[DeTomaso] Sway Bar Mounts on A-arms

[boyd casey]

Actually I was never considering Heim Joints ( to tell the truth I didn't
know what they were) I was and am considering the sphere ball mounts that
Dennis Quella sells and based on my description my friend thought I was
talking about Heim joints. It was only after this discussion and doing more
research that I found out what Heim joints actually are and the the sphere
balls are not Heim Joints. I am planing on getting 180 dergree headers
eventually. I first have to decide when I am going to repower and with what
so I can get headers that match the right heads.I want to be sure my car
handles well and stops as well as it can before I work on making it faster.
Boyd

On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 8:16 PM, <wkooiman at earthlink.net> wrote:

> Either way, I doubt that it's going to cause problems on the street.
>
> Yes, I understand your friend knows suspensions.  My comments are based on
> the fact that I've been driving my car with a solidly mounted bar on the
> street for years w/out issues (not heim, but the sphere ball mounts are
> pretty rigid).
>
> A bigger concern is getting enough clearance without causing rubbing with
> the exhaust or dragging on the street.  Heim joints add more parts in an
> already crowded area.
>
> Wait a minute... Do the heim joints, but switch to 180-deg headers.  Best
> of both worlds.
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> >From: boyd casey <boyd411 at gmail.com>
> >Sent: May 12, 2010 11:44 AM
> >To: MikeLDrew at aol.com
> >Cc: JDeRyke at aol.com, detomaso at realbig.com
> >Subject: Re: [DeTomaso] Sway Bar Mounts on A-arms
> >
> >You misunderstood. My friend advised me against going with Heim joints on
> >the sway bar to a-arm connection. He never said it would damage the car.
> >What he said was it it would have a detrimental effect on the handling if
> I
> >were to hit a major pot hole or other defect in the road surface which are
> >quite common here in New York. He said that the force of the impact would
> be
> >transferred to the opposite wheel because the Heim joint didn't allow for
> >much give. He said if I were building a car for track use it would be fine
> >but for a car primarily driven on the street (especially imperfect road
> >surfaces) I would be better off sticking with rubber bushings (like the
> ones
> >I have) on my sway bars.
> >Boyd
> >
> >On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 2:35 AM, <MikeLDrew at aol.com> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> In a message dated 5/9/10 15 23 28, JDeRyke at aol.com writes:
> >>
> >>
> >> 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.
> >>
> >>
> >> >>>Has this ever happened in the history of Panteras?  I would suggest
> that
> >> it has not.
> >>
> >> The vendors have sold hundreds and hundreds of 1-inch swaybars and a lot
> of
> >> people here are using them.  Your description makes it sound like they
> would
> >> tear the back of the car to pieces.  The worst-case scenario MIGHT be
> >> breaking an A-arm mount, I think.  The only failure mode I personally
> know
> >> of is hollow sway bars snapping under racetrack use.
> >>
> >> When Jack and I tested swaybars together with Larry Stock in the early
> >> 1990s, we found that performance went down, not up, when we moved from
> the
> >> Euro GTS 7/8 bar to the 1-inch bar.  However, that car didn't have the
> >> benefit of a chassis stiffening kit.  It would be interesting to repeat
> that
> >> experiment now--it wouldn't surprise me if the results were quite
> different
> >> today, if the chassis was appropriately stiffened.
> >>
> >> In any case, I still maintain that dollar for dollar, the single best
> >> improvement you can make to a Pantera is to ditch the stock 3/4 rear bar
> and
> >> replace it with a 7/8 bar.  The front bar is already 7/8 and can be
> safely
> >> left alone.  I don't think that the improvements associated with
> changing
> >> both bars to 1-inch are worth the effort or cost.
> >>
> >> And Boyd, your mechanic is either clueless, or you're misunderstanding
> him
> >> when you say that he told you that installing a sway bar that is 1/8 of
> an
> >> inch larger than the factory option bar would be dangerous and make the
> car
> >> leap off the road when it encountered a bump.  That's a laughable idea.
> >>
> >> Like Jack, I highly recommend the Spherebar mounts for the A-arms.  They
> >> really do smooth out the swaybar action on the suspension.  It's perhaps
> not
> >> as good as a true heim system, but it's probably 95% as good, without
> all
> >> the maintenance, complexities, inconvenience and cost of a true heim
> system.
> >>
> >> Mike
> >_______________________________________________
> >
> >Detomaso Forum Managed by POCA
> >
> >Archive Search Engine Now Available at http://www.realbig.com/detomaso/
> >
> >DeTomaso mailing list
> >DeTomaso at list.realbig.com
> >http://list.realbig.com/mailman/listinfo/detomaso
>
>