Look for opinions on sway bars to match my Tein Flex coilovers

[tekdeus]

Hey Wiisass, guys,

I am running Tein Flex coilovers, which in my opinion are the perfect balance of good handling while retaining comfort. The spring rates are about 50% higher than stock(12kgf/mm 670lbs/in front, 6kgf/mm 340lbs/in rear) and I want to minimize body roll and maximize handling with a set of sway bars. My car is a widebody and my low-offset wheels make the front wheelbase about 4" wider than stock, and the rear 6" wider. My tires are the best performance tire BF Goodrich makes, the G-force KD, 245 18" front, 295 18" rear. These tires are quite aggressive, with a very stiff sidewall.

I am keen on the Whiteline sways, as they have 3 different settings to experiment with. I am also interested in the ST bars, but don't know their rates.

Assuming that the whiteline bars are the stiffest, I want to make sure I don't go too stiff, as I know this will overload the outside tires under heavy cornering and reduce traction on the inside tire. I just want to find the balance that gives me the absolute best traction around corners.

Also, I have an EDFC controller to adjust my shock damping rates front and rear. Is there an info page or tutorial on how these settings affect handling, and what kind of difference it makes when the front is stiffer than the rear or vice versa? I'm assuming there is a sweet spot setting of ideal handling, but I'm not sure how to dial it in.

Thanks for the help!

 

[Wiisass]

Are you rubbing or bottoming out the damper or is the tire hitting the chassis right now? When you're doing anything? The Flex seem soft, especially for the height of your car, unless your wheel fitment isn't as agressive as it looks. Do you drive the car normally at the height it is in the pictures above?

I would rather see a stiffer suspension and less sway bar on the car. A stiffer suspension doesn't mean that the car has to ride rougher, unless you cheap out and get some crappy setup. The supra can work well with stiffer springs, depending on the weight of the car, upping the rates a decent amount will make the car feel even better when paired with the right dampers.

But if you really don't want to do that, did you look at the list I published of the different bars and how stiff they are relative to stock? I don't remember which is which, I do know that I never tested the ST bars. I think you're right about the whitelines being stiffest on their full stiff setting. And I seem to remember them being 50% stiffer than stock on their softest setting in the front. I don't remember the rear.

If I get a chance later in the week, I'll look over the numbers again and let you know.

As for the EDFC and dialing it in, that would be easier if I knew what the dampers were doing when you turned the knob. A lot of the cheaper dampers, end up adjusting both compression and rebound at the same time, so it's hard to really dial it in. Also, you don't know how they're valved. Best bet would be to just start messing with it, start full soft and work your way up until it feels too stiff and then back it off a click or two. Just feel what it is doing and when and logically think about it. If setting the dampers at full soft will actually have them soft, then it shouldn't be too hard, but sometimes the softest setting on some asian dampers isn't soft enough and it can give false positives when trying to dial in a suspension. But since the thing is in the car and you don't even have to do anything to adjust the damping, just play with it until it feels good.

 

[IJ.]

A bigger issue on your car Brad is the extra leverage from the wide track.

Personally I'd be looking either at custom bars or a piggy back set up.

 

[tekdeus]

Thanks guys. I've never bottomed out the shocks as far as I could tell. The tires were rubbing the fender liners/wells occasionally, and I have since raised the front 1/4" and the rear 1/2", and it seems to be ideal now. It only rubs lightly at the softest shock setting if I hit a massive drop or bump at freeways speeds, which was maybe twice on the 1900-mile trip to Nevada and back.

I used to have the Tein SS coilovers, which are 100% stiffer than stock, and the handling was amazing (I won my class at the '06 SupraFest Auto-X), but the ride was too jarring for normal street driving. The Flex are ideal for my tastes, but do have more body roll. I will ask Tein about the shock valving, but yes, the softest setting is cushy for crusing, and the stiffest is pretty darn stiff.

Yes, I viewed the sway bar stiffness chart, and was hoping to know what the ST's are. Many users are saying that the Whiltelines are much stiffer than the ST's, so I figured that perhaps the softest whiteline setting might be around the same as the ST's, which gives me more options.

IJ, I hadn't thought about the additional leverage on the sway bars, thanks. I suppose going with the stiffest, but most adjustable whitelines with beefy endlinks and tabs might be the way to go for now.

