And the Newbie strikes again. Ok.. did a search and read bunches of stuff but could not find exactly what I was looking for.
I Have seen every one talk about
Tie Bars, Sway bars, 22mm, 24mm, ect and I have no idea what they mean or what they do.
Can any one explain to me what they do. Found lots of stuff on what brands are good, but cant find anything on the mechanics of them.
If some one can post a pic and point stuff out, would be appreciated.
Also, what brands are good, and is there any trouble installing mentioned pieces.
(why am I asking this?)
Well yesterday I took a corner to get on the interstate a little fast and I felt the car start to lean and slide a bit. Got me a little worried. Now I know I took the corner fast, and I learned my lesson, but I want my car to be a little more responsive, and from what I have read on my searches, these items help that a little.
Also, getting new tires because I have come to the conclusion that the factories suck.
Another thing is that I have severe tire hop when I launch. Can that be remedied(sp)??

Wish List of Parts
AEM CAI
Comptech SS Catback (I do not want LOUD, just more flow than stock)
Comptech Sport Springs (Will I need new shocks for a 1.25 drop?)
Kumho ECSTA Supra 712 (195/55-15) Tires (are these any good)
and a CF hood

I think thats it for now...
I kinda got off topic.. apologies..
Thank you


[Modified by Lildrgn, 3:29 PM 10/2/2001]

 

Hey,
I can not really give you a good discription about what the bars do, however, I can strongly recomend several things on your wish list.
I have the AEM CAI, Comptech SS cat back, and the comptech sport springs, and I recomend these things very very strongly. The intake and exhaust are awesome, the exhaust functions well, sounds great and looks great too. The springs are also awesome, sorry i couldnt help more.
Peace
Mac

 

Swaybars help reduce body roll on your car. Tie bars are just like strut bars, they connect the two ends of your car and help make the car more rigid. Comptech(seems like a brand you like) makes a good swaybar/tiebar combo which looks good and from what I hear performs good as well.
Wish list response:
A. AEM CAI = good choice(popular item)
B. Comptech catback = never heard it
C. You won't need new shocks anytime soon with that drop but keep in mind that your stock shocks are not made to handle stiffer spring rates. I would get new shocks anyways to avoid paying the same labor charges in the future. It's like killing two birds with one stone.
D. Kuhmo ecstas I've heard mixed reviews but more good than bad.

Good luck!

 

Well I heard neuspeed was a good brand for the tie/sway bars too...
which is a good brand, and how hard to install?
also, whats with the mm rating?
Also, can you recommend any good shocks to install as well.
(only reason I listed comptech springs is because I do not want much more than an inch drop, and those are the best I could find as far as price and drop.)
can you list any other good springs? 1" to 1.25" is as low as I want.

Thanks


[Modified by Lildrgn, 4:06 PM 10/2/2001]


[Modified by Lildrgn, 4:07 PM 10/2/2001]

 

as far as sway bars go, i would say that it's hard to beat the type r sway bar with the kit. it's a great value.

 

A cautionary note when installing sway bars:

How good of a driver are you? No, really, how good? This isn't meant to be an insult, but a word of caution.

When you add a stiffer rear sway bar, you're going to make the car more susceptible to oversteer. Oversteer is the tendency of the rear wheels to "come around" on you, know in NASCAR lingo as "loose." Oversteer is a trait that is desireable in racing, as it can drastically improve your cornering. However, if you're not used to it, it can come back to haunt you.

Right now, I know if I go too hot into a corner, my stock GSR with stock rocks on the wheels harmlessly pushes towards the outside, known as understeer. A pain for cornering speed, but very safe and easily recoverable. Lift off on the throttle, and it comes back towards the line I want. If I added a stiff enough rear "sway," or "anti-roll," bar, this could change. I may be driving through the corner, and lift off the throttle, and have the rear end snap around on me. This type of slide, while fun when wanted, is much harder to control.

Not discouraging you from modifying, just know that your car will handle differently. Go onto a deserted parking lot somewhere and explore the differences. Go around and around like a skidpad, right at the limit of the grip, and ease in and out of the throttle. Notice what happens. It will help you when you're driving on the road.


[Modified by allenp, 5:07 PM 10/2/2001]

 

Sweet.. Thanks for the advice.
Ok.. so the sway bar goes in the back.
Can you tell me where all the peices go?
Like: Sway bar goes under the rear of the car?
The tie bars go where?

(pics any one)

Sorry for being such a newbie.

 

Strut tower or tie bars are "passive" devices. Which means that is not an active device. Their purpose is to resist chassis flex. The front and rear upper strut tower bars reduce the amount of chassis flex between the shock towers. You will notice that the Type-R/GS-R/SE all come with a front strut tower bar. The rear lower tie bar reduces the amount of chassis flex between the rear lower control arms. The Type-R is the only Integra that comes with this. Therefore, based on the purpose of these bars, the handling improvements are somewhat subtle.

