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Sprung fervour

On Friday evening my daughter and I were sitting watching TV, my car was parked outside on the drive alongside the lounge. There was a really loud bang and we ran outside to investigate. The front offside tyre was flat. The front suspension had collapsed and the coil spring had pierced the rear wall of the tyre. The car is a Peugeot 307SW Registered in Mar 05 and has done 54,000 miles. Is it reasonable for this to happen at this mileage and age? I avoid speed humps whenever I can although this is obviously not always possible. My local garage said straight away that this an ever increasing problem and that it is due to the amount of speed humps on the roads nowadays.

Asked on 4 July 2009 by

Answered by Honest John
Your garage is half right. It's partly the result of the cheap way the springs are made. Partly due to winter road salt. And partly due to shocks from speed humps. As the steel springs cool down the metal contracts and that's when a stress fracture can become an actual break. I receive 2 - 3 e-mails complaining of spring failures every day.
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Makes sense of the 307. Up to seven forward-facing seats. Good to drive. Decent diesels.
 

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