It is for my EK civic ex coupe.
Is this CUSCO front strut tower bar anygood?
I don't want mugen or spoon or skunk2 etc or any cheap generic stuff
I like the look of it, and it's from a good japanese suspension company, and is affordable.


give me your opinions please.

 

i don't like it but it's just my opinion. i've got the NEUSPEED one and love it. reason why i don't care for that strut tower is because of it's design. see how the part that connects to the frame connects to the bar? that looks generic and IMO is a weak point. with the neuspeed it's just a nice piece of solid metal that bolts right up to your frame.

 

I wouldn't go with any bar except the neuspeed!! All others don't compare!

 

I definitely don't agree with that. Try the standing test sometime and see how the average strut bar works, that is put it on the ground and stand on the middle of the bar. If it bends, AT ALL, it's basically useless as a chassis stiffening device. The only two bars I have tested that simply do not budge are Comptechs and Spoon bars. Second hand knowledge says Cusco doesn't bend either, but I can't verify that. One thing I can say... Nuespeeds (at least the Civic one) do bend with my ~180 pounds on top of it. If that much force can bend them, imagine what hard cornerning forces do.

 

i understand what your saying, but i dont think thats the same force its going to be taking when its installed on the car...

 

I think you are correct, there is going to be some twisting of the bar, which will greatly diminish its flexing, I believe.

 

yeah i dont think standing on the bar proves anything guys. thats like saying if you stand on a 2x4 piece of lumber and it bends that its not strong enough to be in the walls that hold up your house. you have to understand that bracing doesnt take force from all directions.

 

**** what it looks like>> The question is ," is it functional?" And for this reason I would buy the neuspeed strut tower brace. Nothing beats 4 pt mounting.

 

cusco=

 

anything is going to be better than nothing..

That looks like a solit unit. Probably not the BEST choice. But looks like it will work.

i can't tell if the ends are adjustable or not. If they are adjustable, get something else.

 

How dare you (cheap generic stuff) should never be used in the same sentance as mugen,spoon,or skunk 2 just kiddin

 

satnding on a bar doesnt prove that it wont work while installed..after all standing on it exerts force/pressure downwards, whereas when its in place all the forces are lateral.

BTW i dont like the look of that bar either, i would say stock GSR bar would be better than that one, all the stress is being concentrated in the single bolt either side!

 

 

The strut tower moves in a big way. How you control it is a factor in your purchase. I went the cheap route for autoxing. I have installed the OEM Honda strut tower bar, as I like to keep it OEM as much as possible, and its cheap. I also have Cusco in the rear, but that is carbon fiber. The lower rear is incorporated into the sway bar, Compech. the lower froont is Cusco; gota love that blue down there. The Upper front is really your question, I think that what you have is by far the best that you can get for the application that you are useing it for, street. If you were to go for multipoint you would need to connect it to the firewall to get the best results formt he bar, which I do not know of any out there for the EK.

I paid $70 for my OEM Honda strut bar, and I think its the best bang for the buck.
Cusco is nice, but heavy.
Your Cusco looks killer by the way.

 

Unless the shock towers are attemping to separate in a purely lateral direction, the many different forces encountered will be expressed through the bar in any number of ways. Think of it this way; during torsional stress on the chassis (the chassis weakest modulus), where one tower is lifted upward and inward while the other is pulled downard and inward, most force applied to the bar will tend to try and bend it just as if a person were standing on it. And you can be damn sure that the forces encountered will be larger than 180 pounds applied about a square foot or so.

My assertion is that if the bar can be bent easily enough by my standing on it, it's not capable of resisting the bending forces which it will encounter. And conventional chassis engineering agrees with me, which is why you'll see all manner of triangulated bracing throughout a race car chassis. They are also almost always heavily gussetted on top of the triangulation. And why? Because in order for a chassis stiffening bar, cage or x brace to work properly, it must be extremely rigid to all enccountered forces. A strut bar may be a simple aftermarket product, but it must also adhere to this thinking if it's to be really functional and not just a pretty peice of metal. That's why the Spoon bars are boxed, rather than being tubular or single extrusion.


And regarding the Neuspeed "4 point" attachment, that's a marketing ploy. The stresses will still apply to the main cross bar, it doesn't matter how it was screwed down to the towers. If the central bar is weak, the entire brace is weak and cannot properly do it's job.

Ps- Oh and about the 2x4 argument, a 2x4 isn't strong enough to hold up the walls in your house. It takes at least one every 18 inches, and those must be sporadically tied together with cross beams about their height. And to top it off, the purpose of all that wood is not to be rigid, but strong and somewhat flexible. A car's chassis needs to be strong and RIGID, not flexible. Suspension performance depends heavily upon chassis rigidty.



[Modified by texan, 8:17 PM 10/25/2002]

 

I have heard naughty things about strut tower bars with bolts on the bar that attaches it to the mounts that then attach to the strut towers. The more points at which 2 solid rigid pieces of metal are held together at one point the more it will have a tendancy to flex. think about it. that bar s going to want to pivot about that bolt. I would think a ONE PIECE solid bar would flex less..... then again something is better than nothing and unless your going to sears point your probably wont be able to tell the difference in the two bars from the drivers seat. this is just one idiots opinion though

 

That one has pivots and is therefore no better than the generic APC ones that cost $39.95 at Pep Boys. Either empty out your wallet for the solid $175-250 ones from Mugen/Spoon/Comptech or get a cheap $25 one on ebay...don't bother spending anything in between for that Cusco.

I have a cheap set on my EK and definitely noticed an improvement in steering response and the car doesn't wander on the highway anymore...if I go over uneven pavement or bumps on the freeway without holding the steering wheel (I keep my hands right there grazing the wheel just in case ), the car stays perfectly straight - no need for steering correction at all. The unibody itself just feels much more solid like most luxury cars.

Now if I bought the solid Mugen one...would it be even better? Yeah, probably. But it wasn't worth that extra dough for my daily driver application. Besides, previous-generation Civics and Integras aren't even that rigid anyway. I drove a friend's otherwise-stock R when he had a generic bolt-in(not welded) 4-pt cage and a week after he took it out and it felt noticeably less rigid. That says something for a car which underwent major reinforcement from the factory. The new RSX doesn't even have a straight-across strut tower bar, yet is much stiffer than the 94-01 Tegs which come with a strut bar.


[Modified by GB, 10:41 PM 10/25/2002]

 

Strut bar is a strut bar. They do the same thing. BTW....in the first pic, it looks like the strut tower bar will hit the hood. How close is it?

 

After hearing all your comments, I will not buy that bar.
I want a Neuspeed but it doesn't bolt into my EK civic
Other than Neuspeed, I think I will go with the Skunk2 bar
This Skunk2 bar may have pivot points, but it is the EXACT SAME design and stiffness as the SPOON bar.
I need your opinions for this Skunk2 Racing bar:

Anygood?


[Modified by HapiHonda, 8:52 PM 10/29/2002]

 

Can't go wrong with Spoon, though I can't vouge for a knock-off.