ride quality and handling w/ 1LE swaybars & poly bushings/endlinks?

[Arctc Wolf]

I'm getting 1LE swaybars put on in a week or so, and I am wondering how the ride quality and handling of my car will be impacted. I'm getting the poly bushings and endlins w/ them as well. I'm assuming the ride quality will go down since the poly bushings and the stiffer swaybars will transfer more bumps through the car and into my butt and the handling will go way up because everything will deflect less. Am I right? This is going out to anybody who's had experience w/ these. Thanks for the help.

[DominusEtDeusNatus]

Which 1LE sway bars are you getting? If you're getting 21mm in the rear you might need stiffer(1LE) springs in the front, but keep the stock springs in the rear for better balance. You'll get more oversteer then you'd like with just the bars. Or you can just go with 19mm bar in the rear and it should be fine with stock springs.

I'm not saying that the car will ride worse. It will be better then stock at first. Later on you'll start noticing it. It took me a few months to notice that I'm getting too much oversteer.

Poly bushings/endlinks are surprisingly quiet and don't contribute to any noise.

[firebird1]

right now all i have is the 1le swaybars, suspension wise. i love em.. i have the 32/21 set from lmperformance [img]graemlins/thumbsup.gif[/img]

i noticed not as much roll going around tight corners at a irresponsible speed. i plan on a lot more in the suspension department, might get in on the slp level one gp...

[V6Bob]

The swaybars and bushings will have a minimal effect on ride, because they only affect ride when you hit a bump with only 1 wheel, and not at all when you hit a ridge accross the road with 2. They will decrease roll.

However, in the area of handling it is not true that "the handling will go way up".

The problem is that handling involves balance, how well the front sticks compared to the rear. Bars _must_ be matched to springs. With 2001 stock V6 springs these '93 1LE bars will cause the front to stick dramatically more than the rear (I tried them). The rear will have a tendancy to break loose, "oversteer" or "loose". This is neither fast nor safe.

The reason is that these bars were never intended to work with these springs, and they don't work well in the area of balance. GM gave up on the 21mm rear (with 1LE springs) after only one year.

As Dom suggests, you could improve the balance by using stiffer front springs or a smaller rear bar. I'd go a little farther that way than Dom suggests, to be safer on wet or dirty roads, where oversteer increases.

[ July 26, 2002: Message edited by: V6Bob ]</p>

[John_D.]

I put the lmperformance set on mine back in May. No other suspension changes. (except an stb).

Before the change, on a left turn onto a side road on the way to work every morning, the rear end would break away easily at the end of the turn, under light or even no throttle, if I came in a little fast. I would work it, and get a fun little slide following one of my buddies in to work many mornings.

After the changes, I make the same left turn, faster, with no rear breakaway, and with more throttle. I haven't found the breakaway point yet. (I think it will be more sudden when it does happen now, and that spot is not where I want to find it...)

Just my experience.

The car is much flatter and hangs much tighter.

The first time I tried jigging it back and forth going down the road, it was almost too responsive, almost scary, compared to what I expected. After I got used to it, it was fine.

Oh, can't leave out this bit of information... I did run the car with 29-30 psi in the rears for a couple of weeks. It was extremely loose in the back with the bigger bars and 30 psi.... I cut it back and forth one morning at about 45mph and ended up fighting it four times before stabilizing it. I was going fairly sideways down the road at one point, in a silent, markless skid, heading toward a rock fence in someone's front yard...

I run 35 all around normally.

Edit -- to answer the other part of the original question -- about ride quality -- it's practically the same. Sway bars will only come into play if one wheel is being worked (via road conditions). If both, like v6bob said, then no change. (unlike spring changes which will affect the ride at all times). If I go over a speed bump a little fast with only one wheel, instead of only the wheel going up, the side of the car goes up too. That's about the only noticeable difference.

(and some squeaking/clunking for the first week or two from the endlinks in the back - a little extra white lithium sprayed up between them helped cure that too, plus just breaking them in.)

[ July 26, 2002: Message edited by: John_D. ]</p>

[Dojo2000]

FS: NEW 1LE Rear 21 mm sway bar + NEW endlinks

I've got a new 1LE rear sway bar and 1LE endlinks for sale if you need it. Just drop me an email.

