Ok I know nothing about sway bars, I'll admit it. I am looking at getting the TRD rear sway bar or the Suspension Techniques front and rear sway bars. Is it worth getting the front and rear? And do I need to lower the car to feel the difference? I am going to lower the car later this summer but I was wondering if I could do this first? :eyebrow:

kinda curious about this too.

the sway bar should reduce your body roll for more level handling.

i'm not sure, i saw somewhere somebody had a trd front sway bar, but maybe they meant the strut tower brace.

trd has the front strut bar.. not sway bar.

you'll notice a big difference regardless if you car is lowered or not.

The 07 comes with sway bars. The purpose of a sway bar is to connect opposite (left/right) wheels together through short lever arms linked by a torsion spring (bar). A sway bar impact on the cars suspension is to provide resistance of the chassis to roll in turns, independent of its spring rate. In it's simplest terms, when you turn into a corner, the outside wheel's suspension (turn left and the righthand suspension points obsorb the force of the turn due to the weight of the chassis/body)) compresses. A sway bar transfers some of this force to the inside wheel suspension points (which uncompresses or unloads as weight shifts to the opposite side of the car) and basically pushing the inside wheel toward the ground. The result is your cars lean in a turn is reduced.

Sway bars (aka anti-roll bars) reduce body lean without making the suspension's springs stiffer in the vertical plane, which allows improved control through a turn with less compromise of the normally sprung suspensions (meaning the springs can focus on what they are designed to do through a turn).

Sway bars provide two benefits when properly installed on a chassis supension system:

The first, as outlined above, is the reduction of body lean. The reduction of body lean is dependent on the total roll stiffness of the vehicle. Increasing the total roll stiffness of a vehicle does not change the weight transfer from the inside wheels to the outside wheels, it only reduces body lean.

The second function of sway bars is to tune the understeer behavior of your car at the limit (meaning when you are pushing your car to the edge of it's capabilities in terms of the suspension). The limit understeer behavior is tuned by changing the proportion of the total roll stiffness that comes from the front and rear axles. Increasing the proportion of roll stiffness at the front will increase the proportion of the total weight transfer that the front axle reacts and decrease the proportion that the rear axle reacts. This will cause the outer front wheel to run at a higher slip angle, and the outer rear wheel to run at a lower slip angle, which is an understeer effect. Increasing the proportion of roll stiffness at the rear axle will have the opposite effect and decrease understeer.

Hope this helps. One word of advice. when making suspension changes on your car you need to look at all the critical suspension components together: shocks (or dampers), spring rates, and sway bar diameter/rates. All these components work together so if you make a big change in one it will have an impact (good or bd) on the others.

trd has the front strut bar.. not sway bar.

you'll notice a big difference regardless if you car is lowered or not.

true! I currently have the Hotchkis front and rear sways and I'm not lowered and the diference is there! I would recomend the Hotchkis sways as I had a very good experience with them as others from this site also have had. Good Luck. :D

by the way if you go front and rear sways you'll need to lower the front crossmember to install the front sway bar. so if you don't have acces to the proper tools and or lifts then you'll better take it to a garage who does have them.

The 07 comes with sway bars. The purpose of a sway bar is to connect opposite (left/right) wheels together through short lever arms linked by a torsion spring (bar). A sway bar impact on the cars suspension is to provide resistance of the chassis to roll in turns, independent of its spring rate. In it's simplest terms, when you turn into a corner, the outside wheel's suspension (turn left and the righthand suspension points obsorb the force of the turn due to the weight of the chassis/body)) compresses. A sway bar transfers some of this force to the inside wheel suspension points (which uncompresses or unloads as weight shifts to the opposite side of the car) and basically pushing the inside wheel toward the ground. The result is your cars lean in a turn is reduced.

Sway bars (aka anti-roll bars) reduce body lean without making the suspension's springs stiffer in the vertical plane, which allows improved control through a turn with less compromise of the normally sprung suspensions (meaning the springs can focus on what they are designed to do through a turn).

Sway bars provide two benefits when properly installed on a chassis supension system:

The first, as outlined above, is the reduction of body lean. The reduction of body lean is dependent on the total roll stiffness of the vehicle. Increasing the total roll stiffness of a vehicle does not change the weight transfer from the inside wheels to the outside wheels, it only reduces body lean.

