how can you tell if your car has the spring protectors fitted?

[Dalex]

Originally Posted by mickhill

2.0 CDT 2001 96,000 miles. Unfortunately today my front left spring broke and punctured the tyre - the concerning thing is that the tyre protectors ARE definately fitted! I checked they were fitted after reading about the problem on the forum. Have I just been unlucky or are these tyre protectors not up to the job? Come to think of it I am VERY lucky as I had my two young kids in the car and this happened as I was starting to back out of the drive. I dread to think what might have happened if this happened at 70+ on the motorway. Funny thing is, reading posts on the forum and other places, it seems quite common that these spring breakages happen on the drive when reversing out. I wonder whether the loads and stresses on the spring are different when reversing and more likeley to causing spring failure. Correct me if I'm wrong but I have not heard of many incidents of such spring failures at speed.

It happened to me today doing 70 on the open road pulling a trailer and man did I **** myself big time!(so did the biker who was overtaking at the time). Fortunately it was a straight stretch of road and I had breakdown cover. I'm definitely going to get the protectors but it is concerning that yours haven't worked.

[HarryM1BYT]

Originally Posted by T-Cut

The Mark 2 models and maybe some late Mark 1s don't have the pilot holes in the lower spring retainer plate. I believe these holes were never intended to take the protector gizmos anyway. I think MGR simply used them to design the cups after the breakage issue became serious. To fit them to later models, you have to drill the holes yourself (note they are of different sizes).

TC

My June 2004 Mk II had the holes already in place. I fitted the protectors and found the springs rubbed against them, so took them back off.

[chipsceola]

There are many threads about this on the forum, they were developed Norfie a member on here, you can see his comment in this thread: http://www.the75andztclub.co.uk/foru...yre+protectors
Apparently later cars had different manufacturer springs in an effort to solve the problem, but still worth fitting no doubt.
Chips

[T-Cut]

Originally Posted by HarryM1BYT

My June 2004 Mk II had the holes already in place.

In hindsight, I think they probably all have them. I picked up on the Mk2 story after someone said they had to drill the holes themselves. I had mine all ready to drill but when I looked more closely they were already present. They can be difficult to see, even using one of the gizmos as a template. There is a slight tolerance on the fit so you have to wiggle it around to line them up.

Regarding the failure to protect event reported above. One of the designers/developers of these plates is a member here and he posted an overview of the work they did in testing tyre protectors from spring fracture. They got through 200 springs apparantly and the design we now see is optimal. Nothing will ever be 100% certain at this level of engineering.

TC