[Arctc Wolf]

I'm asking this question because I just ordered these friday from LMPerformance and wanted to know what I had just gotten myself into. I have a BMR stb as well as Z-rated 255-50 kumho's and I don't like all the body roll I get in corners now, so I figured I'd get the 1LE swaybars since they seem to be configured more for road racing. I was also looking for better traction for 1/4 times and figured a bigger reaw swaybar will help a bit. I'm also going to get G2 Subframe connectors and V-braces in August, and I know that any chassis stiffening parts will increase ride quality a lot(I know the BMR stb did). Later on I'm gonna get a coil-over setup for my car, probly the ground Control kit and get a set of Koni adjustables to go w/ it. Will these springs/shocks be stiff enough to work well w/ the 1LE sways, or should I go stiffer/looser?

[V6Bob]

"Will these springs/shocks be stiff enough to work well w/ the 1LE sways, or should I go stiffer/looser?"

It's not a question of stiffness in general. It's the balance front/rear. You need a strong front spring (relative to the rear) to counteract the large rear bar. Dom is using a rear spring slightly weaker than yours (95 v. 114) and a front that is much stronger (360 v. 257).

It concerns me that a lot of people here are throwing bars and/or springs on their car without understanding balance and how springs and bars need to work together. I don't mean to be an a**, but that can get you some evil handling, especially in an emergency.

[Arctc Wolf]

I understand what you're saying V6BOB, but there's so many other factors that can also play a role in a car's handling during an emergency besides spring and swaybar matching. The car's weight, the brake bias, the tires grip, the car's weight bias(a full tank of gas versus a near empty tank of gas) all can effect how a car performs in emergencies. I'm gonna get stiffer springs eventually and koni adjustable shocks to go w/ them. I am gonna reduce the car's weight at least 100-200 lbs. as well as have more of the weight be biased towards the rear, the suspension will be setup and matched slowly over time as my cash flow permits, and I will be adding horsepower during all of this as well. I'm just looking for an idea of how the new sways will act on my car during cornering and hard straight line acceleration. I'm not gonna road race of autox in the car, but I do want it to perform better than it does stock. I was thinking about only getting the bigger rear swaybar since I'm looking for better traction off the line, but that would cause too much oversteer, so I figured I'd get both to somewhat balance each other out and get better cornering overall. I do not mind oversteer as long as I can control it w/ modulating the throttle, because yes, I have been stupid before and fishtailed around corners before. I'm not worried about re-learning how to take corners quickly, since there's a nice 1/2 mile oval near my house that's open during the week that I can get into and practice a little.

[jersey]

you guys are getting me worried know. i just ordered the 1le kit and now i don't know if i should put them on or not.. i have new lca's and a stb, and sfc's. my springs and shocks are stock.. what do you all think.

[V6Bob]

It's tough to say exactly what to do. As Arctic Wolfe says, a lot of things affect this. I'm trying to write something up that would give people some help.

But, since you asked, some things to know are:

Just slapping 32/21 bars on stock V6 springs will give you a lot of oversteer, and even more so on a 98-up. I think this is a bad idea and that this is a particularly bad combination.

Increasing the rear 2mm makes more of a difference than increasing the front 2mm. It's the percent change (for your '97, 2/30 compared to 2/17) that counts. The bar rate goes up very fast with diameter, going from 15 or 17 to 21 is a very big change.

Increasing the rear bar is much more likely to cause problems than increasing the front.

There are a lot of good books on this stuff. One is "How to Make Your Car Handle". They can tell you so much more than any post.

[Arctc Wolf]

I've seen that Dominic has these on his car, and he hasn't been complaining about it. I can help fix the oversteer problem by getting a wider rear tire than the front. throwing on ZR1 rims w/ 275-40 on front and 315-35 on rear would help it a lot. I'll re-learn the limits of my car when I throw on the swaybars.

Jersey, don't worry about putting the bars on. It's not going to affect normal driving except by reducing body roll in corners. If you were to take it out to a road course or a windy mountain road aqnd push the car, then it will affect how it responds.

[m.malloy]

(jersey) it's me.. yea i'm just going to put them on. i don't think i'll even notice a difference. i just want nice riding car wit tons of power. i have no desire to roadrace or take corners at high speeds. when i get the money i'm going to be upgrading the so i should be all good.
on a side note, my car squeaks like hell. so like it coming from te right rear side. how do i get rid of this. i've tried everything.. when i push on the back of the car real hard i can hear it squeak... it's driving me crazy..

[Dojo2000]

m.malloy, just email the admins and they'll either tell you your password or change it for you.

[m.malloy]

all ready taken care of it. thank you