[SAJ]

Wow! I've started something. This technology is amazing though, that we can interchange stuff so quickly. Attached are more photos. I have what looks like a very old shackle and two plates off the "old" spring, which was rubber bushed. They all measure 1-9/16. The same as Tom's, including the new "repop" plates on the car now. The fillet on the LH perch base can be seen above the axle pedestal. The left one may be a bit buried, but both perches stand 2.165 inches above the surface of the axle (sorry about the decimals, but we've been in mm for years here, though I still work in decimal inches) measured down from the top grease nipple to the axle. Scaling Hardtimes terrific photos makes his look like 2.2 inches , but camera angles can play tricks.
I cleaned and refitted the perches tightly for the pics. that are without rust marks, and loaded them up in both directions with the car weight and a measuring trammel clamped across them, and they did not move. So I think that's all OK.
So, to get the car going I think I will raise both perches up on tapered spacers until the split pins will just go in nicely. This is about 3/16 inch. I will then take the old, stronger, shorter spring and re-set it cold to about what Columbia suggested (maybe a little less depending on what the refitted perches look like) and then worry about the new spring and what happened to it when I am back on the road, since my car is in a couple of old car shows this weekend and next.
Thanks to you all. Apologies are due because I started my reply at my work 10 hours ago, and with all the interruptions from people that can't seem to do without me, I have cut across some of the replies that came in since. By the way, do some of you guys never sleep? I'm doing this at work today so I don't get too much stick from my wife tonight, when I finally get home!(it's 5.30 pm here now).
Regards
and thanks to all who replied . SAJ in NZ