Removed sway bar..... wasn't impressed.

gcomfx.com

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Oct 22, 2002
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Republic, MO
:nonono: Went to the track. Removed my sway bar as many have suggested, and it resulted in a crappy w/e driving the car. And my best 60ft on the bottle was EXACTLY the same as my best before.

1.86 - 60ft

I did not like driving the car all w/e without the sway bar. :nono: I did fine, drove careful, but when an animal runs out in front of you on the highway. All I could do was SLOWLY move over and hope I didn't damage anything.

Luckily the opposum didn't turnaround like they do sometimes.
 
Don't get me wrong.... it makes it more "exciting" to launch. The front end starts low and comes up, but I didn't cut any better times with it removed.

I have drag launch springs with the air bag in the back, and Strange 10-way adj. shocks in the rear.

I plan to add matching struts down the road as well. I honestly don't know how anyone could say they can't see any difference in turning at high speed. I mean the thing is on there for a reason. If it didn't do anything, they wouldn't invest in them from the factory and raise the price of the car. :shrug:
 
gcomfx.com said:
Don't get me wrong.... it makes it more "exciting" to launch. The front end starts low and comes up, but I didn't cut any better times with it removed.

I have drag launch springs with the air bag in the back, and Strange 10-way adj. shocks in the rear.

I plan to add matching struts down the road as well. I honestly don't know how anyone could say they can't see any difference in turning at high speed. I mean the thing is on there for a reason. If it didn't do anything, they wouldn't invest in them from the factory and raise the price of the car. :shrug:


All depends on what you want from your car. I like my car to launch as hard as possible everytime i race. And i dont wanna go through pulling the sway bar on and off everytime i head to the track (im lazy). If your into road racing or hitting the off raps and what not fast then of course please leave it on, as you can deffinatly turn much more agressively with it on. But to say you were scared to turn out of the way of an animal is over board in my opinion. I never found the turning to be comprimised nearly that bad, BUT i was on stock springs where you have the drag springs so im sure that makes a difference.

Also, do you have subframe conectors? When i added subframes on my old car i found the steering to be better with the sway bar off then before the subframes. Which is totally obvious..
 
i really didn't notice a huge difference with the removal of the front sway bar, and the rear for that matter. i drove my vert for a long time w/ neither and only put them on when i sold the car. i also don't like to haul ass around curves, especially with the 3.5" prostars i had up front. but yeah like the other guy said, it definetly help the launch.
 
Sorry you couldnt do this man :nonono:
I did :D

300rwhp + slicks + skinnies +70/30 struts + lower/upper control arms + NO SWAY BAR + dropping the clutch @5500rpm =

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yellow1995Cobra said:
But to say you were scared to turn out of the way of an animal is over board in my opinion.

:rolleyes: That's great for you, but before you slam me like that, you might find out more information, like how fast I was going before you knock my personal experience. You were not there. So ask questions first. For example: I happened to have been moving along nicely at 80ish, it wasn't a highway like any big city with nice large lanes and plenty of them. It was a 2-lane road in between two small towns. Remember I live in the Ozarks. ;-)

I didn't post to make a rule book saying you all are wrong. I posted to get responses to see if I could do anything to fix my seemingly rare results. I've been told for YEARS to remove it, and I did... I wasn't impressed for type of driving I do, which according to some on here would be highly aggressive, but to others very mild, we all drive differently. For instance, I read a post where someone said their car never sees 5k on the tach.... that just blows my mind. I could NEVER do it unless it was broke. LOL Removing my sway bar had virtually no effect on my 60ft times. So I posted about it. Wasn't looking to be called an exagerator, but more for reasons as to why I didn't have good results.

I do NOT have sub-frames. I also do not have a ST brace on the car at the moment. Maybe it is the drag springs.... dunno, but it's NO exageration. Pretty confident in that fact. My friends following me, and racing against me all said something. The car had a different stance with the rear airbag aired up half way. Actually sat crooked when I removed the front sway bar. Had people at the track I never met before make comments to me. So let's ease up a bit. :shrug:

IMG_5912.jpg


Here's a descent shot of the stance of the car that night. :p
 
silverstangman said:
i really didn't notice a huge difference with the removal of the front sway bar, and the rear for that matter. i drove my vert for a long time w/ neither and only put them on when i sold the car. i also don't like to haul ass around curves, especially with the 3.5" prostars i had up front. but yeah like the other guy said, it definetly help the launch.

