poly vs rod ends, strut tower brace and panhard bar questions

[Rapture]

Panhard bars are the one place where a rod end can make a HUGE difference in handling with a very small effect on NVH.

I would definitely go with either a poly/rod-end or full rod end panhard bar.

Damn that sucks. I means damn that's good. How do I avoid paying shipping back to American muscle. I did call and cancel the order but it shipped anyways.

 

[Norm Peterson]

How much better is the poly/poly over the stock panhard?

How much better is the poly/bearing over the poly/poly panhard?

Anything that stiffens up the PHB's pivots will be better. Especially if you're considering 11" wide or wider rear wheels and trying to keep everything under the sheetmetal.

OE PHB bushing stiffness could run as high as 10,000 lb/in. Two of those in series gives 5000 lb/in overall stiffness (ignoring whatever stiffness effect from the metal). A 1g lateral load puts something like a 1400 lb load on the PHB, which correlates to a compliance shift in axle location of more than 1/4". Doubling the "bushing" stiffness would bring that down to ~1/8". Poly bushings could easily be 5 times stiffer, which would limit axle migration to <1/16". Rod ends would be at least another order of magnitude stiffer (under 0.01" compliance effect).

Compare those numbers to the axle movements calculated from the arc that the PHB must describe (normally under 1/16" for any reasonable S197 PHB installation and amount of suspension travel either way from static ride height).


Norm

 

[Rapture]

Anything that stiffens up the PHB's pivots will be better. Especially if you're considering 11" wide or wider rear wheels and trying to keep everything under the sheetmetal.

OE PHB bushing stiffness could run as high as 10,000 lb/in. Two of those in series gives 5000 lb/in overall stiffness (ignoring whatever stiffness effect from the metal). A 1g lateral load puts something like a 1400 lb load on the PHB, which correlates to a compliance shift in axle location of more than 1/4". Doubling the "bushing" stiffness would bring that down to ~1/8". Poly bushings could easily be 5 times stiffer, which would limit axle migration to <1/16". Rod ends would be at least another order of magnitude stiffer (under 0.01" compliance effect).

Compare those numbers to the axle movements calculated from the arc that the PHB must describe (normally under 1/16" for any reasonable S197 PHB installation and amount of suspension travel either way from static ride height).


Norm

Wow Norm! Thanks bud. In other words as someone said earlier, rod ends are for squeezing that last little bit of performance out of it.