Whiteline 22mm Front Bar Clunk... (Tried searching)

[MarkR171]

I know sway bar clunks are super common, and I did search on FT86club, google, etc. and tried solutions I could find. Still clunking.

My car:
Koni Yellows
TRD Springs
Whiteline 22mm front bar with the supplied Whiteline endlinks
(Previous bar was the TRD bar with stock links, no problems)

Driving normally, even on bumpy roads, the car seems perfectly fine with no noises. However, if I hit a sudden/jarring bump with the left front, I get a loud clunk I can feel in the floor. It seems to only clunk when the left front goes over a sudden bump (not a rolling bump if that makes sense) while the right front is rolling normally.

Things I've tried/checked:
1. Attached endlinks with load on the suspension
2. Torqued endlinks properly with load
3. Adjustable endlink lock nuts are tight
4. Checked all suspension bolt torques - everything tight
5. Measured and measured again, the sway bar is perfectly centered
6. Locking collars have exactly 4mm clearance from the bushings (per whiteline's lock collar manual)

There is no grease in the bushings as my kit came with Whitelines newer PTFE lined non-grease bushings. Their instructions say not to use any grease, and no grease was supplied in the box.

Possible culprit:
It seems as though the sway bar is making contact with my lower control arm somehow. There is visible scratching on the control arm and a little bit of rash on the edge of the sway bar, possibly from contact. I don't know for sure if that's what's going on, but the passenger side control arm does not have the same scratches - and the clunking seems to only be on the driver side.

I thought the end links may be too long, allowing the bar to stay low enough to hit the LCA when the left side goes over a sudden bump, but my end links are already nearly at their shortest possible length and they are the Whiteline adjustable links supplied with the kit. I could possibly get them about 2-3mm shorter at the very most if I detached them and tried again - which I may do when I'm less annoyed with working on the car. I've been working on it for 3 days now trying to figure this out. The amount I could shorten them by is the amount of threads you can see in the picture below. Not much.

Picture of the driver side LCA:

[smg1138]

Since you're on springs, you probably need shorter endlinks. I'm lowered about 1" and had similar problems before. I switched to some shorter endlinks from Feal and the problem went away. I think Whiteline makes shorter adjustable ones too, but they're hard to find in stock anywhere.

[MarkR171]

Originally Posted by smg1138

Since you're on springs, you probably need shorter endlinks. I'm lowered about 1" and had similar problems before. I switched to some shorter endlinks from Feal and the problem went away. I think Whiteline makes shorter adjustable ones too, but they're hard to find in stock anywhere.

That's what I'm thinking... but I also thought that was the point of shipping the kit with adjustable links. Except the minimum is still too short. I'm going to go out and try to shorten them by as much as I could, probably 2mm more and see if that helps anything.

Otherwise, I'll order shorter links next week.

[strat61caster]

I agree, the links Whiteline sells with the bar are too long, and they're a pain in the ass to switch holes.

Finding alternates is on my list of car projects.

[MarkR171]

Originally Posted by strat61caster

I agree, the links Whiteline sells with the bar are too long, and they're a pain in the ass to switch holes.

Finding alternates is on my list of car projects.

Does this mean you're having a similar issue with a whiteline bar? (Or endlinks?)

[whataboutbob]

Cut the endlink body right at the line I circled on both sides. I think it removes about 10mm off the length. I had a similar problem and shortening the body gave me just enough clearance.

Bob

Originally Posted by MarkR171

I know sway bar clunks are super common, and I did search on FT86club, google, etc. and tried solutions I could find. Still clunking.

My car:
Koni Yellows
TRD Springs
Whiteline 22mm front bar with the supplied Whiteline endlinks
(Previous bar was the TRD bar with stock links, no problems)

Driving normally, even on bumpy roads, the car seems perfectly fine with no noises. However, if I hit a sudden/jarring bump with the left front, I get a loud clunk I can feel in the floor. It seems to only clunk when the left front goes over a sudden bump (not a rolling bump if that makes sense) while the right front is rolling normally.

Things I've tried/checked:
1. Attached endlinks with load on the suspension
2. Torqued endlinks properly with load
3. Adjustable endlink lock nuts are tight
4. Checked all suspension bolt torques - everything tight
5. Measured and measured again, the sway bar is perfectly centered
6. Locking collars have exactly 4mm clearance from the bushings (per whiteline's lock collar manual)

There is no grease in the bushings as my kit came with Whitelines newer PTFE lined non-grease bushings. Their instructions say not to use any grease, and no grease was supplied in the box.

Possible culprit:
It seems as though the sway bar is making contact with my lower control arm somehow. There is visible scratching on the control arm and a little bit of rash on the edge of the sway bar, possibly from contact. I don't know for sure if that's what's going on, but the passenger side control arm does not have the same scratches - and the clunking seems to only be on the driver side.

I thought the end links may be too long, allowing the bar to stay low enough to hit the LCA when the left side goes over a sudden bump, but my end links are already nearly at their shortest possible length and they are the Whiteline adjustable links supplied with the kit. I could possibly get them about 2-3mm shorter at the very most if I detached them and tried again - which I may do when I'm less annoyed with working on the car. I've been working on it for 3 days now trying to figure this out. The amount I could shorten them by is the amount of threads you can see in the picture below. Not much.

Picture of the driver side LCA:

[MarkR171]

I don't have the tools to make any cuts, so I'd rather just buy another set of links that I know will fit correctly.

[renfield90]

Had the same issues with a Hotchkis bar and left front control arm. Some of us just have slightly unfortunate geometry I think.

When I went to STX and got lower, the problem got a thousand times worse, as instead of a light knock, the bar would bind itself up on the control arm and drive itself too deep in and get stuck. I solved it with an angle grinder to the sway bar...now I can't use the driver's side soft hole.

