How to design a sway bar w/ 3link + watts linkage

[exwestracer]

Originally Posted by JRouche

But thats the tendency you have to be VERY careful with on the street, oversteer. A heavy, pushing car will give you more indication of traction loss before you get into trouble. An over steering car will feel great, almost too fast till she breaks free at the back side at the last second. NOT fun on a city street. Lots of fun on a track with enough HP, you have enough room to recover and throttle her back into the lane

Solly, I got side tracked. Umm,, I like splined sway bars. JR

If you combine a low rear roll center with a big bar, it's a little wider "sweet spot" (to control that breakaway) than you'd get with more roll center and less bar...

[JRouche]

Originally Posted by exwestracer

If you combine a low rear roll center with a big bar, it's a little wider "sweet spot" (to control that breakaway) than you'd get with more roll center and less bar...

Yup. I dont know about a wider sweet spot, Ill take your word for that.

But I did drop my RRC pretty low with the watts link so I opted for a stiffer roll bar out back.

What I see it giving me is more control over the adjustments. Now I have a roll bar that can be tuned to the low RRC. And I can change the RRC height with one bolt, I have about 6 inches of room for adjustment there.

So combining the adjustable RRC height with the adjustable roll bar rate I can either get into some real trouble or find a nice combo of settings to make for a car I want to drive FAST.

The guessing part for me was in the rate for the roll bar. I was kinda shooting in the dark. But I think I got it close, actually on the weak side of where I wanted it, which is odd cause its a pretty stiff bar for the car (I forget but I think its right around 300lbs for 5 degrees of rotation).

I might play with the RRC height before adding more bar stiffness, cause well, its free rear end stiffening, and that was the purpose of having an adjustable RRC height.

If I cant get what I want from adjusting it I can easily swap out the straight torsion bar for a stiffer one, they are ninety bucks. And the bar is pretty stiff, for the type of car. I might just have too low of a RRC height.

I wont mess with the front, I think its got a great bar in place and its controlling the front just fine.

I feel the rear being a lil "slow" if that means anything. For me a fast rear is kinda ahead of the front for turn in, "stiff" or "fast". Dont know how to splain it.

I want it to be a lil faster to react on turn in so its at least responding to the turn as fast as the front or even a lil on the faster side.

Sounds weird but with fast driving I like to see how the rear is responding before the front. If I have confidence with what the rear is doing I can take the car faster through the turn. I NEED to feel what the rear end is doing. And for me that means alot of oversteer and a somewhat touchy rear end.

The front is easy for me, hell, Im holding onto it with the steering wheel, I have a better feel of the front because of that. And with the setup I have on the front I can tell its stiff enough and handling the turns just fine. Its actually very flat, just like I like the front to be.

But the rear needs to be a lil light, or fast for me to get a feel for what its doing.

If I can feel the rear steering then Im a happy camper. But if its trailing and heavy it might as well be a wagon full of hay Im towing through the turns.

No thanks. Guess its odd. But hey, we all have our issues LOL JR