Sway bar knowledge

[cycleguy55]

Originally Posted by bobcowan

Body roll is not necessarily a bad thing. Changing sway bars will change handling characteristics, specifically under and oversteer. If your car is pretty neutral right now, and you add a significantly larger front sway bar, you will most likely develop oversteer.

How Sway Bars Work and Why You Should Care | Speed Academy

If you just want to eliminate body roll, you might want to consider increasing springs rates. Especially if you're getting a lot of nose dive on hard braking.

How's your transient response? On a quick left right left, does it seem to wallow or get tail happy? If it does, that would be another reason to consider better springs.

Increasing the size of the front bar or adding one will increase understeer, not oversteer.

To increase understeer: Add or increase the size / stiffness of the front bar, reduce the size / soften or remove the rear bar, or a combination of both.

To increase oversteer: Add or increase the size / stiffness of the rear bar, reduce the size / soften or remove the front bar, or a combination of both.

[CowtownCobra]

A few of us have used a 3/4" 65 Mustang rear swaybar as our front swaybar. I like the way it made the car respond, but I'm a street cruiser not a racer.

[bobcowan]

Originally Posted by cycleguy55

Increasing the size of the front bar or adding one will increase understeer, not oversteer.

To increase understeer: Add or increase the size / stiffness of the front bar, reduce the size / soften or remove the rear bar, or a combination of both.

To increase oversteer: Add or increase the size / stiffness of the rear bar, reduce the size / soften or remove the front bar, or a combination of both.

You are correct. Should have read my own article a little more closely, I guess.

Anyway, the point is, changing the sway bar will change the way the car handles. That's really the whole point. If you're not careful, you could create an evil handling car in certain situations.

Before making any changes, carefully evaluate how the car handles, then - and only then - make the appropriate changes. Re-evaluate the car, and be prepared to make more changes if necessary.