26mm rear anti-sway bar

[Doug Waschenko]

Does anyone have any feedback on a 92 SHO with Tokicos, Interax springs, 24mm front bar with a 26mm bar?
The Interax springs are 20% stiffer then stock. Is the 26mm rear bar going to be too big for this set up?

 

[AutoSHO]

The 26mm rear bar is perfect, but I would recommend dropping to a 22mm front bar for better corner-exit traction and reduced understeer.

 

[SHO Dude]

The 24mm FRONT bar matches very nicely with the 26mm rear bar. It works even better with a set of our Original Subrame Connectors. These tie the front of the car together with the rear for a more neutral balance in the twisties.

I strongly reccommend not installing the big rear bar until you get the front bar to go along with it. You'll find out pretty quick that the back end gets very twitchy.

If you're looking for the parts, please give us a shout. We gott'em all.

 

[Xs SHO 1]

Does anyone have any feedback on a 92 SHO with Tokicos, Interax springs, 24mm front bar with a 26mm bar?
The Interax springs are 20% stiffer then stock. Is the 26mm rear bar going to be too big for this set up?

The 26mm rear bar is fine IMHO with the front 24mm bar. Test drive a Gen 1, those already has the 24mm/26mm combo stock, see how u like it. Your '92 already has the 24mm up front, all you have to do is install the 26mm in the rear....

 

[Dave Kegel]

Keep in mind that the Intrax spring are progressive and the stock springs are not, so if you're saying they are 20% stiffer than stock based on their fully (or close to fully) compressed spring rate, you may not ever see that actual rate. Having said that, I have Intrax, Tokico, 24/26 bars on my '90 and have been happy with it. But it does understeer a bit on the track, most notably on longer sweeping turns where you are at WOT through the turn. So I am switching to a 22mm front bar to help make it more neutral. The catch is, I have been running TPR sway bar bushings on the rear and rubber on the front bar. I have a feeling that the 22mm front bar with poly or TPR bushings will end up acting a lot like the 24mm bar with rubber bushings, so we'll see.

Dave Kegel

 

[AutoSHO]

When I switched from a stock 24mm (with ~120k on the stock bushings) to a 22mm with fresh bushings, I still noticed a marked decrease in understeer. I'm very happy with the balance my car has with the 22/26, and corner exit traction is also much better.

 

[SHO Dude]

Dave, that's a great point and a valid one too.

The fact of the matter is that a street car is a lot different than a race car. It's true that a loose race car will go faster around a track than a tight race car. But that's given the fact that you've got a lot of butt time in the race car. You know how the car is to respond in each and every corner time and time again and lap after lap.

For a street car, I reccommend that it be as tight as possible. The point of a street car is to #1 - get you there alive and #2 respond with agility when some drunken Bas-Tard pulls out from a side street right in front of you and you have to make an evasive manuver. These things happen at the very last second and in those conditions, a tight street car could save your hide by going where you point it whereas a loose race car will land you in teh ditch as a passenger of your own ride.

I know this from first hand experience. I was in my '89 way back in the day. It was about 8:10am and I was late for work (no big surprise there - supposed to be there at 8:00 sharp). I was on a 4 lane highway with a center turn lane and I was going way over the posted limit. I was looking ahead and saw a late 80's Towncar pull up to the stop sign of a cross street. I was bookin' along in the left hand lane (at nearly twice the limit) and fully expected this Blue-Hair to pull out and stay in the right hand lane (there was no one else on the road but us at this time of the morning). However, when she pulled out, she came right over into the left hand lane right in front of me. I never expected this and was still at full gallop. So I swerved left, then countered right and then left again passing right around her to the left via the center turn lane. The car did exactly what I wanted it to and responded exactly as it should have. Had I not made it the tightest I knew how at the time, I would have either occupied her trunk, or spun the car out and into the gas station to the left, where they probably would have had to strain my remains for finger prints.

The point is that for a race car, a little loose is the best way to go fast. But for a street car, tighter is better.

