oh my! body roll

[PianT]

Came across this article on sway bars, granted he is talking about a BMW but it's still relevant to some degree.

"Now here's the problem with upgrading sway bars only. Yes, they *appear* to reduce body roll. But body roll and weight transfer are NOT necessarily the same thing. When the body rolls, it's transferring weight to the outside, but because the suspension is soft enough, it allows the inside tires (the right hand side from my example above) to remain in contact with the ground.

With big sway bars installed, what happens instead is this. The body still *rolls*, however because the sway bars are so stiff, instead of having the inside tires remain in contact with the road, they now LIFT off the ground, and your effective contact patch is less than 50% of your available grip. So you could, in essence, be driving around on 2 wheels, instead of all 4. It's an easy way to spin, even though the sway bars give you the *impression* of less body roll. Yes, the body rolls less, but the suspension still deflects the same amount it would have before. It's actually quite dangerous to upgrade sway bars without doing the remainder of your suspension.

The second problem with the E36 and big sway bars is the general weakness of the rear sub frame mounts. With ultra stiff sway bars and stock suspension, you can put enough load on the sub frame mounts to pull them clear out, resulting in a painful $$$$ repair (up wards of $5000 to fix....).

Body roll can be reduced by changing springs / shocks, and then adding sway bars into the mix later (if necessary). Sway bars are relatively cheap, so it's an easy upgrade at any time."

[flashbk2]

Nice article...but I can tell you from my own experiences with sway bar upgrades on 2 different cruisers,that the larger sways keep the 4 wheels planted how else could I handle off-ramps at 2x or greater speeds without loss of traction or control ?

[Gear_Head]

I agree with Flashback2. If I was losing traction around curves, I think I'd be feel it. I get more grip around corners than I got before the sways, not to mention less body roll. Like flash I can navagate a corner much better than before the sways were installed. I did take Eibachs recomendation and move the endlinks to the softer setting. Didn't really notice any difference though....

[PianT]

Do either of you have anything else done to the suspension, shocks, springs?

[Gear_Head]

Not going to lower the GT alot. Too much downside to that here in PA. Roads are terrible. Standard GT Turbo springs (supposedly upgraded performance from NA springs) according to DCX. Also stock shocks. I do have a GT Strut tower brace from PT Tuning. I will be going to a set of Konis when I need to change shocks. If I could find a good set of progressivley wound springs that didn't lower the GT too much, I'd consider that too, but I already have some chin rash from steep driveways, combined with not going slow enough...

[MYREDPT]

I just installed the rear Mopr Performance Sway Bar I took off my '01 Limited when I traded it in and I think it handles much better. Got the end links and bolts from Wyckoff. Since I already had the bar, the whole install was under $30.00 and took me about 45 minutes solo.

[flashbk2]

I'm running stock springs,shocks with addco sways and pt wildfire front strut bar. All parts were recycled from my '01 cruiser. My '01 was lowered and had kyb shocks/struts with the same components. Haven't lowered GT as I have " xenon crusher front end " and I thought I was gonna drive GT year-round like my '01 . Driving a neon as winter beater so lowering quite possibly could be in the cards over the winter as well as motor work. Money is the only problem @ the moment !

[Gear_Head]

Ain't it the truth Flash......