Looking for new sway bar. Can I go too big??

MRGTX said
Yes. You can go too big. Too much sway bar and the car will just plow straight ahead under hard cornering.

Keep in mind that sway bars don’t improve traction. They may improve track times because of better body control and greater driver confidence.

Sway bars don’t improve traction?!

Uh, how do you think they improve body control? They add wheel rate, that’s how. And specifically where it’s needed during cornering. If you think that can’t improve traction, I’m not sure what to tell you.

340doc said
We've been slowly upgrading my sons 70 Dart. So far we have 1.03 torsion bars, QA1 upper control arms with the extra caster built in and factory BBP disc. No shocks yet. Now I'm looking at a front bar. We don't have the tabbed lower arms so looking at a kit with bolt on tabs. I've narrowed it down to two bars from Hellwig. One is 1 1/8 dia. the other is 1 1/4. The 1 1/4 bar is offset a bit to accept wheels with up to 5.75 backspace which would be good for us as we have a 17" rim with 5 1/2 BS. My question being is the 1 1/4 bar too big? I could put up with a light rub on the bar from the tire at full lock. Should I stick with the 1 1/8?

Can you go too big with the sway bar? Sure. It really depends on your tires- if you don’t have enough grip for the effective wheel rate the large front bar gives you the car will understeer. Just the opposite with too much bar in the back, you get oversteer as autoXcuda said.

The trick is to match the wheel rates with the capabilities of your tires and the balance of your car. If AJ is still oversteering with 235’s, 1.03’s and a solid 1.125” bar in the front with 295’s in the back though I don’t think you have much to worry about. You’d be hard pressed to find a 17” tire up front with as little grip as the tires that are available in a 235/60/14, and if those 295’s aren’t more than balancing it out you can add a bunch more front bar before it’s an issue.

Also keep in mind not all of those bars are the same. The 1 1/4” Hellwig bar is a hollow bar, pretty sure the 1 1/8” bar is solid. The Hotchkis 1.5” diameter bar is hollow too, and without knowing the wall thickness it’s almost impossible to say what the rate actually is. All three of those bars could easily have very similar rates.