Anyone have any opinions on tack welding the bottom of a coil spring to the spring bucket to keep the spring in place and to keep it from turning on the plate. The way my lower spring buckets are set up with my lower bump stop it would be a pain in the butt to get a spring retainer in there. I was just thinking of making a couple tack weld at the base so they don't rotate on me. All it would take to get them off would be to hit them with a grinder or yank on them a few times to brea the tack welds.

Any other ideas that might work?

I would not weld your spring. Try to find a way to clamp the spring. If you post a picture Im sure we can come up with something.

Hey Rob, check these out - http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=872984 - they're retainers from Shaffer's offroad. They're not on their website, so you have to go through Pirate PM or call them up. Should do the trick, that's what I'm going to do for the rear coils on the new rig - upper and lower captured. That was one thing that I've hated about all the aftermarket coil brackets, the platform is usually flat and the coil spins around too much, mine used to clunk every now and again when they would reseat.

That’s what I use and has worked great for 6 years. I got the parts from WFO so ask them about it while it's there. Kevin should know exactly what I have.

What is the benifit of retaining the upper end of the spring. I can see it if you are not running any bump stop up there, but I limit my flex and there is no way the upper end of my spring can get past my upper bump stop.

The upper retainer is to keep it from popping out with extended droop, not really compression. I imagine you theoretically could end up stretching the spring by running both upper and lower retainers. The idea though is to sandwich the last wrap of the coil between the plates so that it doesn't pop out of either the top or the bottom with severe droop. If you only ran the upper retainer, it could pop out of the bottom unless you had really tall bump stop extensions and likewise for the top if you only ran lower retainers.

Here is a couple pictures of when I built mine. I have the same clamp on the top and bottom of the springs. I think by clamping my spring it sorta acts like a sway bar. Obviously it's made to collapse but it's definitely hard to stretch it! Maybe I'm just crazy?