I'm not sure why you are posting about anti-roll bar setings on this thread but I have to correct what you have posted to reduce the confusion that your comments will cause.
Changing the anti-roll bar end-link point won't alter the car's ride. Given the small difference adjusting the A-R bar end-link makes in the effective anti-roll rate if you noticed a diference in ride you probably have some kind of installation problem or suspension bind.
As to which setting works best depends on the car's general setup and suspension setup (spring rates, strut and damper settings, etc.), and tires you have on the car. An adjustable anti-roll bar only alters the roll rate NOT ride!
Cheers
Quote:
Originally Posted by woodj
Back to the FRPP (put stickers wherever you like). I started out in the Full Forward/Firmest Setting but realized that the ride was "bone-jarring" to say the least. Wound up putting the adjustment in the Full Rear/Softest Setting and now I actually feel like I have shocks again. Bottom line the adjustment on the front bar really does make a big difference. Since I've ridden it both ways I think the Mid Setting/Street Performance would probably be tolerable. Depends alot on where you drive obviously. If you mainly drive on smooth interstate type roads than the Firmest Setting would be fine.
__________________
'05 S197GT Premium Coupe, Mineral Grey, M5, IUP, ICAP
Mods: too much to list here but see my profile if interested
Same here. IT's like a walking advertisement. LEave that to the ricers. :-P
Oh no! HAZMAT, you are pushing my bling-button. We two have obviously gone separate ways we should still sprechen zie Mustang.
I am not speaking your language anymore!
Habla Mustang?
Parlez vous Mustang?
Stop if you feel the need to put hydraulics in instead of shocks. No one wants to see you bouncing down the road or doing the three-wheeled thing, into the DQ.
I'm not sure why you are posting about anti-roll bar setings on this thread but I have to correct what you have posted to reduce the confusion that your comments will cause.
Changing the anti-roll bar end-link point won't alter the car's ride. Given the small difference adjusting the A-R bar end-link makes in the effective anti-roll rate if you noticed a diference in ride you probably have some kind of installation problem or suspension bind.
As to which setting works best depends on the car's general setup and suspension setup (spring rates, strut and damper settings, etc.), and tires you have on the car. An adjustable anti-roll bar only alters the roll rate NOT ride!
Cheers
So what I guess you're saying is that Ford is lying in their instruction sheet? Changing that setting made a huge difference in the suspension. It's noticably softer after moving the adjustment. I'm not mechanically inclined so I'm not trying to start an argument, I'm just telling you what the car is doing.
No, I'm saying you don't understand how an anti-roll bar works and what it can do for your suspension and handling. If you did you would know that ride is minimally affected by anti-roll bars depending on how they are terminated and attached to the chassis and suspension parts.
If the Ford instruction sheet says that adjusting the anti-roll bar will change your car's ride then whoever wrote that sheet does not know how A-R bars work either. And nobody who does checked the sheet for accuracy.
Cheers
Quote:
Originally Posted by woodj
So what I guess you're saying is that Ford is lying in their instruction sheet? Changing that setting made a huge difference in the suspension. It's noticably softer after moving the adjustment. I'm not mechanically inclined so I'm not trying to start an argument, I'm just telling you what the car is doing.
__________________
'05 S197GT Premium Coupe, Mineral Grey, M5, IUP, ICAP
Mods: too much to list here but see my profile if interested
Whew...I'm exhausted after reading and digesting all the threads regarding lowering the mustang, my head hurts.
I'm leaning towards getting the Eibach Pro Kit, but am still very lost regarding all the other components that must be purchased as well to finalize the lowering. I am very novice when it comes to these new fangled automobiles....not that I'm against improvements and modernization, but to stay educated with it all is almost impossible.
Anyway...what I'm asking for is, what all is needed/required as extras when one decides to get the Eibach Pro Kit? What confuses me the most I guess is, I lowered my 1999 Firebird years ago with the Eibach Lowering Kit and all that was needed was to change out the coil springs and have it re-aligned. With the Mustang however, I'm understanding it's much more involved and additional parts are needed?? Why doesn't Eibach or other mfg's make a kit that is all inclusive, or do they??
