Mortorq

2 schools of thought on handling I've found.

A) GM's Herb Adams thicker sway bars and softer springs, or,

B) Dick Guldstrand's no sway bars and very stiff springs.

Any of you pros ever change out IROC springs for RS springs, but keep the sway bars and IROC steering box for a slight improvement in bang-itself-to-pieces on rough roads harshness?

'88 IROC T5 vert LO3

Thanks

paul_huryk

Guldstrand did not advocate no sway bars, just heavier springs with stock bars (and poly hardware).

If you did not have sway bars, you would crash pretty much on the first drive.

SCCAjunkie

Not sure about that on an F-body, but my race car runs NO front swaybar, and only the factory rear "bar" (round stock welded to the trailing arms on a "live axle" setup). Now, it is front wheel drive, and I run 800 lb. front springs (on strut) with 550 lb. rears (coil-over shock) and it's only 2400 lb., but it's got crappy weight bias and many of the same shortcomings in the suspension department as these cars do.

SlickTrackGod

Swaybars depend on the perticular vehicle roll dynamic (Basically talking about the vehicle suspension geometry design and the positive roll affect on the mount points.

Having once been a race car driver for Dick Guldstrand, his concept is more geared towards the C2 and C3 Corvettes. Most Vettes do not need a rear swaybar at all and the fronts are very small- unlike a third gen.

ANyways- either has nothing to do ith ride quality. Getting a balnce of spring rate from both spring and bar, or only bar is both the smae relitive harshness. What controls ride quality is sprung to unsprung weight. You want to add chassis weight, and reduce suspension and wheel assembly weight to increase ride quality. Thats why Cadillacs are so heavy for that "Cadillac ride"

SlickTrackGod

Spring rate vs swaybar size has everything to do with the amount of braking and accelerating g's the car will experience- to go further it would have alot also to do with aero squat (does not pertain to street and freeway speeds- so forget this point) and also bank turn compression( again, not for street use so forget this point also).

The more you have to get on the brakes and distrubute weight over the front end under braking, and then assert weight over the rear tires for acceleration- the more you want heavier springs to control the chassis weight for and after. Lesser brake dive and acceration squat? then you can generally get away with lighter spring rates and a slightly heavier sway bar choices. (For sake of confusion- I am not going to get into shock dampering and how it affects spring rate choice)

SCCAjunkie

Yep, inertia at work. Keep the floating stuff floating (chassis) and make the moving stuff have little effect by low relative mass (wheel/hub assembly). Spring it with just enough rate to keep the chassis at ride height but still allow, what, 75% deflection travel at the high end of street encounters, and use *just enough* damping to keep the bounce under control, and all of a sudden, you have a Cadillac, or as many of us think of it, a wallowing lux-o-boat.

The light-spring-big-bar theory will lighten up the ride over two wheel bumps, but most road issues are asymmetrical, so the bar loads the wheel rate back in again if both wheels aren't affected equally. Unless you go with a truly sophisticated (read-active) handling system, good ride and decent "handling" are probably going to be mutually exclusive for the most part on these cars.

SlickTrackGod

Hey, I drive a Lux-o boat everyday and resemble that remark
A 1985 suga caddy ed do rad do (laughing). Everyone laughs at my reputation and my confidence to drive such a piece of ****. (With the pink fuzzy dice hanging off the rear view mirror of course- gotta have that)

grego93536

Can anyone tell me the difference between iroc front control arms, and all other third gen arms? Any light shed on this will be appreciated. ( I know they are different between the 15 and 16 inch rimmed cars )

JamesC

iTrader: (5)

No real difference in the arm itself, but there are differences as seen below:

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/susp...s-created.html

JamesC

SCCAjunkie

James, I have to say, I'm consistently impressed with how much info you have links to, or even have posted yourself. Every time I follow one of your links, I learn something.

If you want to mod the steering stops on stock 15" wheel a-arms to better limit things for 16" wheels, I've tacked on a piece of 5/16 rod (about 1 1/2" long, laying along the working edge of the stop) as a spacer to mimic the slightly longer stop. On that note, does anyone actually have the difference in length of the stops? I'd like to know how close I am...