Just my opinion...

 

[K-Dawg]

Right, but one of the reasons for using the 22mm on the front is to prevent the inside front tire from lifting off the pavement and spinning.

 

[Mr Anonymous]

I've found that different SHO's respond to different sway bar combinations, well, differently!

Don't forget to take what you're running for wheels and tires into account too.

On my '94, the 24/26 combo was really nice, but on the '92 the 24/26 had horrible understeer, but when I put in a Gen 3 22mm bar (with the collars), it was nicely balanced. Both had stock wheels and stock size tires. On Fred's '95, when he installed the SS 29mm rear bar and left the stocker in the front I thought it would be really squirrelly, but with his 17x7's it handled like a dream.

Basically, my point is don't make your decisions on what other people say worked for them. You may need to experiment with a few different combinations before you find what's best for you and your car.

 

[Doug Waschenko]

Thank you all gentlemen.
The point of a drive tire lifting with the stiffer bar is a valid one.
Has anyone tried adjustable rod ends on a big bar on the rear?
Also, I would think that polyurethane is the best way to go on all of the rubber blocks and bushings.
Any feedback on that?

 

[40BelowSummer]

What would be the best front bar for a rear 28mm bar setup?

BTW I have SFC's, Eibach/Tokico, and 24/28 ASBs

 

[yamahaSHO]

I have the 24/26 combo on my '92 with Eibachs. It is better than the stock 24/23, but I will be reducing the front bar to 22mm. I have 22/26 on my '95 and I can kick the back end out on command. This car also has Eibachs with Koni struts, sub frame connectors, and on, and on...

As in many cases, I will have to agree with Chris.

 

[nc89sho]

i would also like to mention that alignment plays a role in understeer/oversteer in a car. on a street car, you would only want to run pretty mild alignment specs so the bars come much more into play there, but on a race/track car, you can get alot more agressive with the alignment specs and thus a closer ratio between the bars might work better, plus, driving style plays into it as well. i tend to throw my car into a turn pretty hard and i find that my setup with 24/26 still trys to over steer if i get off the throttle at the wrong point. i would say, take it to a track and get some seat time and make a sway bar decicion based on what you want it to do after you've driven it a while.

 

[RonPorter]

There is one big consideration in this whole discussion......

BUY GOOD TIRES

They help the handling and braking more than anything!! Sorry to say, but many SHO folks have shytty tires (by my personal observation).

Also, keep in mind that an excellent driver can take an absolutely stock SHO and walk away from a poor driver with every suspension mod in the book. Changing bars is not the best mod to do first.

FWIW, the current hot tip for track work are stiff linear springs, a reasonable rear bar, and NO front bar.

 

[drivinhard]

Right on Ron. At road atlanta back in Oct, I spent a whole day with no front bar (part by time constraints, part as I was testing something) and although the car was very hard to drive at the limit (no confidence getting into a corner hard), it was still fast on the stopwatch (even though it didn't feel like it) and corner exit grip (with really soft front springs) was killer.

Shamefully my coilover pieces have been sitting in a box for ages, and slowing mutating themselves into assemblies on the bench, one of the days I'll get them on.

Tweak this tweak that...and 4 laps in a dead stock Z06 on race rubber just drives home the shortcomings of a FWD 4 door with 65% of the weight on the nose with 7.5" rims

 

[Stracey R]

NO front bar.

Won't disconnecting your front endlinks simulate a no front bar feel? If the endlinks are not there, the sway bar on the front will just sit there and not do anything since its not connected to anything, correct?

 

[K-Dawg]

Yep, as long as it doesn't hang and get caught in something.

 

[RonPorter]

Won't disconnecting your front endlinks simulate a no front bar feel? If the endlinks are not there, the sway bar on the front will just sit there and not do anything since its not connected to anything, correct?

Correct

 

[Shuey]

Would there be any body flex in the front?

 

[RonPorter]

Body flex? No more or less than with any bar. Tauri are flexi-flyers anyway!!