aight, ive got the koni sport suspension kit (yellows and springs). i was wondering if anti-sway bars are going to improve my handling and what effect they may have.

Absolutely!! They act to keep the car level through turns, keeping the tires flat on the road.

definitely a good investment

Yup. I've got koni sport kit and 1" addco F/R, check my registry

Body roll is basically gone...


Now to get my poly bushings/control arms up front fixed so that I get my caster back in line.

(read: http://www.j-body.org/forums/read.php?f=3&i=87027&t=87027 messed up the rear bushing on the control arm )

hey squisher, u got some pics showing the koni kit drop??

thanks

Sorry, no. No digital camera, I spent all my money on the car

I'll try and borrow one this weekend and get some posted up. I've had a couple of requests.

^^^yay hopefully u can get some pics. thanks

I know its been awhile, but i would still like to see some pics

thanks

Here ya go :p

Sorry, kinda forgot.

Side shot:


Rear fender gap


Front Fender Gap (Still on my azenis...I miss those tires...)



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Sleeper style, they don't see it coming that way.

Koni plus a 1 1/8" Front sway bar makes for awesome handling. Just do go over a speed bump on an angle. It feels like your driving a car with a solid front axle lol.


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Ad1kTed 2 SpE3d and squisher00z24,

Thanks for posting up the pics! and also, did you guys measure before and after? I was wanting to know how much drop the springs give front and back.....

if anyone else has some pics with the koni kit, post them up please

thanks

No i didnt...its not too aggressive...the back is MUCH lower...the front almost looks very little lower..

it is hard to tell in the pics, but does it look lower in the back than front? like the rear is sagging?

thanks

I didn't measure, but I'd say about 2" drop in the back, maybe 1.5" in the front. Back's not lower than the front, it's about the same now

Looks hawt IMO. Much lower than that and it starts getting silly, not to mention you're getting your control arms out of their optimum position (paralell w/ ground) if you go any lower than this.

I should post up pics when I'm on my current racing rims (15x7" Fiero GT rims, don't laugh, 225/50/15's are sticky!). Wide tires on 15s and 16s look dayum seksay with this suspension setup. (ok. 16's are sexy...15's are just ready to haul ass) I never did like our cars with the really big wheels...17s are OK, but they just don't work (IMO) with anything bigger, not to mention the extra weight farther out from the center.

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Koni plus a 1 1/8" Front sway bar makes for awesome handling. Just do go over a speed bump on an angle. It feels like your driving a car with a solid front axle lol.

1 1/8" FRONT? Dayum. What are you using for rear? I've got the Addco 1" front and rear. The rear one is installed in addition to the factory one...drives pretty nice after that.


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Sleeper style, they don't see it coming that way.

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1 1/8" FRONT? Dayum. What are you using for rear? I've got the Addco 1" front and rear. The rear one is installed in addition to the factory one...drives pretty nice after that.

there is no "stock rear anti-sway bar" there may be a a stabilizer bar welded into the rear twist beam, however that does not contribute to negating body roll.

Cinny:

Uh...yeah there is. I understand we have that solid twist-beam rear suspension, where basically the entire back end is one big swing arm, but that bar that goes across does twist.

The stabilizer you're talking about IS the stock sway bar (at least that's what I called it...). (stabilizer != anti-sway bar? I thought they served the same purpose, just different name) IIRC, some of the base model packages (forget what years) didn't have that stabilizer, and it makes quite a bit of difference. It's just integrated in the twist beam setup on the models that do have it. It does negate body roll, a lot. Especially with an after market bar. The Addco bar mounts on the outside of it. They effectively make that twist beam stiffer (less twisting, yes it is designed to twist so that the rear wheels have some independent motion) -- the end result is less body roll in the back.

If you run a search in this forum, somebody asked about if "sway bars" in the rear of our cars actually do anything. Yes they are real rear sway bars, yes they do reduce body roll. If you don't believe me, try it yourself or come ride in mine

To me it sounds more like a difference in terminology, in either case they serve the same purpose as far as I can tell.


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Sleeper style, they don't see it coming that way.

^ if you're talking about that thin little pos thats welded inside the twist beam, i'd HARDLY call that a "real" sway bar.



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- Sold my beloved J in April 2010 -

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from the FAQ aka Event

What is a sway bar?
Anti-roll (or sway) bars improve lateral stability without stiffening normal suspension movement. Anti-roll bars minimize body roll, which stabilizes the tire contact patch for maximum traction. That's important because all of the weight and power of your vehicle is transmitted to the road over a mere handful of square inches called the tire contact patch. Most FWD street cars have moderate understeer (aka "PUSH"). The sway bars are designed to improve overall balance by the use of proportionately stiffer rear bars. The car will have a "neutral" feel, with a gentle push at its limits. The opposite of push or understeer is oversteer. Cars that exhibit this characteristic are said to be "loose" and are prone to spinning.

Compared to the upper strut tower bar, which is designed to increase structural rigidity, the rear sway bar is designed to prevent body roll from occuring in corners. This reduction of body roll prevents the transfer of weight to the outside edge of your car which can "throw" the rear end outward in a curve (a.k.a. "spinout").

The rear anti-sway bar attaches externally to your rear axle through four points. The bar sits directly underneath the rear axle, and mounts in two spots to the axle using polyurethane bushings and bolts on each of the mounts. The bar then curves 90 degrees on each side and curves towards the back of the car. The other two mounts attach to the rear spindle assembly near the rear brake drums with a special bracket included with the kit.