I think it has a lot to do with the way people drive. It's not uncommon to hear my tires squalling on a clover-leaf. I bought the car to have fun in, not just on the drag strip.

My buddy has a fox with a procharger. I've followed him as he passed someone else and watched the car sway as he applied power switching lanes. I'm not to big on that, he's obviously used to it. He also "putts" around most of the time as he runs skinnies alot. :D
 
Swarzkopf said:
That's wild Paul...I haven't had mine on for over a year now I think...I only notice it when I'm really flying on the highway. In regular driving I honest to god can't tell it's off.

I went out for a test run before the long w/e trip. Drove it like I normally do. My g/f made one of those funny grab for dear life moves when I went around a corner at good speed. She normally doesn't budge. :shrug:

She also bracket raced my car that night. She didn't like the sway bar off at all when driving it, and then hitting the shut down and turnaround at the track that night. So it's not just me, but it might just be MY car. :shrug:
 
I'll never put mine back on. Been off for over 3 years no issues. Drives basically the same, takes turns the same ect. Most importantly takes 20+ lbs off the front nose.
 
gcomfx.com said:
:rolleyes: That's great for you, but before you slam me like that, you might find out more information, like how fast I was going before you knock my personal experience. You were not there. So ask questions first. For example: I happened to have been moving along nicely at 80ish, it wasn't a highway like any big city with nice large lanes and plenty of them. It was a 2-lane road in between two small towns. Remember I live in the Ozarks. ;-)

I didn't post to make a rule book saying you all are wrong. I posted to get responses to see if I could do anything to fix my seemingly rare results. I've been told for YEARS to remove it, and I did... I wasn't impressed for type of driving I do, which according to some on here would be highly aggressive, but to others very mild, we all drive differently. For instance, I read a post where someone said their car never sees 5k on the tach.... that just blows my mind. I could NEVER do it unless it was broke. LOL Removing my sway bar had virtually no effect on my 60ft times. So I posted about it. Wasn't looking to be called an exagerator, but more for reasons as to why I didn't have good results.

I do NOT have sub-frames. I also do not have a ST brace on the car at the moment. Maybe it is the drag springs.... dunno, but it's NO exageration. Pretty confident in that fact. My friends following me, and racing against me all said something. The car had a different stance with the rear airbag aired up half way. Actually sat crooked when I removed the front sway bar. Had people at the track I never met before make comments to me. So let's ease up a bit. :shrug:


Here's a descent shot of the stance of the car that night. :p

slam you?? LOL i said u were going overboard.. Dont cry about it please

And oh yea, u said ur looking for a way to fix it. I told you already, get subframes, maybe u missed that?
 
I removed my one day to see the difference between on and off. For daily driving and the roads I'm on, I will always have my swaybar on. My car, passengers, and me are more important to me than getting that little extra something. Safety and more streetability is much more crucial to me, since it was my daily driver.

If you do not have a daily driver, and just a play car (straightline), then it is up to you.

Turns are not the same, it is different.
 
I'm with David. Ford installs NOTHING it doesnt have too (over millions of cars, every cent counts). Though the SN95's handle a bit better than foxes, both handle kinda crappy, all-in-all.

For those that dont run one, I have the feeling they are not into spirited (twisty) driving or they dont have much of a stock suspension.

It'd be like someone [with a stock rear suspension]saying they get wheel hop with no quads. Then someone [who has aftermarket control arms but doesn't mention it] says he removed the quads and had no wheel hop. Well, DUH.

Bottom line is that every car is different, as is its purpose and style of being driven. I do everything I can to make the car handle as best it can - we don't anticipate needing to do evasive maneuvers.

As you can see, I'm not a big HP guy, but like stuff to DD well and track like it's on rails.
MHO.