Steel springs are essential components in many devices, systems and machinery and can be defined as an elastic member that exerts a resisting force when its shape is changed. Read More…
Leading Manufacturers
R & L Spring Company
Lake Geneva, WI | 262-249-7854R&L Spring Company manufactures custom spring and wire formed components for industries such as powersports, automotive, medical devices, and general industrial. Products include compression, extension, and torsion springs, as well as rings, wire forms, fourslide components, and long coils. Wire diameters available from .001" to .750" in both shaped wires and flat stocks. Their experienced team is able to meet the most demanding parts specifications. IATF16949 and ISO9001 certified.
Stanley Spring and Stamping Corporation
Chicago, IL | 773-777-2600At Stanley Spring and Stamping Corporation we have experience in raw materials and metal fabrication. We are a Midwest manufacturer who is part of the American business community. Our coil springs are made from the highest quality material available. Our production ranges from a few prototypes to over fifty million parts. We provide the best quality in the industry.
Tollman Spring Company, Inc.
Bristol, CT | 860-583-1326Founded in 1945, Tollman’s expert engineering staff stands ready to work directly with your designers to meet customized spring design and cycle life requirements and achieve maximum performance of your products. In addition to helping you with the pre-production design of new parts, our engineering and design experts can help improve the performance of your existing products. Tollman’s up-front involvement in the design of customer products saves time and money.
Plymouth Spring Company, Inc.
Bristol, CT | 860-584-0594Plymouth Spring Company, founded in 1959, has continued to expand and grow through new technologies and attention to details to serve an ever larger customer base. Plymouth Spring completed the acquisition of the assets of the Bristol Spring Manufacturing Company and has integrated much of Bristol Spring’s highly skilled workforce, equipment and manufacturing capabilities of compression springs, torsion springs & extension springs into our existing facility.
Gilbert Spring Corporation
Chicago, IL | 800-860-6031Established in 1964 and now in our third generation of ownership, Gilbert Spring Corporation has remained dedicated to not only providing the utmost quality in our products but also offering excellent customer service and on-time delivery with short lead times. Our Secondary department can produce complex Springs and Wire/Strip Forms not suited for machine operations, and our on-site tooling department gives us the ability to quickly adapt to customer’s needs.
Ajax Wire Specialty Company, Inc.
Hicksville, NY | 855-966-2529At Ajax Wire, in addition to manufacturing a growing list of stock springs, we can produce springs to your specifications, samples or drawings in short or long runs. We also offer several assortments that come with cabinets and display boards. Compression springs, extension springs and torsion springs are examples of our products. Springs have been our only business for more than 85 years, Call us today!
Steel Springs - Myers SpringThere are four major styles of steel springs: compression springs, extension springs, torsion springs and flat springs. Each of these steel springs performs a very different function. Compression springs act as a cushion for a downward acting force; extension springs, also known as tension springs, act in reverse by giving resistance to outward acting forces, elongating when pulled by attached hooks at either side; torsion springs store mechanical energy within a twisted coil and act by exerting a twisting force, or torque; and flat springs are very simple devices, being constructed of flat strips of steel that have been tempered with a specific curvature in order to give resistance and shock absorption in simple applications.
Common applications of steel springs include outdoor power equipment, retractable safety devices, tape measures, timing devices, fitness equipment, gardening equipment and toys. Steel springs serve these applications and more in industries such as medical, automotive, oil and gas, telecommunications, textiles, hardware, electronics, military, aerospace and agriculture.
Steel Springs - Myers SpringThere are a few main types of steel used to make springs: blue steel, which is also sometimes called spring steel, and stainless steel. Blue steel is the traditional type of steel using in springs and is a high carbon spring steel. Aesthetically-pleasing, but inclined to rust, blue steel is hardened, tempered and polished to meet specifications.
Stainless steel offers properties that are not available in blue tempered spring steel such as high corrosion-resistance; however, it is similarly aesthetically-pleasing. Steel springs are most commonly formed through the cold rolling process. A type of roll forming, cold rolling utilizes roll forming machines, which consist of sequences of calenders, or roller die pairs, positioned both above and below the metal coil that is being formed.
As the metal moves through the machine, the rollers bend the material along the linear axis, pressing the metal into a more uniform grain flow while shaping the metal into flat coil strips. Cold rolled parts are created at temperatures below the recrystallization point of the metal. The cold rolling process increases the tensile strength of the metal.
Since blue tempered steel springs work well with heat treatment, the next step for this type of steel spring is to be annealed, or made softer through heating, so that they can be wound or coiled. Next, they are heat treated in order to reduce stresses and fractures, which further strengthens the spring.
However, stainless steel springs cannot undergo heat treatment and thus are coiled using a different process. One possible winding process for stainless steel springs is to be lathe formed, which uses a lathe machine that winds the coils through a process of rapid rotation.