What SWAY BAR to choose

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there's a lot of options you have here and it really depends on how nit-picky you want to be and whether you're okay with welding mounts.

no matter the way forward, you're likely going to have to swap your spindles side to side to go rear mount on the calipers in order to avoid interference.

with choosing the option to go with the 67~72 LCA's and stock tabs, you can run a stock style bar from just about anybody: hellwig, hotchkis, firm feel, addco, quickor, sway away. all have their pros and cons: expense, clunky hardware, diameter/rate choices. you will 100% have to do the spindle swap boogie, but that's probably the "cleanest" install with that K and those brakes.

with what you have now, 69K & 73+ brakes & LCA's, the hellwig bar would be the easiest install. it's a bolt in and uses the lower shock mount to locate the tab. so it's a little ticky-tacky that the stock tabs will still be on the arms, but if you can live with that it's the easy button here. the bonus is that you *may* not have to do the spindle swap boogie and it tucks up a bit better than the hotchkis bar. i don't like the hotchkis bar here because you have to weld on the mounts.

at the other extreme end of things is swapping out the K to 73~76 style and updating so that you're running all one system. it's way more work and investment, but a more cohesive combo and then you're back to dealer's choice on swaybar selection.
 
72bluNblu said:
#5904 is a B/E body sway bar. I would definitely want to measure one before I tried it for that application.
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I emailed them and that is what they suggested. I'll check again before I order.

Didn't we have a member at onetime that was a Hellwig employee?
 
BrianT said:
I emailed them and that is what they suggested. I'll check again before I order.

Didn't we have a member at onetime that was a Hellwig employee?
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stock 73~76 bar measures 37" eye to eye (center)
73~76 setup measures 43~44(ish)" shock to shock

remember to take into account the strut bars when deviating from stock or a known entity on bar width and pick up point to the tab. having the end links canted out at an extreme angle isn't great, either.
 
Mopar Momzee said:
But as far as preference or performance solid bar vs hollow ?
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the short answer is: it depends.

for the sake of brevity: hollow needs to be larger diameter for the same rate (usually), arm length and end link length both play a role in effective rate and "feel" of the bar (i know, very technical!)

for most of what people are doing here everybody seems to like the hellwig 1.25 hollow bars.

so without getting into an entire discussion about: material, wall thickness, motion event and installation ratio... depending on your t-bars, wheels/tires and shocks. something between 15/16" and 1.25" solid or hollow should be fine for your application.
 
I do not have pics when I had the Hotchkis bar mocked up under car. Everything was taken apart for powder coating. I may order parts and assemble soon. I do think you can just install the bar and keep your lowers and brake assembly as is if using this bar. You may be able to go on the website and get directions with photos.

IMG_20210610_155053892_HDR.jpg
 
Mopar Momzee said:
Stock 69 barracuda has upgraded disk brakes when i purchased car. Brakes look to be 73-76 due to lower control arm sway bar bracket. Choices are Hellwig front sway bar 5906 stock looking sway bar, with that i have another set of lowers with stock mount sway bar tabs i will put on to accommodate. Or the larger sway bar Hellwig 55917 larger and hollow sway bar. Also I will rotate the calibers towards the rear as some people have done for clearance issues. Thanks jesse

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One thing no one seems to have mentioned here is the actual design characteristics of a sway bar. Better called an anti-roll bar, its main purpose is to decrease the understeer inherently designed into all of these cars. The bigger the bar the more you get towards oversteer. Adding a rear bar tends to offset that. What's absolutely crucial in picking out a sway bar, especially if you add a rear bar, is that the rear bar cannot be any more than the same size as the rear bar and preferably 1/4" smaller at the very least. Improving the effectiveness of the bar is also helped if its mounted in polyurethane bushings and not rubber.
 
72bluNblu said:
It does complicate things, but it just means you can't use the stock 67-72 sway bars. There are other options, like the Hotchkis.

#5904 is a B/E body sway bar. I would definitely want to measure one before I tried it for that application.


I think the Hotchkis is the only one that will bolt up to the 73-76 LCA's on a 67-72 K frame.

Looking at where the Hellwig 55917 mounts, it appears that it put the end links outside the strut rod mounts still. The 73-76 sway bar tabs are on the inside of the strut rods, so the #55917 probably wouldn't work with the factory 73-76 tabs.
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Im trying to decide on front sway bar right now and came across this. My question is, "is the 55917 more effective with the LCA mounts outboard of the the strut rods than would be the 55905 which is inboard?" It seems a matter of leverages. I can weld tabs and fab mounts as needed but don't want to spend the additional unless there is a definite performance improvement. i'm doing 1.08 bars and probably hotchkiss shocks or Bergmans Fox shocks. Car will but mostly street with a couple autocross events a year. Already have Qa1 UCAs and rebuilt everything in the front. Rear has Hotchkiss springs.
Also thinking the 55905 wouldn't limit tire clearance being inboard of the strut rods. (planning on running 245 17 on 17x8 5.6bs.
Thanks to everyone for all the excellent info!
This is for 73 Plymouth Scamp
 
Dcooper said:
Im trying to decide on front sway bar right now and came across this. My question is, "is the 55917 more effective with the LCA mounts outboard of the the strut rods than would be the 55905 which is inboard?" It seems a matter of leverages. I can weld tabs and fab mounts as needed but don't want to spend the additional unless there is a definite performance improvement. i'm doing 1.08 bars and probably hotchkiss shocks or Bergmans Fox shocks. Car will but mostly street with a couple autocross events a year. Already have Qa1 UCAs and rebuilt everything in the front. Rear has Hotchkiss springs.
Also thinking the 55905 wouldn't limit tire clearance being inboard of the strut rods. (planning on running 245 17 on 17x8 5.6bs.
Thanks to everyone for all the excellent info!
This is for 73 Plymouth Scamp
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The Hellwig #55905 and #55917 are for different model years. The #55905 is for '73-76, and the #55917 is for '67-72. It's not just a matter of the location of the sway bar tabs either, the entire bar is mounted differently. The 73+ sway bars are routed through the K frame, the '67-72 bars are not.

So, with your car being a '73 you should be getting the #55905. The '73+ design is better overall, it saves a ton of ground clearance vs the earlier style. Technically the location on the LCA's might not be quite as efficient, but there are other changes as well in the length of the sway bar legs etc that also change the rate that the sway bar will add to the suspension.

And realistically, unless you've determined the exact roll couple for your car and its complete suspension and tire combination along with your driving style, the differences in the available sway bars probably isn't going to make a big difference compared to other components (like torsion bars, tire compounds etc). And if you have done all of that and need additional fine tuning, it's likely you'd need a custom sway bar to get what you need anyway.
 
Thanks, I really appreciate your help. Will go with the 55905. I have a tendency to overthink sometimes.
 
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