Are sway bars necessary on bashers, If so what do they do?

[djrahbee]

I've done a little search but didn't see much. I saw in one thread that speed runners and drag cars don't need them but what about bashers like Kraton and Outcast? I read somewhere else that you could remove the front sway bar on the Outcast 4s V2 to help with steering which I did and noticed a little. I'll be away for a few hours and will try to check on this post when I can until I get back home. Thanks guys!

 

[chilly81]

They transfer some of the suspension load from one side of the car to the shock on the other side, so that the car doesn't sway or dive as much towards that one corner as it would without one. Keeps the car flatter generally.
Drag and speed don't turn. Bashers do, but most bashers don't have them. Probably handle better with them and I doubt it affects bashing too much. But many live without them.

 

[djrahbee]

Awesome. Good info.
When landing higher jumps they will help distribute the weight more evenly to shocks and related parts?

 

[#ARRMArcfanboy4life]

I removed the sway bars awhile back. I haven't notice much of a difference. Mainly, it leans more into corners. Amain did a e-revo and k6s comparison video where they talk about sway bars on bashers.

 

[chilly81]

Awesome. Good info.
When landing higher jumps they will help distribute the weight more evenly to shocks and related parts?

If you landed tilted to the left or right, technically they could help some, but in reality I doubt it makes any difference. Landing flat definitely no difference. They are primarily for handling and trying to keep it together in turns.

 

[Cereal_killer]

As mentioned above. Drag and speed runs. Typically remove em. The basic reason
ensure your vehicle doesn't roll too much when handling turns. Aside from safety, sway bars help prevent lopsided wheel alignment and work to maintain an overall better grip on the road.

 

[joshjosh]

I attached a Hellwig sway bar on the rear of my F-150, it significantly helped with towing, as it stopped the rear end from swaying when the trailer was getting blown around.

With that being said, in the Jeep manual it actually says to remove the sway bars before going off-roading. This is because of the way it links the 2 sides together. When one side lifts up it can cause suspension travel to have resistance and tilt the vehicle instead of the suspension completely soaking up the bump. This is more pronounced in rock crawling, but just general off-road bashing it has pros and cons. If the terrain is really bumpy, you’ll find it drives smoother without them. If the terrain is generally flat and you’re just doing jumps, you might actually find it handles them a little better. It almost always helps in cornering though.

 

[Jerold]

Sway bars are springs that reduce "sway" i.e. keep the chassis level-ish. More importantly they reduce weight transfer to the outside wheels maximize your tires patches while cornering. More tire patch means more traction, more traction means faster.

The way they work, is one side is moved (up/down) relative to the other side and the center bar acts like a torsion bar and because it wants to keep the legs aligned.

A simple sway bar at rest, no load. This is the shape it likes, because it's a spring.

Then you turn right and the cars weight shifts to the left side. The car leans left and causes the left side of the sway bar to move up. This is counter acted by the right side and the sway bar wanting to be flat.

Stiff sway bars mean less movement.

You could stiffen the coils springs and reduce body roll too, but you also impart more energy into the chassis with every bump and reduce the effectiveness of your dampers and makes for a choppy ride. On real cars sway bars can improve handling (or make them undrivable) without effecting the ride quality much, within reason. If I put a sway bar from a semi on a Huyndai, it will probably drive and ride like crap.

In the end it's one thing to help you tune your suspension.

If you want more understeer stiffen the front suspension. If you want more oversteer stiffen the rear suspension. If you take it off, it will change the way the car handles, over steer or under steer ultimately resulting in change in more weight transfer and and less traction.

The only application that I know that sway bars are not desired is in rock crawling because you want the axles to articulate be misaligned. In this case it allows more suspension travel and the tires to contact the surface in extreme terrain. i.e. more tire patch.

On my speed car I have the sway bars installed. They "should" help the car be more stable when I make corrections at high speed and I would gain nothing by removing them.

Better question is why do you want to take it off/ what will you gain?

 

[#ARRMArcfanboy4life]

what will you gain?

A few minutes of my time and so much hassle during maintenance

 

[djrahbee]

A few minutes of my time and so much hassle during maintenance

They ARE a pain in the butt to work on and around.

 

[djrahbee]

Just wanted to say thanks again for all the feedback and info!

 

[#ARRMArcfanboy4life]

Just wanted to say thanks again for all the feedback and info!

Don't just leave us hanging (like old discarded sway bars ) what did you decide? Did you decide to leave or sway?

 

[djrahbee]

Don't just leave us hanging (like old discarded sway bars ) what did you decide? Did you decide to leave or sway?

Lol...I have been running 2 of my rigs without front ones. I'm in the middle of a Kraton build and was wondering if I should just leave them off. I'm still kinda on the fence.

 

[Overkill]

Most useful thing is you can use them to change the understeer/oversteer balance. It's the same principle in passenger cars. Relative increases in sway bar size shift the balance in that direction. Increase the size of the rear relative to the front and you get oversteer. Increase the size of the front relative to the rear and you get understeer.

 

[Moirae]

What does making the sway bar stiffer by screwing in the grub screws accomplish?

 

[chilly81]

What does making the sway bar stiffer by screwing in the grub screws accomplish?

Good question. I always thought it was to hold the sway bar at the center not right right or left, rather than provide any sort of stiffness change mainly because the amount of torque that grub screw can provide to resist. Twisting is essentially zero at that radius never mind that it’s just a grub screw. But that doesn’t really answer the question… It just changes it into a different question that I don’t know the answer to- why does it matter to keep the sway bar centered .

 

[Moirae]

Good question. I always thought it was to hold the sway bar at the center not right right or left, rather than provide any sort of stiffness change mainly because the amount of torque that grub screw can provide to resist. Twisting is essentially zero at that radius never mind that it’s just a grub screw. But that doesn’t really answer the question… It just changes it into a different question that I don’t know the answer to- why does it matter to keep the sway bar centered .

well I was dumb enough to think it did something to the handling of the car so I'm glad you cleared it up for me

 

[Jerold]

What does making the sway bar stiffer by screwing in the grub screws accomplish?

It does nothing.The EXACT center isn't critical. If you lock down the sway bar in the diff attachment point you can create binding and may have uneven torque on one side. It's best if it floats a bit in the diff attachment and be solid at the end links. In race cars we used heim joints to allow for movement and prevent binding.

The way it works is ou have a center bar and two torque arms.

If you could change the length of the torque arm, you can soften (longer) or stiffen (shorter) the sway bar. The stiffness of the sway bar will change the handling of the car and can induce over/understeer. However, as far as I know there is no way to adjust the end points/length of the torque arms.

 

[KevinC]

I’ve removed the sway bars from all of my rigs (9) except my DBXL. They are a pain in the ass and the driving experience seems to be exactly the same……so I would say they are unnecessary in my humble opinion.

cheers,
kev

 

[#ARRMArcfanboy4life]

I’ve removed the sway bars from all of my rigs (9) except my DBXL. They are a pain in the ass and the driving experience seems to be exactly the same……so I would say they are unnecessary in my humble opinion.

cheers,
kev

Same.