torsion bars / drag racing

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ir3333

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Common practice is to use slant six or weak torsion bars to improve launch.
no matter what you use they will be exerting the same amount of lift on the
front end to hold it up.
...How do the weak bars help?
 
Because they are less "stiff", as was said above, they allow the front of the car to raise faster without initially lifting the wheel brake / spindle assemblies, transferring weight to the back for the launch.
 
The weaker T-bars will also allow the front to "droop" a little more after the initial weight transfer. Overall, they should provide a quicker-acting suspension for both lift and settle.
 
i'm struggling with this.
Both heavy or weak bars are holding the front 1600lbs at 8 inches.
..so they must be at the exact same tension.
When the car is launched each bar will be pushing up the same amount.

u guys may have noticed...i question everything
 
Gotta have the setup right for a wheels up car...

A a really stiff setting on shock compression will be what saves a car from crashing down after a wheels up launch, no so much the torsion bar...

2 reasons I see for running the slant 6 bars or even the smallest v8 non ac bars:

1.) You can store more energy in them because they are twisting further than a giant PST aftermarket bar. This allows the front end to be lower if desired - upward front end travel is typically a good thing in low powered cars. Low power as in 500hp or less

2.) Lighter weight.
 
Here's some info.
 

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Gotta have the setup right for a wheels up car...

A a really stiff setting on shock compression will be what saves a car from crashing down after a wheels up launch, no so much the torsion bar...

2 reasons I see for running the slant 6 bars or even the smallest v8 non ac bars:

1.) You can store more energy in them because they are twisting further than a giant PST aftermarket bar. This allows the front end to be lower if desired - upward front end travel is typically a good thing in low powered cars. Low power as in 500hp or less

2.) Lighter weight.


#1 is what I've read, somewhere there's a good write up in this but I can't find it... Basically the /6 bar has a lower spring rate than the thicker bar, so in order for it to carry the weight of the front end it has to be "twisted" further, placing it under more tension... So you get the quicker nose rise, and also quick nose drop once the car "settles in" going down track...

The theory is Also shown by the larger bars needing to be "clocked different" (having the hexes offset) in order to achieve a lower ride height... It takes such little "twisting" of the bar to hold the light A-body front end, the adjusters don't have to be in very far on a factory clocked bar to reach ride height.

Joe
 
Yeah, it's still double speak to me.
It's like the OP says ; you got about 1600# to deal with. To achieve a certain ride height, You can use a thick bar with a little preload, or a thin bar with a lotta preload.
I'm not the brightest bulb in the closet, and I'm glad that the racing bug never bit me, cuz I'd be a loser for sure.
Oh wait! If the big bar lost it's preload before the front end got up, then it wouldn't be helping the motor any, now would it? Is that it? Did I learn sumpin today?
 
Yes, the smaller torsion bars are wound tighter and have to unwind and rebound more from the same ride height - if that helps put things into perspective. But I've always felt that good shocks should be used to control the rate of front end rise and then compression once you get rolling. Too fast either way is not good. OEM shocks are pretty loose on extension & compression. The more power you make, the more you need proper/stiffer shocks to control what's going on, front and rear.
 
A good set of double adjustable front shocks make a world of difference.
 
A good set of double adjustable front shocks make a world of difference.

well this`ll blow your mind. we used to run 318 torsion bars, with stock shocks that were drilled to let the fluid out. was a SS/DA , back in the old days. needed a lot of front end travel cause there weren`t any tires that would hold a hemi on a slick track.
 
i'm struggling with this.
Both heavy or weak bars are holding the front 1600lbs at 8 inches.
..so they must be at the exact same tension.
When the car is launched each bar will be pushing up the same amount.

u guys may have noticed...i question everything

the lesser diameter torsion bars will carry the same torsion as a larger bar....but its the energy is uses in torsional 'twist' is less, although they get to the same point in the end, the lesser size gets there quicker (in energy expulsion)

hope this helps
 
o.k. now i'll throw a wrench in this.
a few years ago a friend was racing his '68 Hemi Barracuda at the SS Hemi shoot out.
..this was with Barton,the Warfish and all the big guns.
the best pass that day was hi 8.4's,until he ripped off an 8.32...i forget the mph
now having said that he is well known and did not actually break the SS record
because his hemi is 472..
...he swears stiffer bars are better,at least in his car.
 
