[DeTomaso] Sway Bar Mounts on A-arms

[JDeRyke at aol.com]

Boyd, he's probably not familiar with Panteras which are definitely not 
race cars. He's right about the 1" sway bar causing problems, which if its a 
solid 1" bar, will overwhelm the rear of the frame rails and twist them 
proportionally with the giant bar. This will eventually lead to cracking 
somewhere. If you run rubber pivot points, they will flex enough to at least prevent 
frame cracking. It has nothing to do with the use of heims on the a-arms. 
One NEEDS sphereball bar ends or heim mounts on big bars, since a-arm 
deflection is often beyond the range that poly bushings will work. The LeMans 
Panteras as well as Bob Woodhouse in SCCA   successfully ran heim-mounted bars 
front and rear for years. 

For the biggest rear swaybar with conventional mounting, in "Pantera 
Swaybar Tech" (POCA Newsletter Jan '08), I suggested   using a HOLLOW 1" rear bar 
which is nearly 30% weaker than a solid 1" bar (calculations in article), 
and will not (at least so far on our '72) cause cracking problems. A few 
Pantera racers have added a support strut on each side where stock mufflers hang 
down, giving two extra outriggers to brace these big bars over a much larger 
distance. That also works, with a bit more complication as you then must 
re-position the exhausts- and you'll still need heims. 

In my opinion, the extra 30% rear stiffness of a 1" bar with outriggers is 
not worth the trouble & expense unless you already run 180 exhausts. I 
autocrossed a Pantera running gumball slicks for some years with a hollow 1-1/4" 
OD Stock-Car Products rear swaybar, using outrigger mounts and heims, 
without cracking. Handling was excellent but as usual, YMMV. FWIW- J DeRyke