Sometimes you guys can be tough....and even somewhat rude, but thats ok, cus this is America, right. I've exposed my pics to the public and their open for comment. I kinda knew that the pics of the performance stickers would raise the fur on a few of you guys. I even got one guy so confused he's talking about roll bars.
One thing about stickers is that they come off easily. If I took them off what else would you find wrong with my car??? I think some of it boils down to plain old jealously:o But of course, thats just my opinion....
BTW- The FRPP springs are a little stiff so Im looking into the dampners to smooth the ride out a bit. Any suggestions... Should I stay with FRPP or go with a different manufacturer.
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05' GT Premium, Triple Black, Hurst Short Throw Shifter, DiabloSport Performance Tune for 93 Octane, FRPP Spring Lowering Kit, Auto Meter Gauges and Tach. Light, White 10" Rally Stripes, K & N CAI, White Faced Steeda Gauges, 8" Shortie Ant., 18" Chrome Deep Dish Rims with Toyo TS-1S's, Strut Tower Brace, Borla Catback Exhaust System, Red Line Tuning Hood Lift Kit, Eclipse AVN 5500 Nav. System, 6.5" kappa speakers, 12" Subwoofer, 500w Kicker Amp., 3.73 Yukon Gears
Whew...I'm exhausted after reading and digesting all the threads regarding lowering the mustang, my head hurts.
I'm leaning towards getting the Eibach Pro Kit, but am still very lost regarding all the other components that must be purchased as well to finalize the lowering. I am very novice when it comes to these new fangled automobiles....not that I'm against improvements and modernization, but to stay educated with it all is almost impossible.
Anyway...what I'm asking for is, what all is needed/required as extras when one decides to get the Eibach Pro Kit? What confuses me the most I guess is, I lowered my 1999 Firebird years ago with the Eibach Lowering Kit and all that was needed was to change out the coil springs and have it re-aligned. With the Mustang however, I'm understanding it's much more involved and additional parts are needed?? Why doesn't Eibach or other mfg's make a kit that is all inclusive, or do they??
Excuse my ingorance on this subject.
If your just lookng to lower the car then nothing else is needed. If your looking to smooth out the ride a little from the extra stiffness the springs will cause then you may want to add dampners as well. Hope this helped. Oh, and your not being ignorant. Not asking questions would be though.....
__________________
05' GT Premium, Triple Black, Hurst Short Throw Shifter, DiabloSport Performance Tune for 93 Octane, FRPP Spring Lowering Kit, Auto Meter Gauges and Tach. Light, White 10" Rally Stripes, K & N CAI, White Faced Steeda Gauges, 8" Shortie Ant., 18" Chrome Deep Dish Rims with Toyo TS-1S's, Strut Tower Brace, Borla Catback Exhaust System, Red Line Tuning Hood Lift Kit, Eclipse AVN 5500 Nav. System, 6.5" kappa speakers, 12" Subwoofer, 500w Kicker Amp., 3.73 Yukon Gears
Oh no! HAZMAT, you are pushing my bling-button. We two have obviously gone separate ways we should still sprechen zie Mustang.
I am not speaking your language anymore!
Habla Mustang?
Parlez vous Mustang?
Stop if you feel the need to put hydraulics in instead of shocks. No one wants to see you bouncing down the road or doing the three-wheeled thing, into the DQ.
No bling with sequential tail lights though, right. Dont be a hippocrit dude. And btw your german, spanish and french all need a little work.
__________________
05' GT Premium, Triple Black, Hurst Short Throw Shifter, DiabloSport Performance Tune for 93 Octane, FRPP Spring Lowering Kit, Auto Meter Gauges and Tach. Light, White 10" Rally Stripes, K & N CAI, White Faced Steeda Gauges, 8" Shortie Ant., 18" Chrome Deep Dish Rims with Toyo TS-1S's, Strut Tower Brace, Borla Catback Exhaust System, Red Line Tuning Hood Lift Kit, Eclipse AVN 5500 Nav. System, 6.5" kappa speakers, 12" Subwoofer, 500w Kicker Amp., 3.73 Yukon Gears
Suspension has not changed much really in the last 40-50 years or so. Sure materials have changed and there is a much better understanding of what is happening dynamically and when this or that is changed but the basic layouts and limitations have been pretty much the same for several decades. This is easy, my head hurts from other stuff like W and Arnold.
