What do you have to say about sway bars?
 

I am looking into getting some sway bars for my Z, and my top choice is whiteline. I thought about hotchkis too b/c they are cheaper, the only concern is they are hollow.
What kind of sway bars do you have? how long have you had them? how do you like them?
If you have used more than one kind of sway bars, please share with us your experiences!
Thanks! :tup:

i think hotchkis are not recommended on this forum.

I don't have experience with any of these but from reading the forum:
-Stillen are good for street driving
-Whitelines are probably best, but more expensive and heavier

The rest, i have not read much on.

EDIT: I too would also like input from people who have used different kinds on which like the most

If a company makes the exact sway bar as, lets say whiteline sways, same thickness, same material, for half of the price, would u consider buying them?

But.... what's the best sway bars?

:inoutroflpuke:

I'm looking to buy a set of sways in the future too, would love to see any input :tup:

Whiteline for sure.

Yes I don't see why not:tup:

Hotchkis are track sways. The OG's of the forum swore by them, they were mostly track hounds though. Whitelines were superpopular with the Z33 and I'm sure are just as good on the Z34. For me though. I would choose Eibach. They make the perfect street sway with very good track capability. Weight is a huge factor for me.

Most of the sways made for the Z are top notch. It just really depends on your application, mods and budget. The safest route would be NISMO sways, which look like either Hotchkis or Eibach copies.

The one thing is I cant find the weights of each of the sways compared to stock

When we installed some hotchkis they were a hell of a lot heavy and beefier than stock. On the flip side they did what they should and inproved handling. Great for the track but i've heard stillen is better for the street and whiteline is the best all around.

I settled with Eibach sway bars and they have been on my Z over a year now. They perform as expected; no body rolls during cornering through turns. They are great for daily drive, and weekend canyon run. I have not run them on the track yet. The weight is lighter than Whitelines. There are 2 adjustment settings for the front and 3 adjustment settings for the rear. For the price, brand reputation (product quality) and performance, it’s an easy decision for me to pick the Eibach.

I've ran Hotchkis on my 350 and now on my 370. I love them. Never driven on anything else. But I here so many great things about Whiteline. If Whiteline ever makes front endlinks I'll buy it all and test them out.

Ok I got these prices from research on the net so I'm sure you can work a deal with our supporting vendors:

Kami Speed:
WhiteLine Front (27mm Solid Spring Steel, 2 way adjustable): $247
WhiteLine Rear (24mm Solid Spring Steel, 3 way adjustable): $220
Whiteline F&R: $440

Eibach Front (32mm tubular, 2 way): $215
Eibach Rear (29mm tubular, 3 way): $215
Eibach Both F&R: $369

Hotchkis F(35mm tubular, no adj) & R (28.5mm tubular, 3 way): $410

Progres Front (35mm tubular, 3 way) : $188
Progress Rear (25mm tubular, 3 way): 172

Tanabe Front (30.4mm tubular, no adj.): $205
Tanabe Rear (25.4mm tubular, no adj): $205

Stillen:
Stillen F(5 way) & R (3 way): $301.78

But what's the Best?:shakes head:

I also run Hotchkis, I have no complaints, I've never heard they were not recommended on this forum. Like Kaien said, they are big and beefy and work well

Like I said before... they are all good. It really depends what you want to do... figure out your driving style first. Do you plan on tracking or not? Things like that...
Hardcore track- whiteline and Hotchkis
Street, auto x and light track- Eibach and stillen. Eibach has the edge...

The others... I don't know. You would have to ask others with experience with them.

Check out this website, way cheap! :tup:

Products - CaptWholesale - AFTERMARKET ACCESSORIES PERFORMANCE PARTS WHOLESALE

:happydance:

Cool. Because Top Speed Pro 1 (the company I got my exhaust from) makes sways bars, but they haven't started making sway bars for 370Z yet. I've seen their sway bars for other cars, they felt just whiteline sways, very solid. The only concern they have is no one is going to buy them.

here is thread regarding hotchkis where people don't like them:

http://www.the370z.com/brakes-suspen...ml#post1496184

I was kidding. I always get a chuckle out of those type of questions: "what's the best?". :rolleyes:

The Stillens are by far the best deal price wise. I actually havent installed mine yet so I cant give any personal opinions but I hear nothing but good things about the Stillen setup when used in a street application. I can tell you that they are heavier than the stock bars though.

It seems all the aftermarket sway bars are heavier than OEM. However, that weight shouldn't be much more and is almost at lowest point on your car.