Bob's got the right idea, you need much shorter endlinks to keep the bar above the control arm at all times. OR you can go with much longer endlinks. That actually might be the preferable solution since a shorter endlink will result in more steering bind. Our front endlink design is pretty terrible in that respect.

[whataboutbob]

Originally Posted by MarkR171

I don't have the tools to make any cuts, so I'd rather just buy another set of links that I know will fit correctly.

Fair enough, but a fresh hacksaw blade makes it easy to trim.

[strat61caster]

Originally Posted by MarkR171

Does this mean you're having a similar issue with a whiteline bar? (Or endlinks?)

I have similar clearance at full droop with my 20mm Whiteline bar, but I have not experienced any noises I can attribute to contact there, nor do I have any rub marks or dents like you do.

I think someone got lazy over there and we got a copy pasted bar/parts list.

If the end link was shorter to get more clearance to that LCA at droop that would be great, far as I can tell there's no reason for it to be that long. If you're real short on the soft hole (because clearance to that LCA is abysmal) and decide you want to move one side to the stiffer hole for a 'medium' setting, too bad, pull the other wheel off and lengthen one side or move both to stiff.

Even better would be if the sway bar was 'wider' such that it flared out and you could flip the bottom of the endlink around to the other side so the stud points out making access to the nut a piece of cake with the wheel off.

If both those things were fixed I'd happily rate the Whiteline bar as a 10/10. I think I'll be happy with a more basic endlink and through bolt like this, just gotta find one in the right specs and not break the bank:




Back when I was a kid racing little go-kart like things where we would bend dozens of these a season we ended up buying like 100 ft. of aluminum rod (they were like 1/2", maybe 5/8" diameter), a handful of rod ends. We made our own with a vice, hack saw, left and right handed tap, and two wrenchs we could come up with new set for about half the car between heat races.

Edit: Worth noting, clearance does increase when the suspension is compressed iirc, ideally we'd all be changing settings and adjusting with the car on the ground to ensure zero preload on the sway bar but that's just not convenient to accomplish, and sometimes downright impossible if you don't have access to a lift or big ramps.

Edit 2: The picture I grabbed was from this forum post on miata.net, I doubt the parts are straight across usable but if you've got a relationship with a vendor they might be able to source something for you. I was going to go searching for generic parts to try and save a few bucks, a bit of diy engineering to ensure they're strong enough. Someone else has posted a source on here as well for some generic endlinks but I'm lazy.

http://forum.miata.net/vb/showthread.php?t=310891

[Fenix]

Originally Posted by MarkR171

I know sway bar clunks are super common, and I did search on FT86club, google, etc. and tried solutions I could find. Still clunking.

My car:
Koni Yellows
TRD Springs
Whiteline 22mm front bar with the supplied Whiteline endlinks
(Previous bar was the TRD bar with stock links, no problems)

Driving normally, even on bumpy roads, the car seems perfectly fine with no noises. However, if I hit a sudden/jarring bump with the left front, I get a loud clunk I can feel in the floor. It seems to only clunk when the left front goes over a sudden bump (not a rolling bump if that makes sense) while the right front is rolling normally.

Things I've tried/checked:
1. Attached endlinks with load on the suspension
2. Torqued endlinks properly with load
3. Adjustable endlink lock nuts are tight
4. Checked all suspension bolt torques - everything tight
5. Measured and measured again, the sway bar is perfectly centered
6. Locking collars have exactly 4mm clearance from the bushings (per whiteline's lock collar manual)

There is no grease in the bushings as my kit came with Whitelines newer PTFE lined non-grease bushings. Their instructions say not to use any grease, and no grease was supplied in the box.

Possible culprit:
It seems as though the sway bar is making contact with my lower control arm somehow. There is visible scratching on the control arm and a little bit of rash on the edge of the sway bar, possibly from contact. I don't know for sure if that's what's going on, but the passenger side control arm does not have the same scratches - and the clunking seems to only be on the driver side.

I thought the end links may be too long, allowing the bar to stay low enough to hit the LCA when the left side goes over a sudden bump, but my end links are already nearly at their shortest possible length and they are the Whiteline adjustable links supplied with the kit. I could possibly get them about 2-3mm shorter at the very most if I detached them and tried again - which I may do when I'm less annoyed with working on the car. I've been working on it for 3 days now trying to figure this out. The amount I could shorten them by is the amount of threads you can see in the picture below. Not much.

Picture of the driver side LCA:

You are not alone. My end links are also long. They constantly clunk. I will eventually switch them.

[MarkR171]

So I got the endlinks out, shortened them to the absolute minimum (probably about 2 turns shorter,) and no difference. The same bump down the street from my place that is on the left side of the road only made the same loud thump. I had a Hotchkis bar on my old 135i that had a slight clunk issue with loose endlinks, so my current noise doesn't sound like that at all. Instead, it's definitely the sound of something hitting.

I really wanted to sort this out tonight because I have a test and tune autocross tomorrow. I'm going to try to run it as is, but if there are issues, I packed my TRD bar in the car and I'll swap it in the paddock.

[strat61caster]

Worth noting, it looks like you have the bar flipped from how I've mounted it and seen others mounted:

http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showp...&postcount=319

That may actually be the solution based on pictures but those can be deceiving...

Edit: to hopefully ping you if you haven't gone to bed yet, good luck.

Originally Posted by MarkR171

I really wanted to sort this out tonight because I have a test and tune autocross tomorrow.

[MarkR171]

Originally Posted by whataboutbob

Fair enough, but a fresh hacksaw blade makes it easy to trim.

It might be time I got myself a hacksaw. And I guess some sort of vice to hold it in place while I cut?