Swaybar stiffness question
 

Greetings,

I recently autoxed my car with my whiteline swaybars on the softest setting. I felt that the car still had a lot of body roll and I'd like to change the stiffness by moving the end links to the stiffer setting.

If I do this, will the car need to be corner balanced again? Will the preload need to be adjusted again?

I will probably be doing this for both front and rear.

Thanks

No, stiffening the sway bars won't affect the weight distribution of your car when standing still, or your alignment.

While the weight distribution won't be affected, I would recommend you to drive on your preferred setting, and make alignment adjustments to compensate for how the car's handling changes.

Just because it has less roll doesn't mean it will be faster nor will you enjoy it more.

-alex

Thanks for the advice.

I noticed after the autox that my front tires had wear indicative of understeer (outer edge radial treads folding inwards). I understand this could be a result of me entering the corner too quickly, but I wasn't plowing through corners...the car felt very planted and I was cornering to my satisfaction. I deduced from this (and correct me if I'm wrong) that I could even out the weight distribution in corners (by stiffening the sway bar) so that the L/R tires have a more equal force on them.

Let me know if I am incorrect in my thinking.

P.S. I was running ~ -2.5 deg camber up front and -1.6 in the rear.

Thanks

Stiffening the sway bar should be done to adjust balance, not stop body roll. If you just stiffen the front bar you'll be shifting the balance towards understeer and might actually end up with slower cornering speeds as a result.

As for the tires, have you tried playing with pressure to stop them from rolling over too much? That can also mess with the balance and grip but is much easier to change between runs.

Did you HAVE understeer, or you just noticed the tires wearing? What tires are you running and at what pressures? Maybe @CSG Mike could chime in to help you out some more.

Everyone above is on point with questions and feed back. Also do you only have sway bars or do you have other suspension upgrades that are adjustable?

Something to always keep in mind when "tuning" your suspension setup is change one setting at a time and do a run or 2 and see what it does. This helps to see the result of what that one adjustment did and you learn from it.

Also, dial 1 end of a car in at a time as well. Don't just adjust both sway bars at the same time just because.

Usually starting with the front is the best way to go. Try to remove the understeer (or get as close as you can) with the adjustments you have available. Once you have done that setup the rear to handle how you like. Every person, every course, and setup has a preference, so there isn't one "go to" answer of where to set things. Just basic understanding of what each setting does.

I did have mild understeer.

MPSS 245/17s on 17x9 RPF1s @ 35lbs cold. Didn't bother to check them after runs


I have ST XTA coilovers. They were set to middle stiffness 7/14 clicks front and rear. Also I dumped the camber plates as far as they could go.

I just ordered shorter whiteline adjustable endlinks for the front because I couldn't put the bar on the stiffer setting due to collision between the arm and the bar.

I am going to get the car realigned and corner balanced at a shop that has very knowledgeable staff and hopefully they will also guide me towards even better handling.

ARB's are the last thing that you want to adjust with. So I would play with camber and tire pressures first. If you want to get rid of some understeer using an ARB you will soften the front or stiffen the rear.

I don't know the characteristics of those tires, but you can try to lower the front pressure a little bit (maybe down to 32psi cold) as long as they weren't overheating and that might help you out.

ARB = ???

ARB = anti-roll bar = sway bar