The Eibach Pro-Kit Sport Springs are an excellent choice for a performance oriented sport spring kit. Stiff enough to use alone without having to resort to larger front and rear anti-roll bars but being a progressive rate design still very comfy on the street if you don't get too greedy in terms of dampening rate.
There are several "complete" suspension kits out there. Eibach, Saleen, Roush FRPP all make "complete" suspension packeages. But you need to know that they are not all created equal, none of them are really complete and none of them offer struts and dampers adjustable for rebound and compresion rates. The reason for the lack of a truely complete suspension package is cost. If Saleen offered a suspension package that really had "everything" the cost would appear to Mr/Ms Joe Public to be way out of line with a suspension maker's kit that offered a less complete kit. The other problem is that most of the other suspension makers didn't bother to research, engineer and design and build all the other bits it takes to correct and build a truly complete and refined race suspension for the street. Steeda has the most complete parts offerings and have done almost exactly the same things as I would have done. The few places we differ is where I selcted BMR components to install where Steeda does not offer a comperable part or the BMR part is a better more efective design.
So with this information the obvious choice is a suspension kit that you make up yourself picking and choosing the best components for your car based on how you plan to use it and yor expectations of ride comfort and handling performance.
The key suspension component which determines ride comfort and body/suspension control are the struts and rear dampers. When you buy a sport spring the spring rate usually is going to be higher than the stock O.E. spring rate so you will want a stiffer strut and rear damper rate. How much stiffer? You might like to think that the makers of the "complete" suspension kits would spend the time to develop springs and dampening rates that would work well together. Believe it or not they don't.
A good example is the FRPP suspension package which has struts, springs and anti-roll bars. Well the springs and anti-roll bars are made by Eibach and the struts and rear dampers are made by Multi-Matic (the Canadian Co. that developed the FR500C race cars for Ford), and advertised as being specially "tuned" for the S197 chassis. I've driven an '05 car that was completely stock except for the Ford handling-pack and the front strut and rear damper rates were much too stiff in compression even on the stock 17" tires. There is no reason for this error IMO. Granted this was a fresh install of the FRPP kit (I did the install), but struts and dampers don't get too much softer even once fully broken-in. I don't know what Multi-Matic tuned the dampers for but the Multi-Matic struts and dampers would be a good rate for the race track. The FRPP struts and dampers do not make a great street setup unless you live on Mulholland Drive and commute to your girlfriend's house at the other end of Mulholland Drive several times a day 8^).
Anyway, if you are serious about road/track handling performance and want to retain some sort of decent ride for a daily driver or long trips you will need a set of adjustable struts and rear dampers that are easy to adjust and have good basic valve rates selected for reboud and compression. The Tokico D-Specs are the only regular production struts and dampers that are fully adjustable and low pressure gas charged. Sure you could get a set of Moton double adjustable remote reservor nitrogen charged race dampers and have them kick the valve rates down a couple of notches but you are talking $8,000-$10,000 dollars for a set of custom struts and rear dampers that will need to be rebuilt on a very regular basis.
The other thing to realize is that the lower you go the worse your ride comfort will be and the worse your car's suspension geometry will be out of wack. You can correct the suspension geometry issues to regain the good handling traits of the stock suspension but this costs a lot of money, trust me on this point! Pick your Sport Spring kit carefully, Steeda and H&R make top self springs that lower the car but do not lower it quite enough to make you NEED the suspension geometry correction work done. This class of spring lowers the car about an inch or so and allows you to use the car much as a stock spring with no scraping on ramps, driveways and dips. These springs are a good choice for snow belt drivers. You also need to know that if you go lower then the Eibach Pro-Kit springs will drop your car you will be scraping a lot and you will NEED to spend a lot of money to correct the geometry errors created by lowering the car using a Sport Spring kit. The Pro-Kit springs are as low as is practical in a daily driven car, you go lower at your own and your chassis' peril!
