What are the pros and cons on running without the stock sway bar on my 1996 civic coupe?

 

well if you don't run one up front that means (asuming you like your car to rotate) that you have to give it that much less stiffness out back. this is kinda vauge statment it makes sense to me in my head but might not to you

 

On a street car you use a front swaybar to reduce body roll since you can't use stiff springs. On a purely track car, you use high enough spring rates that a front swaybar isnt needed, and then you get the benefit of better acceleration out of turns. A swaybar makes an independent suspension dependent. It will take traction off the inside wheel, which is bad on the drivewheels especially without a LSD. The trans sends all the power to the wheel with no traction.

Less weight up front.

You still want to use a rear swaybar though.

 

On my ITA crx I have NO front sway bar and a big rear one with 450lb springs up front and 600's in the rear.

My car rotates very nicely and has about a 10-20% oversteer but when the tires get hot and greasy the car evens out to a 10% understeer... Since I like more over then under I think I'm gonna set the rear shocks a bit stiffer to help compensate... but I might just play with tire pressures first.

 

ok so i have 400lb springs up front and 500 in the rear coupled with my progress coilovers. would that be considered high enough that i wouldn't need the benefit of the sway bar up front? Unfortunately i don't have a rear sway bar yet but as far as settings go i got about 1.5 degree toe out -3 degree camber up front and 2.5 in the rear. Of course the rear sits higher about a half inch more then the front. if that makes sense.

Thanks for all your guys inputs on the dynamics of the car with and without swaybars.

The only reason I made this post was because I recently may have wasted my money on chromoly LCAs from Competition Engineering. My mechanic ordered them for me saying that I would be able to adjust my camber and that they would save me 24lbs of weight for both sides. Since I have a coupe I'm always about weight savings. So I am trying to figure out if I could have tossed the money into a racing bucket instead.

As you guys can tell I'm wet behind the ears as far as supension set ups. I haven't read that much into road racing and autox yet but slowly and surely I am starting to get there.

In 24hrs I will be running at my local SCCA autox event here in Las Vegas. Hopefully I can reap the benefits of my newly set up suspension.

I owe many many thanks to Auto Performance of Las Vegas especially Victor, Eladio and Gene. Without these guys Id be buying a body kit and stereo system for my car.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by AutoxEK9 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">ok so i have 400lb springs up front and 500 in the rear coupled with my progress coilovers. </TD></TR></TABLE>

Does your progress shock are revalved to have this spring rates... I got progress coil-over kit (the base one) and I would like to have that spring rate(400/500) but i'm not sure about the stock valving on the progress will take it....

 

autox is over 90% driver skill. and its easier to learn technique on a mostly stock car.

dont get into a habbit that everytime YOU mess up you blame the car and think you must mod it to preform better. also, understeer/oversteer is VERY dependant on the style of driving. if you are driving at 11/10's of the cars capability, more than likely you will be plowing into and out of turns.

i run 475/600 with no front bar and a 19mm rear bar and the car is pretty much planted. i like it a lot better without the front bar, but on the street the steering response isnt as crisp as when i had it on. its really all driver preference. just go drive and have fun. oh yeah and i think the bling control arms are going to throw you into prepared class.

 

I agree with Jer about driver skill, but I usually neglect to mention anything about it cuz this is a car forum not a driving forum, or at least I think of it that way.

24lbs lighter each side on the front will make a huge improvement to how your front wheels hold the road. Course I would have spent that money on a driving class but I said I wouldn't mention anything like that.

I think you still need a front bar with 400 front spring rate, but it depends on the type of racing. AutoX probably no, you're not getting to high enough speeds to load the suspension up as hard as road racing. If the front end still rolls badly causing lots of camber change, then you need a front bar or higher front rates.

That much rake is killing you. Lower the rear end and then take out some of the rear camber.

Those massive oversteer setups are not making the most of the available traction. But for a low speed tight course like autoX, maybe it works.

