what size sway bars for my coilover setup?

[Dave Kegel]

Here's another link that covers sway bar combinations, but I'm not sure how much it applies to a car with coilovers: http://www.panix.com/~awinbow/sho/suspension.html

I recently drove two Gen2s back to back on the track. One with 24/26 bars and poly bushings front and rear, the other with 24/26 and rubber front bushings/poly rear. The car with poly/poly had noticably more understeer, as you would expect. So, running the 24mm front bar with rubber bushings seems like a good alternative to switching to the 22mm bar, at least on a fairly high speed track.

Like Mark mentioned, for a track car, yoy can actually get by without sway bars if you have stiff enough springs. Mike Courtney's track car had no sway bars, if I remember correctly. As for 700 lbs springs... I personally can't see how the SHO-specific Koni's could even keep up with that kind of a spring rate. I guess they'd last a while at full stiff, but I wouldn't think it would be streetable.


Dave Kegel

<small>[ June 06, 2003, 06:02 PM: Message edited by: Dave Kegel ]</small>

 

[thebigjimsho]

drivinhard:
You can get away more with a bigger from bar with a quaife and not push as much under power. In an ideal world, you want to get your roll stiffness from springs and not sway bars. This makes for a punishing ride on the street though (but keeps the tires on the track better). Big bars tend to lift the inside wheel off the ground.

For a typical weighted MTX car w/ a quaife, 22/26 is a nice compromise for street/track work. Auto-x is a different animal, as it's slow speed tight radius slow speed corners, you want the car to rotate as much as possible. Probably not the same set-up you'd want to run doing 100+ mph off turn 12 at Road Atlanta with the wall just feet away.

If you race your SHO, you'll have every sway bar size hanging on your garage wall, something for every occasion Every car, track/tire is a bit different. There is no perfect combo for everything.

Well, I must not have had YOUR speed, Mark, on that turn. I kept out of trouble, but, yeah, like Mark said, different bars for different tracks would be the bestest. A neutral car is primo for autocrossing, not as much so for a road course. thumb

 

[billyshoe]

The rear is planted but I can feel the front leaning a little.
The front rolling over is whats making the back outside tire stick. stay on the gas.