SWB Suspension Upgrades?

[Richard]

Ok. My two cents.

For a street car that is ocasionally driven on the track I like sticking with the stock factory torshion bars (19mm front; 23mm rear). They give you a reasonably comfortable ride and are firm but not harsh. Regarding anti-sway bars you have lora of options. The stock early 13mm sway bars are small and don't really do enough to limit sway when driving your car hard. But, as long as you leave the torshion bars at their stock sizes you won't get a harsh ride. You can tune your car with larger anti-sway bars and still get a good ride...while making a huge differnence in the cornering ability of your car. Because the SWB car is inherantly an oversteering car at at the limit I like a slightly bigger sway bar in the front than in the rear. Pick what ever you want. 16MM front/15MM rear...or agressively...19MM front/18MM rear. Or just for cruising...how about a 15MM front and either a 15MM or a 13MM rear. All these combinations will work for a fun street driven 911/912. The key to keep in mind is that the stiffer you go with torsion bars and shocks the more your ride will suffer. (OK for the track but maybe not ok for the street). Sway bar changes are kind of free...maybe not totally free but pretty much. You can make them bigger or smaller and your ride won't change much...but you can tune you handling with them and end up with a car that stays flat around corners but doesn't punish you while you are driving it.

R.

[50/50]

Does anyone have a mounting location for attaching the facory rear antirollbar mounting plate for a SWB? See link below

http://www.stoddard.com/shop/shopexd.asp?id=2651



Thanks,
50/50

[edmayo]

Here's a link to a rear bar install tutorial I did some time ago. Hopefully will explain enough.
http://www.early911sregistry.org/for...ay+bar+install

[Fishcop]

Wonderful thread.

My contribution relates to going too far... I took my car to a more track oriented set up and made it very unpleasant on the road. In hindsight this is the 'bad' I created:

Ride height too low - A arms actually struck some road obstacles (some goat tracks where I live)
R rubber 205/50 Kumhos too low and stiff.
Possibly ruined a set of Konis as there wasn't enough travel.
Added race seats (glass shells), too hard to get in and out of.

The car became a chore and sat in favour of using my daily driver...

[50/50]

Ed
If there wasn't the internet, you would of authored the longhood companion to John Muir's "How to Keep Your VW Alive: A Manual of Step by Step Procedures for the Complete Idiot". Encyclopedic Knowledge.

Fishcop: Agree with your observations. Although we don't have any goat tracks, we have plenty of frost heaves, pot holes, lax public works road keeping, tank traps etc.
Want to keep the spine and sheetmetal intact. Out with the lowprofile and in with the period correct 70 $eries.

[66S]

I have a SWB front suspension modified by Dave Coleman for racing. It has cut down struts with shorter inserts, spacers between the strut housings and steering arms to raise the spindles, ball joints relocated farther out on the A arms for more negative camber and angled for a caster change.

[Fritter]

I rebuilt the suspension in my '68 a few years ago with all new rubber parts. It has stock 19mm front and 22mm rear torsions. It's lowered to Euro spec, corner balanced. It has 196/65 tires. Six inch flat Fuchs. It has the through the body 13mm front sway bar and no rear sway bar.

It rides and handles great for the street! No more squeaking and groaning!

Don't get sucked in by all the internet hype about changing everything right away. For the street, rebuild the stock stuff with rubber bushings and then drive it and decide if you want to upgrade from there.

If I don't sell my '68, I may do some DE's this summer with it. I will learn more about the limits of the stock setup when I do this. I'm guessing if I make changes after that, I'll do either Koni shocks and/or a rear sway bar.

[Chris Pomares]

I just reread this thread. It takes me back in time a good decade. Before I went to coil overs on my SWB car I settled on 19/24 T's, 15/15 sways, ultra smooth Rebel bushes, adjustable SWB to LWB ball joints, Koni's, (fronts 71S 3.5 caliper pattern), 25"F/24.5"R ride height, 1.5F/2.0R camber, and 195/55/16 tires. Compliant for 1000 mile drives to Cali, and fun at 8 to 12,500 feet in the mountains. Now with coil overs, 16/16 sways, Rebel Bushes, Elephant GT3 type front suspension, 2.0F/2.5R camber, and 195/55/16 tires. Still complaint, but tracks (arcs) on longer radius turns even more strait and true.