Obviously bumpy roads and potholes will suck regardless, but I feel compelled to let you good people know the disadvantages of going TRD.

I installed mine myself,, very very easy with the enclosed instructions,, and set that **** to STREET. This combines with stock springs and stock 17 profile for the tires.

SO the sway bar is excellent and in MY area its a no brainer , but if u do live in a city with poorly maintained roads, the 100 percent increase in tire bump and thump will drive u buggy.

now for the more controversial part, I wouldnt get this period if u are running 18 or 19 wheels with even thinner profiles. Some of those wheels look like the amount of tire cushion was purely an afterthought.
THis does not apply of course to those who are tracking their cars for its primary use, but thats about 1 in 400 as a guess..

Summary :
TRD sway bar mandatory for a 17 Oem wheel/ tire scheme on maintained roads.
TRD sway bar stinky on 18 and up wheels and or poorly mainted streets.

btw, im going up one notch more in tire profile when I switch out so it will offset the harshness a bit, and will be able to enjoy the greatly reduced body roll without cringing whenever I see a bump in the road ahead.

hooray for TRD sway bar review!!! : )

 

i have the trd sway bar, trd lowering springs, and 18x8.5 rims with 225/40/18 tires and the ride is fine to me over bumpy roads. i also have my sway bar on RACE setting, didnt even bother with street after i tried the race setting becuase the ride quality was still pretty good. thats what you get when you modify your suspension, you should know that the ride quality will diminish. but the body roll is almost gone and the performance and feed back i get from the TRD suspenion upgrades are well worth the ride quality. im very happy with my TRD bar, its all in preference

 

I never drove it stock, but I did note that with the swaybar and stock setup (like yours) it does hug corners and steer very well, but over speedbumps it's a killer! It really seems to get a bit airborne or something in the back. Not really to my liking. Around town this isn't a huge deal and on the freeways (even the torn up ones around Washington), it doesn't matter. What concerns me is I'm about to start driving this up to the mountains to go snowboarding. The roads are fine, but when there is frost and built up snow on it, it gets pretty bumpy... might suck. I was interested that you were going up a notch in tire profile - on the stock 17s, what is one notch up from the 215-45/17"s? Assuming you keep the same wheels on it, that means that the actual circumference of the tire is larger, right? How much does this mess up the speedometer, etc?

Thanks!

 

excellent ?
I will go 215-50-17
maybe 225-50 theres few tires in this range
gives me a bit more cushion

your speedometer and odometer will be off 3 percent

big whoop

ALL YOU NEEED TO KNOW TO STOP CONFUSION
http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html


laters

 

oh and in case it helps you from dying in the snow

I will assume u know to get larger profile all season OR at least lower performance tires for snow, and dont drive like a fool ; )


you do not want skinny ___ slick tires like came stock or youll be hating life when the car slides out from you .

change out asap and thank me later : )


road and track magazines have good ads from tirerack.com
shouldnt be but 90 bucks a tire and worth it to save that lovely Scion,
and no im not a big fan of the word lovely

 

I just installed my TRD sway, springs, and shocks last weekend and the ride is INCREDIBLE!

1. Can anyone comment on the difference between the Street setting and the Race setting? Left mine on race and haven't tried street.

2. Did you guys cut the bushings in half for the rear shocks?

 

I looks more like a 5 percent difference with the 225/50-17 but I don't think that's a bad thing, necessarily. You will loose some low-end power because it's like raising the gear ratio. So you'll be a little slower off the line but will have a higher top speed. You'll get better gas mileage too.

 

eghhhhhh?? why are u slicing bushings??
im ignorant on the matter

 

I agree that in general I'd trade a little bit of low end for a better RPM band on the freeway, especially since this car has plenty of torque. Plus, with my un-lowered setup, it would probably look good with a little less wheel gap, and the padding never hurt, but I am concerned with a 5% disparity on the speedo reading. If I've got this correct, it would be 5% low on miles on the odometer, which I won't fight, but I want my speedo to be correct. There is no (easy) way to get this adjusted? When I see the flashing lights in the rearview mirror, I want to know how fast I was going.