[blankito]

Hi all,

My Dinan Spring set is completely destroyed by rust after only five years...

I really like the ride on these springs and I was pretty happy with the product.... But now I'm pretty disappointed by the long term reliability of those... I'm not an expert myself, but my mechanic told me they look 10-15 years old and their shape is so bad they must be replaced after only 5 years..

I tried contacting Dinan but they weren't much help... They told me they weren't aware of any issues... and best they could do is offer me 10% off a new set...

See by yourself how they look after five years...

Anybody had similar issues?

[Watsey]

That's appalling - I'd be really pissed about that.

My Ohlins springs also have a yellow finish and have also been on the car for around 5 years. After a wipe with a damp cloth they'd look pretty much as new.

It's a difficult one in terms of warranty. Technically the springs haven't failed and the coating can be argued as largely a matter of aesthetics. Even so, I'd be pushing for a significant refund. Clearly they have aged prematurely.

[alohasurftoad]

apparently it's standard

https://f30.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1711664

[johnung]

Originally Posted by blankito

Hi all,

My Dinan Spring set is completely destroyed by rust after only five years...

I really like the ride on these springs and I was pretty happy with the product.... But now I'm pretty disappointed by the long term reliability of those... I'm not an expert myself, but my mechanic told me they look 10-15 years old and their shape is so bad they must be replaced after only 5 years..

I tried contacting Dinan but they weren't much help... They told me they weren't aware of any issues... and best they could do is offer me 10% off a new set...

See by yourself how they look after five years...

Anybody had similar issues?


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Judging by the photos, that may just be surface rust caused by a failure of whatever coating they used.

Your mechanic only imagines solutions that are easy for him. You can save yourself $300 or more that it would cost you for a new set of springs. Have him remove the springs and give them to you at the end of the work day on a Friday. Return them to him to install on Monday morning.

Since you like the springs I suggest using a simple, easy & cheap rust removal technique that I use on rusty brake rotors. Most things needed can be purchased at Walmart.

Get a cheap plastic storage container that will hold all four springs that you can completely immerse them in white vinegar for 24 hours, no longer or metal surface could begin to pit. Big box stores like Costco, Sam's club, BJ's usually sell white vinegar cheap by the gallon. The vinegar will dissolve the rust and turn black. See photo.

Tip: if you have too much space around the springs in the container and you need to raise the vinegar level, just place full plastic bottles of water with the caps on, into the vinegar and the level will rise to cover the springs.

Remove springs. Using a funnel, pour vinegar back into plastic bottles it came in and discard. Latex gloves work best. Wire brush springs by hand to remove any crud using copious amounts of Formula 409 household cleaner. (409 really works best) when finished spray down with a can of brake cleaner and dry them with shop towels so they are ready to paint. Do all this over an open plastic container to catch the junk that comes off because it stains.

You could have them powdercoated if you had the time and money. But it would work just as well to spray paint them with Rustoleum rusty metal primer. Then spray paint them with a rustoleum black. A heat gun like from Harbor Freight can hasten dry time between paint coats. Thin coats are always best. I've used my wife's blow dryer, unbeknownst to her.

Hope this helps!

[Ennoch]

Echoing johnung's suggestion, if you can't DIY it then that's a reasonable option. For springs like that I'd be tempted to just drop them at a local powdercoaters. You'll have to remove all the remaining coating, de-rust and then re-paint which is time consuming, and will use a fair amount of scotch pads and papers, as well as primer, paint etc - if you go down this route I'd use 2 pack epoxy mastic and brush it on tbh, it's under the car so shouldn't degrade from UV too easily and will be much tougher than powder coat as powder coat is essentially a single entity so once it gets damaged water can creep under and cause rust, leading to failure like you've got above. Decent powder coating will be pretty tough though. Epoxy is essentially lots of shorter molecules that bond to the steel and are much better at preventing creep. A half way house would be to find a blaster who could do the work and then spray a layer of something like Jotun 87 on them, allowing you to then use your own paint on top.

After working on my Impreza restoration I've got to the point where small things get DIY sorted with rust, whereas anything big or complicated is just not worth the time or effort to do when you have a decent blaster nearby. But then again I have approached stuff like this before when the project's been a novelty. I'm long past that point now...

[RodriguezM]

where do you live and did you drive all year long?

[mdpelta]

I head he is still around in Mountain View, CA

[Watsey]

Bearing in mind that the vast majority of the time/cost/inconvenience is in the time taken to remove/refit the springs I'd just buy replacements and swap them.

Springs are cheap (Ohlins charge around £80 each in the UK).

Why bother with removal, chemical treatment, sanding, re-coating, potentially taking the springs to be powder coated, etc, and potentially have the car on jacks (un-driveable) for several days just to save a couple of hundred Bucks ?