J-bodies do not come with a stock rear sway bar, but some models do come with a rear stabilizer bar. Aftermarket rear sway bars work with the stock rear stabilizer bar (you do not have to remove it).

Aftermarket front sway bars replace the OEM front sway bar. If you do not have a stock front sway bar you need to get the hardware kit off of a Cavalier/Sunfire that does have a stock front sway bar so the new front sway bar can be installed.

Anti-sway bars also exist for the front axle of the car. Some cars come with them stock; those with the FE1 suspension package comes with an 18mm front sway bar, and the FE2 package comes with a 22mm.

You must be careful when adding or changing these bars, because if the bar is too large in either the front or the rear, you will introduce either understeer or oversteer. The trick is to find a balance, or "neutral" handling condition, where the car neither "pulls" you inward through the turn nor "pushes" you outward through the turn. Oversteer (or "pulling") is mostly found on rear wheel drive cars, like the F-body. Understeer (or "pushing") is mostly found on front wheel drive cars, like the J-body.

Hellwig used to make a rear 19mm bar, which helped to create a more "neutral" handling when added, while keeping your stock front sway bar. The new Hellwig bar is 26mm. (25.4mm) RK Sport and JC Whitney sell the Hellwig bar.

ADDCO makes 25mm (25.4mm) rear anti-sway bars for the J-body.

Eibach makes a 22mm rear bar and a 25.4mm front bar, sold together as a package.

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Event
well i know the addco rear bars are gold...

basically look under your rear axle you will either see a bar or you wont ....

addco swaybars aftermarket mount to theouter parts of the arm, go to teamforwardmotion.com to see what it looks like... or use the search button on here....

the gm shop manual lists a stabilizer bar in the rear and and anti-roll bar in the front....

anti-roll is a sway bar in other terms... some use stabilizer bar as it, but a stabilizer bar isnt really the same...


its called a STABILIZER BAR, according to GM... , not an ANTI-roll bar... i woould be more than happy to scan the shop manual if needed...

its part the determinant for axle twist, but having a relatively thinly stamped rear axle beam... it doesnt help much..

thats what determines the ride handling package... fe0, fe1, fe2

a more realistic sway bar will be like an aftermarket setup from addco and look like the ANTI-ROLL bar that is incorporated in the front of the car... bushings, endlinks, etc...

the bar in the rear is more for the ride handling package...

thats why z24's still have a good amount of body roll in stock form... with a sway bar they dont...

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If you look up inside the v-shaped piece, you will see it. It is not really a sway bar. It is a tubular piece of steel welded into the solid rear axle beam. There is no possible way to install a true sway bar like independent suspensions have. I used to have the old Style RK Sport bar on mine, and all it does is stiffen up the car. If you notice, the rear solid axle is shaped like a U that pivits on the body. The outer arms of the U, flex to see that your tires stay in contact with the road. If you want to see it happen, follow a cavalier down a bumpy road and watch how one wheel moves and the other does not. This is a dirt cheap way to make a suspension idependent. So, all the stock " sway bar" does it stiffen the triangle part for twisting as the ends flex. The aftermarket sway bars stiffen the entire rear of the U shaped suspension giving the solid rear beam suspension less flex than stock. If you install a RSB, make sure you have good tires. It makes the rear end very tight, super oversteer, and cheap or stock tires, you can drift in corners cause the just cant hold.

Just to note, Cavaliers are not great handling cars. The only way to make them race track worthy would be to correct the camber issues that the rear wheels are permently set at. That is why you dont see any Cavaliers in SCCA race events, their suspensions SUCK. They are very cheap and very economy, way to go GM!

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Event
a sway bar is roughly the shape of a "U". swaybars work as antiroll features keeping the body level.

tie bars make sure in hard cornering the trailing axle doesnt flex in. as you have seen on teamforwardmotion.com the tie bar come with heim joints. reason. in hard cornering of a 2300+ lbs car the sway bar will move more than an inch or two. the heim joints are there to allow movement.

the trailblazer BS is a subframe brace which doesnt alow the sway bar to move as it should. this would be better suited for using up front of the car where a subframe brace is needed.

on a variety of cars, there has never been a tie bar without heim joints. the tie bar works like a strut brace, but it has heim joints to allow the sway bar to move freely.

the thing is here with all of the trailblazer bar posts, they dont even mount the bar where its needed. flex occurs between the trailing arms, not at the bottom of the sway bar. so in addition to already using a restrictive bar which affects the function of the sway bar, people arent even mounting it in the correct place.

the hellwig setup is the most accurate cause the tie bar is mounted DIRECTLY between the trailing arms. it still allows torsional twist of the bar, but keeps the arms from flexing in on hard cornering.

daily use...depends. do you turn alot? enjjoy spirited driving. if so, its a decent improvement.

some use the trailblazer bar cause its cheap. personally i dont agree with it, cause there are reputable places that show what a proper tie bar looks like, located on teamforwardmotion.com and building your own can be done for under 20$

being cheap on a bar just to add a bar is like using cheap coilovers. your prob not looking for performance, you just want the look, and problems can and will occur.

now without a swaybar, you may exceed the pivot point, but witha sway bar the bar does allow a bit of articulation.