And that should tell you something about the factory bars.:ugh2:

I just installed a set of Stillen. My first AutoX for the year is tomorrow. Certainly I agree that for the price, Stillen would be hard to beat given they are slightly stiffer than my stock Nismo bars with enough adjustability to balance my car once I see how the car settles-out with my Hoosiers and my driving style.
I will say, a lot of debate can be had with regards to the purpose of sways....I personally subscribe to the theory that once you've finished all your majors suspension mods, sways are used to fine tune your F/R balance.
I will report on my impressions of the Stillen bars after I have some time to dial-in the car. Fitment was excellent.

Lol... I shoulda known.:tiphat:

Bump

How long would you say it takes to install? Eibachs are coming in today!

I would think it should not take too long at all.

if you have the right tools and have another person helping you it's not that difficult. look for sway installation DIY on the forum, people sometimes have their own little tips to make your life a lot easier! :tup:

good luck!

My whiteline should be coming in next week! :happydance:

A lift, the right tools, and 30 mins, done.

On my 95 300zx, I had stillen and they worked great. Since I may do an occasional track day here and there, I am by no means a weekend warrior heh.


I will probably go with stillen again seeing as hotchkis is more hardcore then I thought (1st choice).

Greg

On my fairly new 370 (less than a year old with 9K miles on it), not a daily driver and only driven in fair to good weather, all nuts and bolts are not corroded and still in good clean shape. Install time, about a couple of hours with ramps and another guy helping. On a 40th Anniversary driven in Florida exposed to beach sand and sea salt, corrosion and binding nuts were a huge problem. Total install time about 3 hours+ with Ramps and another guy helping + pneumatic tools.

The Rear Sway bar is the most complex installation. We dropped the muffler drum out of the way and removed the A-arm support as well, and we were able to sneak the old sway out and sneak the new sway in fairly easy. Again, all sway bar nuts and bolts are VERY HARD to break loose, so make sure you have at least an 18" cheater bar wrench. We also used a pneumatic wrench and a battery powered handheld nut driver - makes life so much easier running those nuts and bolts in and out.

Couple of pieces of advise for you - before removing the old rear sway bar, note exactly how it is connected and laid out... it's a little confusing putting the new one on - AND, spray all nuts and bolts threads with WD40 once you take them off. Makes running them back in so much easier also!

Good luck with the installation. We installed EIBACHs by the way and they are worth it!

Must have been the salt and sand. We have swapped mine from stock to hotchkis and back again on both of my 370's without a big problem.

Even on mine, which is in pretty good shape, those sway bar nuts are on extremely tight. Did you find those to be super tight on yours?

Thanks for the info guys. I installed the fronts myself and the nuts were a pain. I had a hard time doing the rear so I took it to z1 motorsports. It feels much better than stock. I set the front to the softest setting and the rear was set in the middle. @ Paulz370, what setting are your eibachs set at?

I put mine at stiffest setting on both front and back. The car is still very responsive on quick side to side or "S" turns (that's the whole point of stiffer sway bars) , and I even tried to see if it will over-rotate if I pushed it, and I could.. the back end felt it was coming around and the VDC kicked in... so understeer at those settings did not appear to be a problem. I went home and did some Math (virtue of being an engineer) and here is what I come up with - very simple, but sorry if I bore you!

Stock Sway Bar settings: Front @ 416 lbs/Sq Inch, Rear @ 374 lbs/Sq Inch - Ratio Front to Back = 416/374 = 1.1123 or 11.23% Front being stiffer than Rear (Understeer Baseline)

Eibach Sway Bar Settings (Stiffest): Front @ 900 lbs/ Sq Inch, Rear @ 860 lbs/Sq Inch - Ratio Front to Back = 900/860 = 1.0465 or 4.65% Front being stiffer than Rear (Less Understeer than Stock Sway Bars by 6.58%)

So in effect, at the stiffest settings on the EIBACH's, I dialed out 6.58% less stiffness in the Front or that much less under-steer... AND now I also dialed out the little plowing as well... so she is solid but still turns on a dime... not a bad deal...:driving:

not boring at all. Maybe I'll drive around for a few weeks with my current settings and then try your setting. Shouldn't take long to adjust.

I calculated your settings to be on the Oversteer side by approx 1.5% - that's a total change of 12.71% over stock - from understeer by 11.23% to oversteer by 1.48%... let me know how she does - keep an eye on the VDC and see if it kicks in more often than before...?

ps - you are running stock springs right?

swift springs. I took a sharp turn today where VDC usually kicks in, but it didn't with the eibachs

Then you are probaby dead on with the springs and sway bar settings... I am running stock springs, so things would be a little different between your vehicle and mine. Take care my friend! :hello: