Lighter Sway Bars?

[GrinderSS]

OK, maybe this is a pipe dream, but is there a set of sway bars available for the Camaro that will improve handling yet be lighter than the stock sways?

Edelbrock has a front sway bar that's hollow 1" chrome molly, but I'm not sure if it's lighter than stock.

[Cam 427]

I installed LSR's chrome molly sway bars. I didn't weigh them, but they felt lighter than the stock bars.
http://www.camaro5.com/forums/showth...t=lsr+sway+bar

[PfadtRacing]

Originally Posted by GrinderSS

OK, maybe this is a pipe dream, but is there a set of sway bars available for the Camaro that will improve handling yet be lighter than the stock sways?

Edelbrock has a front sway bar that's hollow 1" chrome molly, but I'm not sure if it's lighter than stock.

I think this is a good question to finally come up. Not to many people are concerned with proper product engineering, where weight and useless material are discarded due to them introducing nothing into the equation. We at Pfadt are, and prove it. On an already overweight car, weight matters.

The problem presents itself though that the factory sway bars, specifically the rear, are so undersized for performance handling that even though they are hollow, the actual size of them is what makes them light to begin with.

So when designing a clean sheet design, like Pfadt did, we took the time to make the lightest possible set of bars that we could. Due to the drastically increased roll rate provided by our designs, again, especially in the rear, it is hard to match the target weight of an already effective strength/weight ratio of the factory design. The rear bar is just so minuscule, that using the weight of it as a target is not even realistic.

So here are our weights and roll rate comparisons. You will see with our race bars, that they are actual race bars, and not just marketed for racing. They are lighter, stronger, and the rear is a proper three piece design.

Weights:

Front ARB:

OE FE3 Weight - 7.5 lb
Pfadt Sport ARB - 10.6 lb
Pfadt Race ARB - 8.25 lb

Rear ARB

OE FE3 Weight - 5 lb
Pfadt Balance Bar - 16.5 lb
Pfadt Sport ARB - 12.25 lb
Pfadt Race Bar - 10.1 lb

[Supercharged2SS]

I am not sure about net weight, but MTI has their own, www.mtiracing.com I have them on my car and it made a huge difference in the way it drives. took most of the body lean out of the car. plus they are red and look cool.

[2quick]

Our bars are 7.7lbs front and 8.1lbs in the rear. As pfadtracing said the stock bars are light but don't perform. If you upgrade to just about any bar i think its going to add weight. Small amount but still will add some. The front bar is adjustable from 159%, 212% and 285% stiffer then stock. While the rear bar is adjustable from 204%, 364% and 495% stiffer then stock. Hope this helps.


Here is some video of on track testing.

[GrinderSS]

Thanks for the details. As I expected, there's no way to improve the sway bars without increasing the weight. Has anyone looked at using titanium?

I hate that this car is so heavy. I just installed an E-Force supercharger and it added a net of 75-100lbs to the weight of the car. I'm looking for ways to offset that weight increase, while not reducing the performance/handling.

Originally Posted by PfadtRacing

I think this is a good question to finally come up. Not to many people are concerned with proper product engineering, where weight and useless material are discarded due to them introducing nothing into the equation. We at Pfadt are, and prove it. On an already overweight car, weight matters.

The problem presents itself though that the factory sway bars, specifically the rear, are so undersized for performance handling that even though they are hollow, the actual size of them is what makes them light to begin with.

So when designing a clean sheet design, like Pfadt did, we took the time to make the lightest possible set of bars that we could. Due to the drastically increased roll rate provided by our designs, again, especially in the rear, it is hard to match the target weight of an already effective strength/weight ratio of the factory design. The rear bar is just so minuscule, that using the weight of it as a target is not even realistic.

So here are our weights and roll rate comparisons. You will see with our race bars, that they are actual race bars, and not just marketed for racing. They are lighter, stronger, and the rear is a proper three piece design.

Weights:

Front ARB:

OE FE3 Weight - 7.5 lb
Pfadt Sport ARB - 10.6 lb
Pfadt Race ARB - 8.25 lb

Rear ARB

OE FE3 Weight - 5 lb
Pfadt Balance Bar - 16.5 lb
Pfadt Sport ARB - 12.25 lb
Pfadt Race Bar - 10.1 lb

[Apex Motorsports]

Originally Posted by GrinderSS

Thanks for the details. As I expected, there's no way to improve the sway bars without increasing the weight. Has anyone looked at using titanium?

I hate that this car is so heavy. I just installed an E-Force supercharger and it added a net of 75-100lbs to the weight of the car. I'm looking for ways to offset that weight increase, while not reducing the performance/handling.

Titanium sway bars would be freaking awesome but would have an astronomical price tag. There are plenty of ways you can reduce weight, even with suspension components, but sway bars are unfortunately not one of them.

[2quick]

The right grade of titanium tubing would be $$$$$$$. cool but mucho dinero

[tomanji]

considering im in the metal business i can get my hands on all the titanium you guys could want for testing or whatever and its realy not that expensive.. could use some 6-4 ti or i would think CP ti would be better considering its what most aircraft use.