My 40lb yellow top battery is now in the rear right hatch beside a dual 10" subwoofer tire-well enclosure. With a wider heavier rear, should I have the rear sways one notch stiffer than the fronts?

I only have local streets and corners to test my handling, the local Auto-X is closed now. When I test my car with all the possible combinations between sway stiffness and shock damping, what should I aim for? Slight body roll, and have all 4 tires break evenly? Try to find a setting that eliminates over/understeer under extreme cornering?

Is there ever a situation where the front shocks need to be stiffer than the rears, or vice versa?

I just want to be able to go around corners with my current setup as fast as humanly possible Lol!

 

[IJ.]

Brad: I went through the same issues with my widebody Z car

 

[tekdeus]

Brad: I went through the same issues with my widebody Z car

Did you find that no sway bars were stiff/strong enough?

 

[IJ.]

Yep I had Whiteline (then Selby) make me a custom pair that were from memory +3mm to their biggest available.

On a Mk3 it's going to be problematic though as they tend to tear the stock mounts of as it is. (I believe a lot of this is due to the long travel stock dampers allowing the suspension to overextend on one side so I had my shocks shot stroked when they made them)

 

[GrimJack]

Randy can beef up the mounts for you, I'm pretty sure he's done that on his own car.

 

[tekdeus]

Randy can beef up the mounts for you, I'm pretty sure he's done that on his own car.

That's the plan!

 

[Wiisass]

So what are the offsets on your wheels?

And talking to Tein about shock valving probably won't get you anywhere. I'm not saying that you won't be able to get someone on the phone that actually knows what they're talking about, but you won't be able to get someone on the phone that actually knows what they're talking about.

If you have it raised up now and it's not rubbing and the shocks aren't bottoming out and it rides alright, then it should be fine for now. I mean I think you should get something better on there, meaning not another Tein setup, and lower that thing, so it looks as agressive as it should, but obviously, it's your call.

I still haven't had time to look over the numbers, but whitelines are probably a good choice if you want to keep your current suspension. They're adjustable, so you can dial them in.

When you're dialing in the car, you should aim for a balanced feeling with slight understeer at the limit. You will only be able to adjust the amount of body roll with springs or sway bars, adjusting the dampers will not affect the total amount of body roll. And like I said before, I have no idea what the EDFC is adjusting. Compression or rebound or both? So it might take some playing to get it to feel right. But since you're just driving it on the street, just get it so it feels comfortable to you.

And the front shocks should be stiffer than the rear because you're running a much stiffer spring in the front. But that doesn't have anything to do with how the adjusters are. I have no idea how those dampers are valved. What might work best for the front could be full soft, while the rear works better on full stiff, I don't know because no one knows what is happening inside that damper. So you just need to play with it and not worry about what adjustment number you're on, they're essentially meaningless without shock data.

If you just want to corner as fast as possible with your current setup, I wouldn't even worry about aftermarket sway bars unless the balance is off. A little extra body roll isn't a bad thing. The only reason it would be bad is if the alignment isn't right and as the body leans, the outside of the tire is getting loaded. So as long as the alignment is close, you shouldn't have any problems.

 

[tekdeus]

Fronts are 18"x9" offset -7, Rear: 18" x 10.5" offset -10. Based on feel, it seems that the shock adjustments affect both compression and rebound rates. I know that Tein valves their shocks to match their spring rates, because I inquired about putting softer springs into the Tein SS coilovers I used to own, and they said the valving would have to be changed.

Thanks for the info. I guess I'll be doing a bunch of wild cornering to find out the best combo for my wide-ass luxo-tank.:biglaugh:

 

[tekdeus]

I installed the Whiteline sway bars today. What a huge improvement!! So much more stable and predictable. The handling limits are pretty high now, almost couldn't find the limits safely on the street.

I seemed to notice the steering a bit more squirrely. Normally my wide front tires low offset wheels tramline and make the car turn when following grooves in the road. Tonight it seemed to do this a bit more. Could the sways bars cause this somehow?

 

[SPD TRP]

What settings are you running front and rear? I have the same setup as you with the EDFC. I am still fiddling with it to find my happy medium. My setttings that are current are 26 front and 29 rear, but I took some spring out of the front and may need to put it back, maybe a turn or so.

Wayne