The suspension parts that none of the suspension makers tell you that you need include some way to adjust your camber and a way to recenter your rear axle under the chassis once you lower the car using sport springs. You may also need to buy a set of anti-roll bar end-link bolts from the Ford dealer if you have the stretch bolts used on the production line. There is no way to know if you need them ahead of time unless you look at them on the car. The production line stretch nuts lack the NYLOC part of the nut that the Ford replacement parts has. This is why people keep tightening them and they keep getting loose over and over, you need to replace the nuts with a conventional NYLOC nut to keep them from coming off.
So my minimum recommended core handling component list is made up of the following parts:
Tokico D-Spec struts and rear dampers
Sport Spring of your choice applicable to your use and local roads
Eibach or SPC Camber Adjusting bolt kit
Steeda Adjustable Panhard Bar with poly/poly bushing
Steeda H.D. Panhard Bar Brace
Once you have these parts installed and your car gets a good thrust alignment you will not likely go any farther. This is because the car at this point will be better than 98% of the people out there can drive it. With Eibach Sport Springs you won't need or want the compromises of anti-roll bars unless you are going to be driving very hard or on a race track regularly and need to change the handling balance.
If you feel this setup is not enough the next step is to refine the suspension setup to improve chassis dynamics, grip, feel and steering response. You can do this by restoring and improving on the factory suspenson geometry and improving the way the chassis works by reducing chassis and mounting point flexture. This step will make your car pick-up road noises more than stock and let them into the cabin. It's not really that much but you need to be aware of it.
Steeda Front Control Arm Relocation Kit
Steeda Front Control Arm Bushing Insert Kit
Steeda G-Trac Brace for Front Contol Arms
Steeda Bump-Steer Correction Kit **OPTIONAL**
Steeda Street Adjustable Anti-Roll Bar End-Links
Steeda Billet Anti-Roll Bar Mount w/Poly Bushings
Steeda Anti-Roll Bar Mount Braces
BMR Weld-On Lower Control Arm Relocation Brackets
Steeda Adjustable Upper Control Arm w/Poly Bushing
Steeda Fixed Tubular Lower Control Arms w/Poly Bushings
BMR Heavy Duty Boxed Subframe Connectors
At this point you have a car that is going to be VERY fast even on the stock width 17" or 18" wheels and skinny all season tires. On a tight canyon road a well driven car with this setup and small tires will be faster then a big tire car with the same setup. Bigger tires can only be an advantage if you have the additional HP to make up for the frictional losses of the fat tires and you are on a high speed course with lots of high speed turns where the extra grip can reduce your corner times enough to make up for the acceleration losses due to friction and the mass of the big wheels and fat tires. IMO skinny tires is good more of the time than fat tires and you get better milage to boot.
Most people won't really appreciate the improvements the prior steps made but if you are a finesse driver or you are on the track at all you will really notice the differences very clearly over the core suspension setup. The advantages on a race track will not be small in any case.
These parts represent the end of the road, if you need to go past this you need a race car.
Steeda Adjustable Front Anti-Roll bar w/Poly Bushings
Steeda Street Rear Anti-Roll Bar w/Billet Links And Poly Bushings
**OR**
For a car with larger rear tires than the fronts
Steeda Race Rear Anti-Roll Bar w/Billet Links And Poly Bushings
Lightweight forged 18" Wheels, optimally 9"-9.5" all around with dry performance tires. You need to buy a tire with a 27"-27.5" tire height to help keep the suspension geometry optimal. So a tire sized 255/45X18 will be the best choice unless you want to stagger your tire sizes front to rear. Whatever stagger you choose to do make sure that your tire heights are within 0.2" of each other front and back or you may have subtle to serious issues with the ABS and traction control systems.