 

I am always the first one to scold people for trying to combat body roll with sway bars rather than springs. But while others in my region have been popping off their bars, I have been sceptical. Every purpose built race car I have ever seen has an anti-roll system in place for both axles, and Carrol Smith's books all vouch for how necesary they are, so I wasn't convinced this was a way to make our cars faster.

I decided to pull out the ol' LapSim today, so I am going to share what I found with the class. I picked an identical point on a left turn, ran the same FWD car through both, and only changed the front sway stiffness, one at 50Nmm, one at 0Nmm. I observed only force exerted on each tire.

Force in Newtons

w/swaybar
1298 5082
183 4420

w/o sway bar
1426 4977
0 4548

diff
+128 -105
-183 +128

looking at this, I concluded that indeed, there is more weight on the front left tire. This should combat wheel spin, which has been a reported positive effect. Also, net weight is added to the front of the car, producing more bite, and hopefully oversteer. However, we also see that we have no weight on our inside wheel. Yes, we have wheel lift , which means we have less rubber on the road behind the CG, which should also add more oversteer.

I am not convinced this is good. We have increase our ability to accelarate by about 23 N in the front axle(normal force), however we have cost our car 55 N of normal force on the rear axle AND the abliity to transfer more weight due to a 0'ed wheel. I think this will make a car that rotates for sure, but your overall cornering you can exhert on the road is reduced, while only adding a minor advantage to acceleration.

The sway bars function seems to be a dynamic means of corner weight your car .

I think that skilled trail braking, turn in, and accleration by the driver, that and an LSD, if preferable for speed to removing your front bar.

LapSim agrees with me by 0.6 seconds in favor of running your front bar.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Jer &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">autox is over 90% driver skill. and its easier to learn technique on a mostly stock car.

dont get into a habbit that everytime YOU mess up you blame the car and think you must mod it to preform better. also, understeer/oversteer is VERY dependant on the style of driving. if you are driving at 11/10's of the cars capability, more than likely you will be plowing into and out of turns.

i run 475/600 with no front bar and a 19mm rear bar and the car is pretty much planted. i like it a lot better without the front bar, but on the street the steering response isnt as crisp as when i had it on. its really all driver preference. just go drive and have fun. oh yeah and i think the bling control arms are going to throw you into prepared class.</TD></TR></TABLE>lI can't agree with you more Jer with autox being 90% driver. I just wasn't feeling as comfortable as I was before the new arms were put on and the swaybar removed. Its probably all in my head. I just have to get used to it. About the arms putting me in another class: shhh...what they don't know won't hurt them.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by gotocrx &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I am always the first one to scold people for trying to combat body roll with sway bars rather than springs. But while others in my region have been popping off their bars, I have been sceptical. Every purpose built race car I have ever seen has an anti-roll system in place for both axles, and Carrol Smith's books all vouch for how necesary they are, so I wasn't convinced this was a way to make our cars faster.

I decided to pull out the ol' LapSim today, so I am going to share what I found with the class. I picked an identical point on a left turn, ran the same FWD car through both, and only changed the front sway stiffness, one at 50Nmm, one at 0Nmm. I observed only force exerted on each tire.

Force in Newtons

w/swaybar
1298 5082
183 4420

w/o sway bar
1426 4977
0 4548

diff
+128 -105
-183 +128

looking at this, I concluded that indeed, there is more weight on the front left tire. This should combat wheel spin, which has been a reported positive effect. Also, net weight is added to the front of the car, producing more bite, and hopefully oversteer. However, we also see that we have no weight on our inside wheel. Yes, we have wheel lift , which means we have less rubber on the road behind the CG, which should also add more oversteer.

I am not convinced this is good. We have increase our ability to accelarate by about 23 N in the front axle(normal force), however we have cost our car 55 N of normal force on the rear axle AND the abliity to transfer more weight due to a 0'ed wheel. I think this will make a car that rotates for sure, but your overall cornering you can exhert on the road is reduced, while only adding a minor advantage to acceleration.

The sway bars function seems to be a dynamic means of corner weight your car .

I think that skilled trail braking, turn in, and accleration by the driver, that and an LSD, if preferable for speed to removing your front bar.

