Sway Bar Question

Fulltimer · **Posted:** Fri Feb 22, 2008 5:12 am

The guy that put my lift kit in said: " From the looks of this kit I think you would do just fine without your sway bars" I know that some people on here have said that disconnecting the front one for highway use doesn't work. The KJ wanders all over the road. But what about the rear one? Does anybody drive theirs all the time with it disconnected?

Terry

corwyyn · **Posted:** Fri Feb 22, 2008 5:41 am

I pulled my rear swaybar back when I put my lift on - over one year and I've never noticed a difference even towing a trailer. Unlike the front swaybar the rear unit does not significantly help in body roll so it is safer to run without. Running without the front swaybar is (IMHO) an invitation to disaster :shock:

Fulltimer · **Posted:** Fri Feb 22, 2008 8:06 am

That's what I thought. The guy that said that was very impressed with the Franky! This morning after I posted the question I was talking with a guy about this and he said that it helps a lot in an emergency situation and he would just buy or build an extension for the rear and disconnects for the front. From what I read on here the disconnects are noisy. I wonder if adding an extension would work in the front also. At least they would still be hooked up and still have the travel of being disconnected.

Terry

JJsTJ · **Posted:** Fri Feb 22, 2008 10:36 am

No rear bar in either KJ since I owned them (SFA does have rear bar now though) and no problems on either in all the years of driving them on and off road. I wouldn't drive one on road w/out the front.
I honestly don't see that huge of a difference in the fronts ability to work off road w/ the front bar attached either. I have run w/ and w/out a front bar as well as run w/ a custom built front disco bar all on the same trails w/ two different IFS KJ's and I got through w/out any more work than when I ran the whole trail w/ the bar connected. Others in the group had either a disco'd bar or removed bar and we all got to the end of the trail w/ the same amount of effort. Unless you test the same trail back to back w/ and w/out your front bar you will never know if it really makes a difference on your KJ so YMMV on this topic.
I will say that in off camber situations the KJ definately felt more stable, less tippy w/ the bar than w/out. I will also say that I was a huge fan of running disco'd on the KJ but I wheeled w/ others that were not and like I said, we all made it through the same trail w/ the undisco'd guys making it through fine.

Fulltimer · **Posted:** Fri Feb 22, 2008 12:27 pm

JJsKJ: that was a very useful post. Thanks!

Terry

jerbacher · **Posted:** Fri Feb 22, 2008 12:59 pm

Running the front disco'd on the trail will definitely help you keep all the wheels on the ground. period. i know there are a few spots on the trail we do in KY that it helps out in. there are a couple of spots where you one wheel front and back of the ground and without a locker you are stuck. the discos help with this.

my JKS discos do not make any noise at all. you just have to make them the right length and keep them greased up.

there are plenty of pics out there showing the front end flex you can achieve disco'd, but i'm not sure where they are. here's a couple of mine from last weekend

compared to:

not the same spot, but you get the idea

Uffe · **Posted:** Fri Feb 22, 2008 1:14 pm

Odd - I removed both my sway bars on my Patrol (which is an SFA+SRA car). I noticed a bit of roll on the road esp. in roundabouts. The difference in the terrain was immense. Nothing less of extraordinary!

It kept the wheels on the ground even if the drop was pretty deep. No way I could have gone the same places with the swaybars on.

Why would a swaybar make the vehicle wander on a road? I can't really imagine why that would affect anything on a road, which is level.

jerbacher · **Posted:** Fri Feb 22, 2008 1:17 pm

if you were to make an emergency maneuver or something, the body would roll like crazy. it kinda feels like youre driving a 3-wheeler when you have the front disconnected. if you were braking and swerving.... it would be bad. all the weight of the vehicle would go to one of the front wheels which would probably stuff in the wheelwell. i havent tried this, but it seems like a super bad idea to drive on the road disconnected.

dgeist · **Posted:** Fri Feb 22, 2008 2:55 pm

Uffe wrote:

Why would a swaybar make the vehicle wander on a road? I can't really imagine why that would affect anything on a road, which is level.

Turns are where you really notice not having them, especially with IFS. The geometry of the steering/suspension changes slightly through the stroke of travel it's typically supposed to to maintain safe and favorable handling characteristics on-road. If you don't dampen the travel (with the sway bar) then it's entirely likely t that it's moving way more than it was designed to and that translates to "wandering" or other words.

Sway Bar Question

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