[Billfitz]

That's surface rust. The springs are OK, the coating is obviously junk. I have a can of spray undercoat handy when I'm working under the car to spritz on anything that's rusty. It's not pretty, but the only one who ever has to look at it is me.

[Ennoch]

Originally Posted by Watsey

Why bother with removal, chemical treatment, sanding, re-coating, potentially taking the springs to be powder coated, etc, and potentially have the car on jacks (un-driveable) for several days just to save a couple of hundred Bucks ?

Why waste money when you don't need to? I'm not poor but I don't believe in being so wasteful as to throw away perfectly good components and buying new when they can be refurbed, and that's the case even if the cost isn't ultimately that different.

[F30RiK]

Hi, I posted something similar 2 years ago. Mine look like yours. Dinan quality is really poor.
Paid 600$ at my local BMW dealer for those springs and they are junk

[blankito]

Originally Posted by RodriguezM

where do you live and did you drive all year long?

I live in Montreal, Canada.

I drive the car all year round.. Obviously, our winters are really tough on cars and all metal parts.. But I have never seen springs deteriorate so fast... 🤷*♂️

[blankito]

Originally Posted by Watsey

That's appalling - I'd be really pissed about that.

My Ohlins springs also have a yellow finish and have also been on the car for around 5 years. After a wipe with a damp cloth they'd look pretty much as new.

It's a difficult one in terms of warranty. Technically the springs haven't failed and the coating can be argued as largely a matter of aesthetics. Even so, I'd be pushing for a significant refund. Clearly they have aged prematurely.

Tried to call them, opened a support ticket, called them back twice after that..

The guy on the phone felt bad for me but apparently his boss said there is nothing they can do other then giving me 10% off on a replacement since I'm out of warranty... 🙄

[RodriguezM]

must be the coating on them...

[Billfitz]

The coating is AFU. You can see that it's cracked and flaking off. It's made of a material that's not elastic enough to flex with the springs during compression and expansion. Not that there isn't plenty of rust on other components, it's just that the springs are worse. That takes me back to why I have a can of spray undercoat handy whenever I pull a wheel and/or go under the car.

[Musashi]

No, I can confirm that my first set, mounted in 2017, Canada driven 4 winters, rotted and snapped. Despite good cleanups etc. They looked worse than the OEM, for obvious reasons below. As if not enough, my 2017 Dinan sway bar, we replaced it with H&R, at my insistence, as I noticed perforation rust on the bar. So it was going to snap. Got a new Dinan spring sept end 2023, and kick myself, it has massive creaks under moderate braking, turns, and turned several times on the bottom mounts (twisted). In 2023, when the front Dinan old set snapped, it the my car in another lane, incidentally, deriving to Montreal on a beautiful fall day.

All and all, simple causes: JUNK. Cheap very cheap steel given the product's applications, and not evening the same universe as the OEM or H&R. German steel. So will buy H&R now to replace the new Dinan, I refuse the warranty offer to swap them Why would I swap junk with junk?

Now here is a thing folks may not know. as steel cable strands corrode, well before snapping, as the corrosion takes over, as low as 10, 15%, the steel properties change. So whatever Dinan benefits are, by design, they are gone past one, maybe two winters. This explains why, at 50,000 kms on my first Dinan set, my car was no longer lowered at 0.5", but 1.5" The rotting springs could not keep it up. Yes that affects handling, bounce rate etc etc

[gunnerxq]

Originally Posted by Musashi

No, I can confirm that my first set, mounted in 2017, Canada driven 4 winters, rotted and snapped. Despite good cleanups etc. They looked worse than the OEM, for obvious reasons below. As if not enough, my 2017 Dinan sway bar, we replaced it with H&R, at my insistence, as I noticed perforation rust on the bar. So it was going to snap. Got a new Dinan spring sept end 2023, and kick myself, it has massive creaks under moderate braking, turns, and turned several times on the bottom mounts (twisted). In 2023, when the front Dinan old set snapped, it the my car in another lane, incidentally, deriving to Montreal on a beautiful fall day.

All and all, simple causes: JUNK. Cheap very cheap steel given the product's applications, and not evening the same universe as the OEM or H&R. German steel. So will buy H&R now to replace the new Dinan, I refuse the warranty offer to swap them Why would I swap junk with junk?

Now here is a thing folks may not know. as steel cable strands corrode, well before snapping, as the corrosion takes over, as low as 10, 15%, the steel properties change. So whatever Dinan benefits are, by design, they are gone past one, maybe two winters. This explains why, at 50,000 kms on my first Dinan set, my car was no longer lowered at 0.5", but 1.5" The rotting springs could not keep it up. Yes that affects handling, bounce rate etc etc

Ahh confidence inspiring. Surprisingly It looks like it'll be my cars first winter. I'll be spraying ACF-50 on everything. Hopefully I lucked out with my springs, the coating looks pretty solid on them.

I'll either go back to stock springs or eibach, H&R springs cause too much stress long term on the front drive axles.