Swaybars on the other hand are "active" devices. Which means the that they are active or have the ability to function or operate. The purpose of the swaybar is to prevent the amount of "body roll" when the car is turning.

FYI, when a car is going down straight down the road there are no lateral forces acting upon the car. But as soon as the car changes direction the momentum of the car wants to continue in the forward direction. This change is direction causes weight to be transfered to the outward tires. In the non-Type-R-Integras stock form the car is setup to understeer. Understeer (or sometimes called a "push") is caused by more weight being transfered to the front wheel as compared to rear wheels. Oversteer (or sometime called "loose") is just the opposite, more weight being transfered to the rear wheels as compared the front wheel. But there is a happy medium called neutral handling, which means that there is no understeer and no oversteer. Or there is an equal amount of weight on the front and rear tires.

For performance driving you would want a "neutral balance". The primary means for achieving a neutral balance in an Integra is to increase the size of the rear swaybar. A larger rear swaybar will cause more weight to be transfered to the rear wheels which will reduce or eliminate body roll and understeer. My personal recommendation is the Type-R rear swaybar. The reason being is because of the price (approx. $120-$125 for everything) and the size (22mm).

Sorry for being long winded, but I thought that this would helpful to explain this topic indepth.

 

Very Helpful..
That explained everything very well...

Thank you

 

I agree on the type-r swaybar, just make sure when you buy it that it comes with the endlinks and brackets, those can be a pain to find. A lower tie bar in the back will not make a huge difference, but on larger bars it can prevent a sway bar from tearing up metal (i have seen the after effects of not having one) but anything around 22 mm should be fine without. Neuspeed is also a sway bar that is talk alot about, but for the price i would still stay with the type-r.

Other parts:
Exhaust- again, consider a type r exhaust, on a ls, this should bolt right up, and will provide better flow with little increase in noise. For something a little more performance oriented also look at the GReddy SP exhaust, this is the one that i want to get, my friend has one on his GSR and it sounds stock until you put the pedal all the way down.


Kumho tires- i recently purchased these myself- wonderful in the rain, and i just toook them on their first autocross outing, and they were a bit noiser than the yokohamas that i had on there before, they still performed admirably, at half the cost of my others. I did get a 195/50/R15 for a lower sidewall, it is better for my autocrossing, and that little of a change will make little difference in terms of the speedometer being off. and i saved myself 8 bucks off the price of the 55 ones

 

thanks for the info Bret!

 

Not to pick nits, in general BSQ's explanation was good. But there are a few points I'd like to make.

First, I'd be careful with the terms active and passive. In today's suspension technology, both devices (anti-roll bars and tie bars) are passive devices. Meaning, they bolt on and function without any active response. Active devices contain sensors that adjust the characteristics of the device corresponding to some input. Active suspensions can detect a cornering condition and stiffen the dampers to reduce body roll, then when the corner is complete go back to a softer, more comfortable setting.

To be exact, anti-roll bars and tie bars are the exact same device, but connect to different components. They both aim to increase chassis roll stiffness, and by doing that improve cornering response. You can think of your car's chassis as being the suspension for a moment (think go-kart.) The body does flex, albeit a very small amount, under cornering loads. By putting a tie bar on it, you connect the right side to the left side, and thus increase the resistance to flex. Now correlate that to the actual vehicle suspension. You're tying the right wheel to the left wheel, so when the right wheel deflects it transmits that force thru the bar to the left, using both stiffnesses to resist the roll.

Increasing the size of the rear anti-roll bar does not in itself cause more weight to be transferred to the rear wheels. In fact, in most cases, increasing weight on the rear wheels will worsen understeer, as the rear will "stick" harder. This is the function of rear wings on race cars -- aerodynamically increasing weight on rear wheels. What it does do is increase rear roll stiffness. Generally, increasing rear roll stiffness reduces understeer.

Lastly, neutral handling does not imply 50/50 weight distribution. Nor does 50/50 distribution imply neutral handling. There are cars with 60/40 distribution that oversteer naturally, and there are cars with 40/60 distribtion that understeer. By adjusting the suspension, the designers can make the car handle just about any way they want, to a point.

Again, not to criticize or pick nits, but I just want everyone to understand the concepts correctly.

 

i saw you are looking into tires too i'd suggest going a little wider with a 205 instead of that paltry stock 195's

 

Not to nit pick, but there are a few points that I would like to clarify and comment on.