LapSim agrees with me by 0.6 seconds in favor of running your front bar.

</TD></TR></TABLE>
Thanks for the physics class. I passed that with a C- so I see where your getting at. What you said about battling understeering with swaybars rather than springs intrigues me. This is my daily driver so I don't want spring rates to be too crazy. The only reason I went 400f/500r is because it is still streetable to me. What would you suggest interms of spring rates to battle understeer on our cars? Even if its a race set up it is fine because I will be testing and tuning my car in preparation for HPDE in November right after SEMA Show here in Las Vegas.

Again thanks for all your guys input in my questions. I have only been racing and dialing in my suspension for the last 6 weeks so its all new to me.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by AutoxEK9 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
. What would you suggest interms of spring rates to battle understeer on our cars? Even if its a race set up it is fine because I will be testing and tuning my car in preparation for HPDE in November right after SEMA Show here in Las Vegas.
.</TD></TR></TABLE>

knowing the tires would help, but if you want to get rid of push then have less grip in the back. you can do this many ways one of which is to mess with springs and sway's, another is tires and the width you run, another is your suspension setings, all of these have a great deal to do with how your car feels. id leave the suspension as is, and mess with your alignment settings, and maybe run wider stickier tires up front and skinier tires in the rear.


kinda of off topic but i was looking at the spoon sports TSX the on friday and i noticed that the work rims are a +32 offset up front, and the rear is +45, i can't remeber the width of the tires front to back or anything but i didn't think that it was interesting they had the staggered setup, on there

 

tire pressure can play a big role in how the car rotates as well. what tires and pressure have you been running?

 

I wouldn't take your front sway bar off. Instead I would put stiffer springs on (100-150lbs/in at each end) and look into a rear anti-roll bar.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Jer &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">tire pressure can play a big role in how the car rotates as well. what tires and pressure have you been running?</TD></TR></TABLE>

i currently run my street tires which are yok ES100s 205/15/50 on enkei rpf1s 15x7 and i run depending on time of day usually starting at 32f/32r and adjust accordingly from there.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by slammed_93_hatch &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

maybe run wider stickier tires up front and skinier tires in the rear.</TD></TR></TABLE>

i don't have a lot of money to spend and i've been speaking to some of the other honda guys that run sts in vegas and they have told me to purchase a rear sway bar set rather then messing with different offsets. What should I purchase? A stock one for 1999-2000 Si( what width does the stock come in?) or should i go with something aftermarket and if you guys have any suggestions as to which would be best for both street/track that would be greatly appreciated. I will look into different spring rates as well but at this time its just not in my budget.

 

well i suggest you get some azenis if you run STS. run them at about 35-37psi front and 28-30psi rear.

although running less pressure in the rear should increase grip and make it harder to rotate, running less pressure in the rear will increase the slip angle and make the rear want to break away faster. some people like to run really high rear pressure to get a more controlled feeling when it starts to slide but from my experiences it is a lot easier to just run less pressure in the rear.

this is for azenis only. it may be the same for other tires but i have not ran anything besides these for autox.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by AutoxEK9 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
i don't have a lot of money to spend and i've been speaking to some of the other honda guys that run sts in vegas and they have told me to purchase a rear sway bar set rather then messing with different offsets. What should I purchase? A stock one for 1999-2000 Si( what width does the stock come in?) or should i go with something aftermarket and if you guys have any suggestions as to which would be best for both street/track that would be greatly appreciated. I will look into different spring rates as well but at this time its just not in my budget.

</TD></TR></TABLE>

alot of people get into a habbit of doing things one way and then they will start to say that other ways are wrong, i think alot of people, including myself, need to be open to new ways of doing things, now im not saying the offset thing is a better or worse just it is something to consider, and i wouldn't be so quick to dissmis it just because other's don't do it.

again sway bars anit super cheap either, uping the spring rates in the rear is the CHEAPest way i think.

and the sway bar agian is up to you personally i don't like to run alot of sway bar i only run a 19mm sway, partly because i don't have super high springs rates (380f/450r) but im not so sure i would make the sway bigger if and when i do up the rates.


id ask some of the guys on this board what alingment settings will give you "less grip" in the *** end, and more in the front. i have no clue what these might be but i do see people offering there opinion on alingment setups all the times

 

for allignment, 1/8 total toe out front and zero toe in the rear. others will vary slightly but it is a good place to start.