Yes but on a hard launch. I don't want my front end loading and unloading several times down the track like an old buck board. Hench a good set of shocks, and I'd say the lighter the spring the more the importance of controlling said bounce. For most racers double adjustable is an expense you can spend elsewhere. Your either in to them for the wow factor or trying to fix some other point in your suspension that is lacking. In fact, I'm personally of the opinion I want to minimize the rise and fall, not create more. I want an arrow, flat and wicked fast with minimal porpoising.
 
i'm struggling with this.
Both heavy or weak bars are holding the front 1600lbs at 8 inches.
..so they must be at the exact same tension.
When the car is launched each bar will be pushing up the same amount.

u guys may have noticed...i question everything

The way I have always understood it, you have to put more tension on a / bar as opposed to a heavier bar to achieve the same ride height.

That added tension/springiness is what helps lift the front quicker providing better weight transfer.
 
Look at it this way. Replace the T bars with say, "2 x 4s" which have NO spring. Now, starting / launching, if the car hooks at all, the reaction of the torque / rear suspension will try to transfer weight and try to lift the front. BUT there is NO HELP from the front because the 2x4's have no spring. Worse, all the unsprung weight of the tires / brakes / suspension will now have to be lifted "dead weight" by the torque reaction. Normally all that dead unsprung weight would "sit there on the ground" and the T bars would push the rest of the car up, transferring weight to the rear.

If there is not enough hook, the whole chassis won't react, and won't generate "hook." It just might sit there and spin.

Now think about T bars. As the car tries to hook, the tension of the T bars helps lift the front, and transfers some / more/ yet more to the rear. You can see this if you've ever jacked up a car under the front spring perches. There's enough distribution that the front also comes up.

Now visualize the relationship of the 2x4s, the heavy stiff T bars, and the slant bars. As others have pointed out, slant bars require more "windup" to support the car. So they push a long ways before they UNwind, and all that push equates to the weight of the lower parts of the suspension and tires staying on the ground

This is opposed to heavy bars, which might be "all unloaded" (practically speaking) before the front tires/ brakes / LCA / other unsprung weight gets off the ground. As soon as all that unsprung weight "has to be lifted" by the rest of the car, that much weight cannot be transferred, so to speak. It is dead weight which the torque of the rear axle is attempting to lift.
 
I'd rather build a car to handle than "launch", but I suspect that modern suspensions, shocks, and tires MAY have lessened the need to "transfer the weight". The need to transfer the weight was about traction, more weight on the rear tires equals less wheel spin. I'm fairly certain that IF traction was equal between two otherwise identical cars, the one with LESS front end lift would be faster as all of the power would be used to propel the car forward as opposed to upward.
 
I'd rather build a car to handle than "launch", but I suspect that modern suspensions, shocks, and tires MAY have lessened the need to "transfer the weight". The need to transfer the weight was about traction, more weight on the rear tires equals less wheel spin. I'm fairly certain that IF traction was equal between two otherwise identical cars, the one with LESS front end lift would be faster as all of the power would be used to propel the car forward as opposed to upward.

Exactly what Joe Pappas (Mopar Missile) explained to me.

He said they found when they ran the Missile off the bump stops......basically NO front suspension travel.....the faster they went.

Not really sure how that equates to a 11 or 12 second car.....two different animals
 
The /6 bars work like this . They travel further with less resistance. So the more they are wound the further they travel before reaching nuetral.

Hence more inches of upward travel with help from the spring pushing upward.

I had them in my car and it did help on the launch. but the downside was every dip in the road while driving normal (I mean slow )the header would bottom out on the road.

You need some big numbers to hold those bars in a jounce position for a quarter milewith a 3100 lb car.

They work with SS springs that is what they were commonly used with.

I think once you go to standard leafs, cal-tracs or coil overs in the rear you throw all the early science out the window.
I would go with the stiffer bars. Thats just me.
 
Multi-adjustable, aluminum drag shocks for the front can not only tune the rate of front end lift, but also front end compression. The singles have a fixed, STIFF compression with a tunable extension. Then there are the double-adjustables. Neither are cheap, but it makes tuning much easier. Usually, the faster you go, the stiffer shocks that you need, front & back.

OEM shocks are usually too soft on both sides. A friend smacked his Moroso pan braking at the finish line with OEM shocks! He tore up some engine bearings on the next pass. A stiff compression won't eliminate the possibility, but it will help a lot over OEM, regardless of what torsion bars you have. Stiff front compression also helps hold the "transfer" and compress slowly to reduce the chance of the rear tires unloading. (Helps control porpising & wheelhop.)
 
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