Mid-Ohio race prep is moving along. As mentioned before, I really wanted to do a spring rate change. Either drop the front rate about 100 lbs/in or increase the rear rate 50 lbs/in to dial out some of the mid-corner understeer the car has at the moment.
Since a spring change is a semi-PITA, I was initially going to throw in a stock S14 rear bar to move the roll couple rearward out of simplicity. After messing with my suspension spreadsheet a bit it probably wouldn't have been enough of a shift. I then stumbled upon an S15 OEM 21mm rear bar on ebay. It's a diameter that falls right in the middle of OEM bars and aftermarket ones and it's tubular. Weighs nothing vs aftermarket ones which are almost always solid. Made a low-ball offer and the guy accepted.
I just wanted to use the existing brackets, but the bushings were taller:
The bar also needs to be spaced down from the subframe since the subframe is raised and there's potential for the bar to hit the gas tank on an S14. So, I machined some stepped aluminum spacers to use the new bushing and space it down:
I also wanted some adjustability. So I flattened the end more on a press and drilled another hole.
stock:
Flattened and drilled:
I then realized that I didn't want to use the OEM style end-links and still had the nice adjustable spherical end-links from the 24mm Progress bar I used to have on the car. But, OEM bar end-link mounting look like the above pictures. Need the mounting holes rotated 90 degrees.
So? My overkill solution; I made up some aluminum clevis' with 3 different lever arm positions to mount to the two holes now on the sway bar:
But, my first test install revealed that there was too much mis-alignment with the spherical. Using some washers to rotate the clevis into a position that would work to get an idea of how much I need to move:
Nothing a little oxy-acetylene heat can't fix! Probably partially annealed that area, but it's not of concern:
Voila. My 21mm adjustable tubular adjustable rear sway bar:
Should be interesting to see how it helps at Mid-Ohio, which is very technical and undulating and will destroy the front tires if the car is understeering a lot. Will obviously report back on the change.