Just to clarify, notice that when I used the word passive and active that I put them in quotes (ie. ''passive", "active"). Meaning that I wasn't calling something an active suspension. Because as you mentioned there is such a thing as active suspension. What I was meaning was that when a force is applied to swaybar, it reacts by twisting. When a force is applied to a spring it compressed. Therefore, these two items are "active" device. If you look up the word active in the dictionary is says "having the power to operate or influence". When a force is applied to a strut tower bar or a tie bar, it does not react (ie. it doesn't twist or compress). Therefore, it can be referred to as a "passive" device. If you look up the passive in the dictionary is says "not acting, but acted upon".

For everyone that would like to find out on swaybars go to http://www.grmotorsports.com/swaybars.html . This is a very good article which does a good job of explaining swaybars and how they affect the handling of the car.


I do not agree with the comments made in the first sentence. Based on my explaination above.


I do not agree with these statements. By increasing the size of the rear swaybar less weight will be transfered to the front wheels when the car is turning. Therefore, if less weight is being transfered to front wheels, then more weight has to be on the rear wheels. Rear weight will not worsen understeer, see http://www.google.com/search?q=cache...ng+chart&hl=en for a chart which shows this.


Theoretically 50/50 weight distribution would give neutral balance. Think of it this way, if you have a car which weights 2000 lbs. and the weight was distributed 50/50, the each wheel would be supporting 500 lbs. Therefore each wheel would be caring the same load. Ideally a performance car is designed to be as close to 50/50 weight distribution, look at the Honda S2000. But sometime auto designers are unable to acheive this goal. This is where suspension tuning comes into play. Engineers then have to start working with spring rates, dampening rates, swaybar sizes to try to acheive the handling balance that they are trying to acheive.


I greatly appreciate allenp's comments. I just wanted to address his comments and make this a learning experience for others to learn. Any comments from allenp or others would be openly welcomed.

 

I don't want to enter/contribute to an argument, both people make good points

If you want to see pics of a swaybar and tie bar on the lower rear, look at my site; there are close-up pics. The sway and tie bar are Comptech. They now sell both together for ~380 in a kit (the tie bar in the kit actually reinforces the frame, whereas in the a la carte kits, the swaybar comes with separate reinforcement plates and the tie bar mounts like the ITR one on my site and provides little/no chassis tear protection; I got these separate for 270 and 160).

I would say the ITR bar with BSQ's mounting kit is a great deal and I would have gotten that had it been available 2 years ago.

The only thing with the Comptech bar is it comes with polyurethane bushings (which are harder than rubber BUT have a tendency to squeak unless you lubricate them). Polyurethane is regarded as superior to standard rubber bushings, but its up to you if the extra maintenance hassle is worth it. Also, to stiffen up the front a little, I replaced the rubber endlink bushings and swaybar bushings up FRONT with polyurethane. This seems to help the steering response quite a bit, but the squeak is annoying.

 

I'd like to add that sometimes my car scares me while cornering very hard it seems like the back end will come lose, but it has not yet! In retrospect (sp??), I would have bought a 19 mm bar instead! Just pick wisely!

 

I noticed that you have Eibach Prokits, Illuminas and Type-R rear swaybar. But are you still running the stock tires?

If so, this may be some of the reason that your car "feels" like the back tires will loose traction. Also how do you have your shocks set (front and rear)? You can adjust the handling by adjusting your shocks and by also adjusting your tire pressures.

 

I can't add anything to the sway bar debate except that Bret (BSQ) knows his stuff.

So... Don't waste your money on the Comptech springs. They are overpriced Eibach ProKits. Just get the Eibach's and KYB AGX or Koni Yellow adjustable shocks.

The Comptech exhaust is very good though. They have improved the design of the b-pipe. Before my b-pipe cracked at the welds where the resonator is because there was no support to hold the extra wieght. They have since fixed the flaw so now it's great. Customer service was also very good. They replaced the b-pipe for me for the revised version for free!!! It also helped that my friend at Honda knew Bob... But that was before I moved to Texas. Doh!


[Modified by Gee3, 10:41 PM 10/3/2001]

 

To move from the sway bar debate, I can make a few comments about your other choices.

First, I'd highly recommend you get involved with autocrossing. It'll help teach you car control at the limit. You said, "...felt the car start to lean and slide a bit." Of course the car is going to lean, no big deal, but what about that slide? My guess is you were understeering through the turn. If you chickened out half way through the turn and lifted off the gas, even a stock suspension could start to slide on you. Autocross would teach you how to handle the car in these situations and correct for them.

For parts....

Comptech exhaust is nice. A slight power gain, with no loss of power. Sound isn't too loud and certainly doesn't sound buzzy like many of the other exhausts out there. Looking things over again, though, I'd probably go Mugen next time around.

As someone mentioned, Comptech Springs are just Eibachs...so cut out the middle man. If you're looking for just a small drop, you could go with H&R OE Sport Springs. The .75 inch drop doesn't require a camber kit or new shocks. I'd still recommend new shocks anyway.