The second function of sway bars is to tune the understeer behavior of your car at the limit (meaning when you are pushing your car to the edge of it's capabilities in terms of the suspension). The limit understeer behavior is tuned by changing the proportion of the total roll stiffness that comes from the front and rear axles. Increasing the proportion of roll stiffness at the front will increase the proportion of the total weight transfer that the front axle reacts and decrease the proportion that the rear axle reacts. This will cause the outer front wheel to run at a higher slip angle, and the outer rear wheel to run at a lower slip angle, which is an understeer effect. Increasing the proportion of roll stiffness at the rear axle will have the opposite effect and decrease understeer.

Hope this helps. One word of advice. when making suspension changes on your car you need to look at all the critical suspension components together: shocks (or dampers), spring rates, and sway bar diameter/rates. All these components work together so if you make a big change in one it will have an impact (good or bd) on the others.

:doh: :doh: Hate to tell you but all the TC's come with sway bars installed, STOCK ONES, but the aftermarket ones are stonger and have different settings, I.E., RACE and STREET, for the TRD Rear Sways.

Didn't mean to imply that only 07's come with sway bars front and rear. Should have been clearer.

if you want rear only get progress, if you want both then get hotchkis

the front is a baitch to install, but I would go with both!
I know I went with the Hotchkis and love the different settings the kit offers.

wow this is great, I have learned so much today about sway bars. Im going to look into getting both I guess. Thanks for everything guys!

If you go much stiffer than the TRD in the rear, then you want to get a set. This is why the stiffer ones come in sets. The TRD on race setting pretty well balances the system out. Takes a lot of the understeer away and reduces body roll quite a bit. If you go stiffer in the rear, you are probably going to promote too much on the side of oversteer, so a stiffer front will be necessary to balance it all out.

If you are driving on a lot of rougher city streets most of the time, I wouldnt go much further than a trd rear. The sway removes independence in the suspension, so on uneven, bumpy streets handling can suffer if you go too stiff. On a nice, groomed track you can go much stiffer.

On bumps that affect both sides equally (like speed bumps) you wont notice the decrease in independence since both sides compress together.

TRD Springs and TRD rear sway is a great combo IMO

ok that is very good to know because up here in New England the streets tend to be on the rough side. So i think I will go with just the trd in the rear so I dont have to be too stiff.

I like being stiff....

I had to do say it!!

I am glad someone did.... my immature side was screaming at me :P

Twin cities streets are mixed as far as good and bad. I have the setup I mentioned above and the difference over stock is awesome. I also run on Avon TECH M550's which do a good job. I am seriously looking to run 245's and some different wheels as well at some point. There is a complete discussion on this over at yoursciontc.com if that is an option for you.

Handling comes first for me. The stock power does fine on the twisties. Power will come later most likely.

haha yeah I set you guys up for that, lol it was kinda on purpose. I think im gonna go with the trd one in the rear and get it for my birthday from my girlfriend in a month or two.

Does anyone have the Hotchkis stage 1 TVS kit? Is it a good buy? I mean, I was looking at the Hotchkis springs anyway, and I'm trying to see if the sway bars are any good.

I hear they are pretty good. Much stiffer than the trd so you will lose some more ride quality. If I was going to get serious with autox in the tC that is probably the set I would get.

They did have some rubbing issues at first though, so you may search around to see if they fixed it.

If you get a front sway, be ready for a tougher install. It wont be monumental, but definitely a lot more work than the rear.

The rubbing I believe was in pair with a set of Tein coilovers. The steering column was hitting the bar when turning HARD. It won't be an issue if you're not taking it to the track.

The rubbing I am talking about is with almost every install. It was a big deal when it first started happening, but I think they made some changes to things. I know people with hotchkis and trd springs were having the same issue. But like I said, I think it is corrected now.

Cool, thanks guys!

Does anyone have the Hotchkis stage 1 TVS kit? Is it a good buy? I mean, I was looking at the Hotchkis springs anyway, and I'm trying to see if the sway bars are any good.
I started out with TRD springs, then got the Hotchkis front/rear sways, and then swapped my TRD springs with Hothkis springs, so I ended up with the TVS kit.

TRD springs and Hothckis sways made driving straight feel like stock (smooth) and it squatted in the corners. I didn't think it could get any better then that.

Then I got the Hotchkis springs and to my surprise, the ride stiffness did not increase dramatically, but the handling did. It squats even better in the corners, and my lane changes feel quicker. However, I did end up having to move the rear seting from stiffest to middle to compensate for the increase spring rate of the hothckis springs.

now I have the Koni yellows up front and am messing with the adjustable stiffness on that until I find the perfect mix of ride quality and handling over the construction heavey roads here in Vegas.

Sweet! Thanks man. I'm sold on the TVS kit.