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Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.
3

Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

(OP)
Today I was lining up a collection of ovate beehive valve springs (because I have that kind of time) from a Ford 4.6 DOHC 4-valve motor.  While doing this, I noticed that roughly half the springs were wound to the right and half wound to the left.  Is there any good reason why Ford would specify springs wound in different directions?  These are not nested springs...  they are the single OEM springs from Ford.  I looked at a couple of brand-new heads and all those springs seemed to be wound the same direction.  My guess is that some machines wind right, others left but it's all the same to Ford.  Is there more to this?

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I assume while compressing the spring, some of the force translates into a rotating motion of the valve, which helps to keep the valve and seat clean on closure.On opening it also makes the passing gas rotate a bit.so I guess it gives a better flow pattern if inlet an exhaust gasses are counter rotated.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

(OP)
That is some excellent insight, insight I never would have dreamed.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

you're welcome

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I dont honestly think the small bit a valve turns once it opens has any effect on air passing between it and the seat but I could be wrong, Ive been wrong before..

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I'd be very surprised if the reason was gas dynamics.  My hunch would be valvetrain dynamics, possibly connected with tappet offsets.

- Steve

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

It may keep the valve from seating at the same spot every time - thus keeping the fit between seat and valve always "ground" and tight fitting.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

That's quite obvious, but left vs right bank windings?

If there were nested spings, you'd expect them to be differently wound to prvent lock-up.

There must be a reason.  Maybe someone from Frod Munter can chime in?

- Steve

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Obviously, the left hand springs are from down under.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I assume by "roughly half" you mean it isn't intakes one way, exhausts the other?   

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

If there is meant to be a difference in the way the left-hand and right-hand springs are installed, the assembly instructions ought to cover it, and if they're not OEM parts, the supplier ought to cover it.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Maybe on set is an american company that could follow directions and the other set from a country that couldn't.

It would be nice to know if there is some though out reason for it though.  

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

It could just be the result of using different spring vendors and one vendor just happened to have spring coilers that were set up for left hand winding. It may also be that if some sort of automated assembly equipment were in use, and two springs were fed to the assembly point, that having LH and RH wound springs would prevent them from nesting in the feeding mechanism.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Just a guess?
Ford found that more springs could be made from the same stock, lower scrap rate, some bean-counting factor.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

SomtingGuy: The Ford 4.6L DOHC engine uses a RFF valvetrain (Roller Finger Follower) and has no tappets per se.  Pushrod style engines use tappet offset to ensure rotation of the tappets, but there is no need to do this with a RFF valvetrain, as the cam followers have a roller incorporated directly into them. (Your comment: "...valvetrain dynamics, possibly connected with tappet offsets")

I suspect valvetrain dynamics figures into why springs are wound in different directions, but it's not tappet offset.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

an idea:  if the intake springs have a different rate/number of coils/fitted length/etc than the exhaust, having them wound opposite ways would make the types visually distinguishable.  
 

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

a friend of a friend of mine might have design responsibility for that part... I'll see if I can fish out any info from my "network."

 

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I was perusing the Summit catalog and some other sources to see if they showed these.  Interestingly, the searches pulled up Chev springs;  apparently some are using Chev beehive springs on mod-motors?  Even Ford Racing springs for the 4.6 are not beehive type, this may be a high-RPM upgrade?

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

The valve spring never is exposed to either the intake or exhaust gases.  The helical of the spring has nothing whatsoever to do with flow turbulence.  And yes, valves do rotate ever so slightly with each open and close.  No idea why one would be right and another left hand.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

(OP)
RossABQ:  You definitely picked up some errant information there.  The 4.6 dohc modular came out circa 1994 and some of those real early motors did not use beehives (I know because I've disassembled several in a junk yard) but, for the most part, all dohc modulars have OEM ovate beehive springs. Comp Cams is the only aftermarket supplier of mod springs and they are also ovate beehive, all winding the same direction.  Frankly, I believe the Comp Cam product is a failure because they cause the cam bearings to wipe (too much spring) but that is another subject.  If Chevy springs work in these heads, I would be surprised, as the mod springs are only about an inch in O.D. Thank you for your interest in this subject.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

These are the Ford Racing springs I saw, they do not appear to be beehive. Maybe stock are beehive, hi-lift racing are not?  Neveer been inside a mod-motor, much more of a 5.0 guy!
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/FMS-M-6513-T46/?rtype=10

            


 

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

ornerynorsk:the tought of the gasses to rotate was not because they're exposed to the spring (i know that).Just thinking of the velocity of the gasses, when the inlet valves opens, exceeds the velocity of the piston (diameter of inlet port being much smaller than diameter of piston).
As the gasses start to rotate when filling the cylinder, I assume they follow the path, choosen by the first molecules entering the cylinder, easiest for them would be to follow same rotational direction as the valve.
but than again, the counterwound beehive mistery may as easy have to do with different after market supplier,...

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

...but the rotation of the valve is a small fraction of one revolution per lift event...
 

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I doubt that the springs from Summit or as pictured.
 When did you see a racing spring without a inner dampening spring?   

I don't know anything but the people that do.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

The direction of the spring winding is specified on every valve spring blueprint.  I fall into the valve rotaion direction group

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

what is the direction of valve rotation supposed to affect?

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

"what is the direction of valve rotation supposed to affect?"

My opinion is nothing, It's just incedental.

Is it a good thing that the valve to seat contact differs all the time? Maybe for equal wear or seal?

Kind of begs the question, what would happen if we fitted square or oval section valve stems and guides, not very practical from a production point of view, but maybe you could then shape the back of the valve in some way to aid airflow in a certain direction.....