However, before recommending new suspension, someone here should have asked you where you're going to drive the car: street, autocross, track, drag, all of the above. The answer to what will work well depends on your needs.

The Kumho 712 is a good tire for the money, but certainly doesn't have ultimate grip. Again, if you're autocrossing, there are better tires than this. If you're just on the street, these tire will do fine.

 

One other thing...you asked where sway bars connect. Check out this link.
http://integra.vtec.net/geeser/swaybar.html

 

But I doesnt the prokit drop the car like 1.75?
Thats to low for me.
Dont want to get real low... just low enough to get rid of some of that tacky tire well clearance.

Thanks again for all your advice, but now I am really confused again.
so much stuff to read.. headache forming.
so far I have understood this:

ITR swaybar
Either ITR catback or Comptech SS
AEM CAI
205 instead of 195 tires (this makes the tires wider correct?) dont want that, wider tires = more friction = more drag = slower car
Eibach springs (although I have to check the drop, I think its lower than I want)
CF hood
Still debating wing or not. Dont want ricey but do want something a little bit different, but worried about extra un needed weight.
anything else?
Im not going to race at a track or anything, but just want to be able to keep up with the rice boys. (BTW I am a pretty good driver, for some one who wanted to know)
Thanks again for all your answers and input

 

with regards to the lift off oversteer.
i was quite used to my old corolla twin cam.
it plowed through the corners, understeering like a bastard... and the moment i lift off a bit, the **** of the car would try to come around and bite me. very unpleasant
took my integra out for a fang for the first time last weekend and found it to be SOOOOOO much better.
boy was i pleasantly surprised.
lift off oversteer was still there, but only very very slightly compared to the (15 year old) corolla. i think the fact my front tyres have plenty of tread and the rears are bald would be contributing to it.

one thing i've noticed is that fwd cars seem more suseptable to this problem than rwd cars. i'm not sure why.

i know with rwd cars i have driven, the oversteer you end up with in it, is either power induced, or body roll induced.

these auto-x events i see americans talk about looks alot like the motorkhana events that car clubs have on weekends.

peace out.

 

The Eibach Prokits lower the car 1.5", but the Sportlines will lower it 1.8". I have Prokits on my car, you can see some pictures at http://www.geocities.com/bretq/gallery.html .

 

The reason that you will experience oversteer when you lift off of the throttle, is because you are transferring weight to the front wheels when you do this. This transfer of weight to the front wheels causes less weight to on the rear wheels and therefore there is less traction on the rear wheels when you turning, which causes the rear end to come around (ie. understeer). Lift throttle oversteer can be very helpfull when trying to get the rear end of the car to come around at the track.

 

Okay, I'm back.. BSQ, it's nice to see that someone is open to dialogue and not critical or argumentative in their comments. I think we all can learn something here.

I'd like to open by saying (and trust me, I'm not blowing my own horn, just trying to add some credibility to my statements) that I have a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering and took several high-level design courses that focused on suspension design, vehicle dynamics, and vehicle testing. My daily job includes in-vehicle testing and evaluation of drivetrain components. So I feel I have a fair amount of education and experience to back my statements. And this is in no way meant to discredit BSQ or anyone else, please don't take that the wrong way.

But, back to the discussion:

Strut tower tie bars do in fact react. If you were to place a strain gauge on a tie bar and take a corner, you would see actual compression. The motion is dramatically smaller than a anti-roll (sway) bar, but there nonetheless. Any piece of metal, no matter how big, will deflect a given amount with a given amount of force.

And if you were to apply your own definition to both sway and tie bars, "not acting, but acted upon," they are both passive. They are both acted upon. The only acting they do is resist motion based on their physical characteristics, a completely passive device.

In function and theory, sway bars and tie bars ARE the exact same device. They are both structural members that connect one corner of the vehicle to the other, and they both increase the roll stiffness of that end of the car. The difference is one connects the suspension components, and one connects the chassis components.

I am in the middle of checking my references for an explanation of how sway bars affect weight transfer in a corner. For the moment, all I remember is that they increase roll stiffness, and increased roll stiffness reduces the cornering traction at that end of the vehicle. Hopefully I will find what I'm looking for and post it!

As for static weight distribution:
Agreed, performance cars strive for 50/50. No question, that's the best place to start from when designing the suspension. But, the dynamic weight distribution, which is a critical factor in cornering performance, can be drastically different and is dependent on the suspension parameters, as BSQ noted. My reason for making the statement I did is to prevent the simplistic assumption that 50/50 distribution will give you neutral handling -- it does not.

The Handling Chart that BSQ cites is a good general guideline. But, it does not apply to every vehicle and every situation. So it's not a final answer... It says that to reduce understeer, you want more rearward weight distribution. This may be generally true, but there are definite exceptions.

All for now... Is anyone's head hurting yet???