 

Before spending a lot more cash on new suspension parts- try running the setup you have. Then remove or disconnect the front bar and see which setup feels better. My feeling is that most AX cars want more oversteer to get the rear to rotate.

This is very much a driver feel thing- what feels best to you will give you the confidence to run the car harder and smoother = faster.

 

So to sum things up I should see how my car runs the way its set up now. I will be purchasing one of those rear swaybar kits from a-spec-racing. and that should help the back stay loose. Chris and Charleston are really helpful . Will be doing business with them pretty soon.

 

&gt; About the arms putting me in another class: shhh...what they don't know won't hurt them. &lt;

HA! BUSTED ! im the guy with the white 89 Civic Si in STS #50...
oh... actually they are legal. you can add one adjustment for camber in STS, and many people do run the arms. this was actually discussed among the national guys.
i have ran without a front swaybar, and also with the CRX HF front swaybar, and with the stock one. with the setup i have now, the stock one worked the best. however, im still sorting the car out, and am going to be swapping spring rates and swaybars back and forth this year, getting ready for next years national season.
yes, auto-x is a large percentage driver, however a bad handling car can be difficult to drive, and often teaches bad habits. also, at the national level, it pretty much comes down to the car. the top guys all drive awesome.
alignment is everything... it has the most effect out of anything i've done to the car. you can bolt all the parts on in the world, but you have to tune it in. i dont know if you noticed last autocross, but there were some pretty awful handling cars in STS... all the bolt ons, but still slower than the same stock cars on street tires.
come talk to me at the next auto-x. i'll help you out. i'll give you a ride in the car too.
dave

 

Maybe I had a bad experience, but I loosened my front bar alot, short of removing it all-together, and the handling was horrible. The front end was all over the place, really nasty. I tightened it back up to where it was before, and left it. I couldn't imagine taking the bar off entirely. Perhaps my other settings need to compensate for the removal of the bar. I simply loosened the bar, and kept everything else the same.

FWIW - I'm running 25mm tbars in front, 325lb. springs in rear, 19mm rear sway, stock front sway, 43psi front, 29psi rear, Azenis.

 

Ow! you got me. Yah I'm messing with my alignment settings now. But since its a daily driver I don't want to have to spend hours upon hours upon hours to get it fromt street to autox set up. So I am trying to find a happy medium.

As far as swaybars go, I am going to purchase an aftermarket set up from one of the guys on HT for a really good price. That should help the rear end out. But in terms of the front end, I know my spring rates are soft in terms of racing 500lbf/450r so I was wondering at what spring rates would I reap the benefit of not having a front bar?

Thanks for the ride offer Dave, maybe I'll take you up on that at the next autox event.

Oh and those awful STS looking guys...All Filipinos not knowing how to spend their money correctly. That Corrolla FX was doing pretty good thou&lt;gh.

&lt;Marlon who is Filipino, but my car's not set up for all that bling like they have on theirs.

 

You may want to swap your springs front to rear, if you can. Increase the rear rate for free, right off the bat. That'll help. Or you could keep the 500f and get a 600 or 650 rear spring. That should be enough to negate the use of the front bar...

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by AutoxEK9 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I just wasn't feeling as comfortable as I was before the new arms were put on </TD></TR></TABLE>

This may make you more uncomfortable. I looked into the CE LCA's. Some of their statements.... intrigued me. So I contacted Competion Engineering / Moroso. I asked if the arms were OK to use for autocross of road racing, since they stated "not for street use". I asked if this was a cornering strength issue, or a liability on the street issue. They replied that the LCA's are not strong enough for autocross or road racing, and should only be used on drag cars.

(I wanted to save the weight, too.)

Anybody have any experience with these parts - not in a straight line?