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

A grove in the stem and a guide pin in the guide would be fairly easy but pointless as you do not have to prevent the valve from turning to create swirl. The purpose of the valve turning is to create even wear and maintain a good round concentric surface to maintain a seal over a long time.

To create swirl, groves in the back of the valve head similar to the vanes on a centrifugal pump would do it, but once again, to what purpose.

Regards
Pat
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RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

The rotation is for even wear/even seating and to help prevent severe coking of the valve underside near the lands.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Yeah, we've all got that bit (even wear).  Just waiting for someone to explain why left vs right rotaion needs to be specified on a per-cylinder or per-bank basis.

- Steve

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

How certain are we that the left and right springs only differ in the direction of wind?  I expect there is probably some other difference such as spring rate etc. and Ford used the direction of wind as an easy visual way to distinguish between the two.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

that was my suspicion too...  (1 Feb 10 14:49 )

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I agree also. There is no technical reason for different wind direction, therefore the logical reason is identification. I thought colour coding was the traditional method.

Regards
Pat
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RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I've seen a lot of painted clutch springs, but valve springs?  I'm probably completely wrong, but I just don't recall seeing them on all then stripped engines at work.

- Steve

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Painting costs extra, hand is free.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Which application used the beehive springs ?
The few I looked ( 1998 Cobra, Lincolns ) at would use a Sealed Power VS1631 which is not beehived in the pictures on line.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I've seen lots of valve springs where a stripe or dab of color
 is used to ID.  I don't know what the wind direction is about.

Torquey;  In the OP you say  "roughly half"  Does this mean It's not precisely half as you'd expect if  say, larger valves got a higher rate spring?

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

I have a set of valve springs sitting on my workbench at home for my Edlebrock heads for my 66 Mustang.  They have a white and voilet stripe on each spring.  I suspect they are for production tracing since etching or otherwise marking valve springs is not practical.

Franz

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RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Lots of springs are painted or dyed.  After all, you can only distinguish between 2 springs with coiling direction so if you have more variety you need something more.  But you do pay extra for the identification.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Is anyone other than Rod and myself old enough to remember Chevvy Browns.

The OEM heavy duty spring for SBC back in the 70s and 80s was a brown colour hence the name.

Regards
Pat
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RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Slightly off the subject, but a related matter - Why are beehive springs so much better than conventional springs?
 The usual reasons given of slightly less reciprocating weight and oval section don't seem to me to be enough to account for their improved performance.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Pat, was the brown actually a coloration of the metal, rather an obvious dye job?

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

@yves/Norm,

yes, surge behavior is the driver for the "beehive" shape.  Having a smaller coil diameter changes the spring rate in that region, so you end up with spring with a surge (rsonant) frequency that varies over the lift event.  It's effective for "breaking up" resonance (surge).

 

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.


I recall SBC springs that had a brown coating/paint on them back in the 60's.  They were what we used with the Duntov grinds from the Chevy parts counter and to keep the cost down when we started using aftermarket cams.  Of course, it wasn't long before we just had to have dual spring set-ups, for our (cranial) heads as much as the fact that we would take the revs up to at least what the cam grinders would claim to be the upper limit of the rev range for a given cam.

Yosh

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

My first set of dual springs was on my new '61 Vette heads done by Jack Moss Automotive in Amarillo, Texas.  Picked up almost a full second (and an NHRA record) from the OEM setup.  I was only 22 years old and I did not trust my own ability yet.
Were they brown?  Hell, Pat, how am I supposed to remember that far back?

Rod

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Pat, I am, as well as "Pink" Rods.......

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

And "camel hump" heads.

ISZ

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

Pat - old enough, but as I wasn't building Chevvies that far back, "browns" doesn't register.  "Pink" rods, camel hump heads, and Duntov 30-30 all do.


Norm

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

good factory large journal 350 rods (3/8 inch bolts) were painted pink
I think the good small journal FI type 327 (11/32 bolts) rods were green

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

are you sure about the engine these springs came from?  My "network" approach paid off - sort of - the response I got back was that the springs on the Ford 4.6L are not wound in different directions.
 

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

"Pink" rods were so called because they were factory dye-penetrant checked and the residual dye was not removed...

 

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

as to the right or left hand winding the only reason I can think of was touched on in the post by swall, I base this on the info that these engines were designed with machine assembly in mind (never touched by human hand)....
as to the benefit of the beehive design, while resonant freq is modified in my opinion the original reason for these springs was much more simple..."how do we fit a larger dia. spring to a head with limited space in the spring seat area.
Not sure you can make much of an argument for beehive springs being "better", all of there benefits can be seen using other spring parameters and combinations and the fatigue life of the beehive design has significant draw backs.

 

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.


As far as I know, the beehive shape allows a bit more lift or float before the spring binds and bad things happen.

Yosh
 

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

A third of the way down this page it mentions the Olds version of the 215 aluminum V8 used "conical" valve springs.
http://www.rover-v8.nl/v8web/index.html

I'm guessing it was a weight reducing detail.

RE: Right/Left Wound Beehive Spring Mystery.

The "beehive" valve spring shape gives increased lateral stability.  It also has the characteristic of rising spring rate due to progressively fewer active coils as the spring is compressed.  Both of these factors make the beehive spring more resistant to surge.  In this regard, a single beehive coil is preferable to multiple coils or a single coil with a dampener, since the beehive would have less friction and heat generation.

Torquey mentioned the springs are "ovate".  While he may have been referring to the spring's profile, some very high performance valve springs have been made with oval cross section wire.  Round wire is normally used to simplify spring winding.  But an oval section wire will give better performance since the spring will be lighter, have a lower installed height, and will have a higher natural frequency than an equivalent round wire spring.  The drawback is that winding an oval wire spring is more difficult.

http://www.compcams.com/catalog/299.html

Regards,
Terry

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