Great post jako. I used to look at your charts with springs & give it little attention but since becoming a student of price action have learnt of their meaning & value, although I refer to them as "fakeouts" (as opposed to breakouts, i.e. they are false breakouts), and also specifically they are bars that are the first bar to break a spike high or spike low.
Yes, like everything in TA they do not always work, but they offer good reliability (which these days I refer to simply as being better than 50%).
One comment I have is that from my observation - mainly with FX but I think it applies to other markets too - is that if the fakeout closes outside the high or low of the spike (high or low) being "faked out", it offers a higher probability of a fakeout reversal vs breakout follow-through than if the close of the fakeout occurs inside the high or low of the spike (high or low). The rationale behind this dynamic is that breakout or trend traders take notice if the close of a bar occurs outside a high or low, not just if a bar penetrates that high or low but closes inside - thus a stronger reversal towards the inside (i.e. a reversal) occurs as more traders' stops will be hit if price reverses inside the fakeout low or high (hopefully that all makes sense).
Below is a AUDUSD chart showing a few examples:
View attachment 663048
Cheers, Sharks
