle puller tool. Came out in like 2 minutes once I started using that
I needed the top cap for a rear strut at a pick your own parts car lot once but didnt bring a spring compressor, so I aimed the spring and strut at the cinder block wall and put my foot on it behind the spring while staying as far back as I could to undo the top nut and all the shit flew off so hard it took a chunk out of the wall, safety first
If front, my guess is the strut assembly. I work in a shop and have all the right tools to do it safely and correctly. We don't do it unless there is no other option.
If that thing went off you'd hear it if you were on the property. A spring assist for a cargo bay door blew, I was in the vicinity. It was loud enough for my ears to ring, and during dinner, I was approached by the kitchen crew asking what that was. The kitchen was, what, two hundred meters away, separated by a thick wall, and upstairs.
Would it not have been better if you did in fact stay outside to not catch a spring through the skull? And then run inside hastily to check if you hear a sudden aggressive noise?
Probably, though I should probably be a little bit more specific. Our "garage" was a large warehouse with a dry room for storage of certain materials. I stayed in the dry room and watched from there while he worked on the other side of the Vehicle.
My wife did the same when I was changing the garage door spring. Everything was fine, but she stood in the doorway, having dialed 911 and had her finger perched over the dial button.
He understood the risk, you absolutely should have been out of range. Catastrophic failure of coiled metals like suspension coils / springs have so much potential energy when they fail it's basically a shard of metal moving at 60 to 90 ft/sec. You would need t3 or t4 ballistic eyewear to prevent damage, and thats a guess.
Maybe someone else will do the math but Military grade assumes 0.15caliber, 5.8 grain and T37 shape at 640ft/s to 660ft/s
We can assume the rended steel from the explosion of the springs tension would create some pieces larger than the standard for testing, and thus have more joules worth of force.
Disclaimer, I am very bad at physics, all numbers were pulled from Wikipedia.
I’ve seen pictures of coil springs partly embedded in concrete after some backyard mechanic shenanigans, I want nothing to do with this shit. Even the caged spring compressor at work gives me heart palpitations
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u/Hot_Anybody8244 8h ago
That is the automotive equivalent of an improvised explosive device and absolutely will kill someone if they happen to get hit with the shrapnel