how will anti-roll bars affect everyday driving?

[sage]

i know they will help on hard corners, but will my everyday average commute be bumpier than stock?

also, how do you adjust the sway bars once they're in? is it easy? can i do it without raising the car?

[Khoalty]

The ride is about the same except your car is more well balance.
If you want to adjust the bars, you need to raise your car up and adjust em. Its pretty easy to adjust them.
I have Eibach Sway Bars on my car for about couple of days.
Khoa

[blubimmer]

yeah, you gotta get under the car to adjust them
How does it affect daily driving? You'll be taking corners 50x faster than you did before.

[Stylin]

I noticed it did stiffened up the car more.. bumps and potholes are a bit harsher but not much. You'll be driving like blubimmer said.

[yardboy]

I love my eibach anti-sways. ride is changed very minimally. car will be much much more precise in corners. best mod i have made so far imho.

jkl
'98 328i 5spd

[Seedster]

Originally posted by yardboy
best mod i have made so far imho.

i second that.......

[232is PoWeR]

what about your dif???! r the sways a better mod (even though theyre nto in the same category) and i think i am goin with a 3.23.....how much will i feel these gains you think?

[Stylin]

Its a different mod.. ur talking handling vs speed.. it all comes down to which one u want first coz u know u will end up buying them ALL.. I love both of them.. Of course u'll notice some acceleration increases with the 3.23.. but if I was u.. I would wait around for that 3.38 to come around. :

[yardboy]

personally, i would say sway bars before just about anything except wheels. if you have no mods, do wheels/rubber and sway bars first. i would be suprised if anybody who has really modded their car would disagree with me, unless its a 318, which needs power first and foremost.

jkl
98 328i 5spd

[232is PoWeR]

im getting things soooo randomly...and putting wheels off because as you can prob see! imm ahvin trouble deciding: :

[Mateen9]

Sorry to bump this ancient thread, but I've had some eibach sways sitting in my garage for two weeks now waiting to get put on in a few days. I was wondering how they were adjustable. Is it the two holes on the end? Where would I put the nut if I wanted full stiffness?

[Reizvoll]

what if you were to put the sway bars from a m3 onto a 325i would that be any difference?

[Mad Machine]

personally, i would say sway bars before just about anything except wheels. if you have no mods, do wheels/rubber and sway bars first. i would be suprised if anybody who has really modded their car would disagree with me, unless its a 318, which needs power first and foremost.

Not bad advice.. though I went to wheels, bushings, and coilovers first. Set up like I had it, the lack of power in my 1.9 only hinders initial acceleration, I just do not have to lift for corners allowing me to carry more momentium through them, which is better than having to slow way down for the corners then having to accelerate again.

Sway bars will only change how your car rides if you drop one wheel on an axle into a pothole or over a big bump and not the other. A sway bar is nothing more than a stretched out spring that links both sides of one axle together. When one wheel moves and the other doesn't, the spring goes into tension and tries to bring both wheels back into sync with each other.

In a lean, the outside tyre tucks and the inside drops. A sway bar will try and pull the tucked tyres out of the fender and raise the dropped tyre back up into it. Other wise is just moves with the tyres as they go over road imperfections

[Meatball546]

To adjust them to full stiffness, put the bolts through the holes farthest away from the ends. Think about how they work. They work by torsion from the two sides of the car being uneven in height in a corner. The closer the end links are to that axis of torsion, the more leverage the sway bars have on your control arms.

[joerodd]

x32489023 on swaybar being awesome. I did them with PSS's and new wheels and tires. It was like having a race car after that. The car is extremely predictable and precise. It is hard for me to keep myself from taking turns aggressively, when i am just puttin around town. But it is awesome cause you can feel like you are pushing the limits without going too fast, Shit i take turns at intersections at 30 40 mph sometimes when i know that the traffic isn't going to be in the way. And when you are running late its nice that you don't have to slow down as much to turn. haha

[Mateen9]

To adjust them to full stiffness, put the bolts through the holes farthest away from the ends. Think about how they work. They work by torsion from the two sides of the car being uneven in height in a corner. The closer the end links are to that axis of torsion, the more leverage the sway bars have on your control arms.

Cool, so where they're bolted now is full stiffness?

[onetrillionrpm]

I noticed a difference with just my 20mm m3 rear bar. I would love to throw a set of H&R bars on this winter.

[vector006]

Sway bars will deteriorate your ride quality and increase harshness because you are coupling two wheels together. The stiffer the sway bar, the more you upset the other wheel that is connected to it. However, the car will feel more "go-cart" like with stiff bars, which you might like! OEM's dont put small sway bars on cars because they want to save material cost or deteriorate the customer's driving experience; its a trade-off between ride quality and performance. That being said, I am looking for sway bars for my car because I would rather have the car level when cornering hard, but I realize that traction and ride quality will be reduced.

Without getting into the details, swaybars will not make you go faster on the street, but they might make you feel like your going faster.

[ChipB]

what if you were to put the sway bars from a m3 onto a 325i would that be any difference?

It's possible, but M3 sway bars are designed to attach to the strut, whereas for non-M cars the sway bar attaches to the trailing arm of the suspension. The M version therefore has a more direct action on the suspension, and as a consequence the diameter of the sway bar for M3 applications is smaller than for the 3-series but offers greater stiffness. So to use M-stye sway bars effectively you will need to swap out the struts to M-compatible versions, in order for the sway bar to attach to them. If you don't, and use M-stryle bars on your non-M, with the links attached to the trailing arm, you are actually decreasing the effetiveness compared to your stock sway bar.

Cool, so where they're bolted now is full stiffness?

No - what Meatball546 said is that the closer the mounting hole is to the axis of the long length of the arm the stiffer it is. So as shown in your photos you have the bolts in the soft position, since the bolts are in the holes that are closest to the end (furthest from the torsion part of the bar).

[BMWMPow3r]

yeah, you gotta get under the car to adjust them
How does it affect daily driving? You'll be taking corners 50x faster than you did before.

No, the stiffer you go on the sways, you increase body roll response, but lose overall grip.

the same goes for independently adjusting them. You want the front sway stiffer than the rear. Typically in racing you probably want the rear sway on the softest setting and the front a level stiffer to keep a nice balance.
but ultimately its up to you, but keep in mind that the stiffer you go the more responsive it becomes but the tires will break earlier.

[Mateen9]

No - what Meatball546 said is that the closer the mounting hole is to the axis of the long length of the arm the stiffer it is. So as shown in your photos you have the bolts in the soft position, since the bolts are in the holes that are closest to the end (furthest from the torsion part of the bar).

Of course, I feel like an idiot now because after actually reading what he said, that makes sense.