sway bar mounting

[High Plains Mopars]

Have any of the members on here mounted sway bars in aluminum or bronze blocks instead of rubber or urethane? How about using heim joints as end links?

What were the results like? What, if any, problems did/have you encountered with this type of mounting arrangement?

[parsonsj]

My sway bar is mounted on a spherical bearing with heim joints as end links.

The arrangement works, and allows fine adjustments for ride height changes. It can be noisy, especially when one tire hits a bump. As far as normal driving, it's fine. On the track, it's awesome.

jp

[wendell]

Use rod ends on the end links routinely. Only problem is that you've got to get everything lined up well. A front sway bar in a lowered car ends up with VERY short endlinks. You end up with two 3/8 rod ends and just enough hex stock to screw the two together (if you're lucky).

Also can be hard to get it all to work given the relatively large range of motion/ angularity needed to accomidate the suspension travel.

As far as a performance improvement... 90% of the cars put together here have made such HUGE compromises already, they'll never feel a differnece. That said, everybody reading this has a car in the other 10%. For them, depending on the preload, a pair of rubber bushings will significantly reduce the effective rate of the bar. Add any miss adjustment or degradation of the bushings and your bar ins't doing anything in the first inch+ of suspension travel.

As for the frame mount, I've never used anything fancy for the front. The poly blocks are so small they can't deflect much. On the rear I did a bearing and collars thing but that was a one off.