Lastly you need better brake lines, calipers, rotors and pads. With a 17" wheel you are going to be limited to a few 2-pieces performance rotors, improved pads with a higher operating heat range and teflon/stainless steel brake hoses. With the 18" wheels you can go with Baer's 14" brake upgrade that basically reuses your stock calipers with different caliper mounts on 14" 2 piece rotors with better pads and SS brake hoses. You can do the front AND rear for $1,200 or less! These work well and with the addition of a bit of brake ducting and a scoop in the lower valance you will have 98% of the $2,500-$3,000 4-6 piston brake kits with 2 piece rotors.
The reason you only needed to install springs in your old F-body car was that the F-bodies had a different type of suspension than the S197 cars do. But the S197 chassis suspension is very good and sensitive to changes because Ford spent a LOT of time optimizing the geometry for real world performance with lots of suspension travel and excellent isolation. The F-body cars have a very narrow range where they work well and limited suspension travel along with very poor road isolation. The S197 chassis is a much more refined car and even in stock form superor to the F-body chassis in virtually every way.
Hey, we all ask questions! It's the variety of answers that makes this so fun! I hope this helps you figure out a direction for your suspension!
Cheers
Quote:
Originally Posted by GTSTANG06
Whew...I'm exhausted after reading and digesting all the threads regarding lowering the mustang, my head hurts.
I'm leaning towards getting the Eibach Pro Kit, but am still very lost regarding all the other components that must be purchased as well to finalize the lowering. I am very novice when it comes to these new fangled automobiles....not that I'm against improvements and modernization, but to stay educated with it all is almost impossible.
Anyway...what I'm asking for is, what all is needed/required as extras when one decides to get the Eibach Pro Kit? What confuses me the most I guess is, I lowered my 1999 Firebird years ago with the Eibach Lowering Kit and all that was needed was to change out the coil springs and have it re-aligned. With the Mustang however, I'm understanding it's much more involved and additional parts are needed?? Why doesn't Eibach or other mfg's make a kit that is all inclusive, or do they??
Excuse my ingorance on this subject.
__________________
'05 S197GT Premium Coupe, Mineral Grey, M5, IUP, ICAP
Mods: too much to list here but see my profile if interested
I was wondering what some of your secret mods were???
Guess the world will have to keep wondering. I left all the stickers on the work bench in the garage, and don't feel the need to have a 400+ charactor signature listing them out.
__________________
2005 GT Premium,torch red, all available factory options.
Performance mods: Lets just say it's not stock.
Some people are like Slinkies. They're really good for nothing. But they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down a flight of stairs.
Guess the world will have to keep wondering. I left all the stickers on the work bench in the garage, and don't feel the need to have a 400+ charactor signature listing them out.
Now you've degraded my car and my signature, whats next pigboy.
Im sure you've been told in the past that your a real wise a$$. So why dont you crawl back into whatever dark hole you came out of, take your depression medication, and come back in the morning. And btw- try using spell check once in a while so you dont seem so dumb.
__________________
05' GT Premium, Triple Black, Hurst Short Throw Shifter, DiabloSport Performance Tune for 93 Octane, FRPP Spring Lowering Kit, Auto Meter Gauges and Tach. Light, White 10" Rally Stripes, K & N CAI, White Faced Steeda Gauges, 8" Shortie Ant., 18" Chrome Deep Dish Rims with Toyo TS-1S's, Strut Tower Brace, Borla Catback Exhaust System, Red Line Tuning Hood Lift Kit, Eclipse AVN 5500 Nav. System, 6.5" kappa speakers, 12" Subwoofer, 500w Kicker Amp., 3.73 Yukon Gears
I'm a computer consultant with a good understanding of engine management and race car chassis dynamics. Back in the early days of small microprocessor based personal computer (think mid-late 70's), I designed, tested and built memory boards and other hot-rod modifications for some of the popular small computer systems of the day. Later on I did consulting for UNIX systems, like for the last 20 years or so. During the same period I also did consulting work for a well known SoCal. performance autoparts maker and distributor, first designing, building and installing their in-house accounting and inventory system and then creating their in-house computer tuning program back in the early 90's. Once the ECU dynotuning program was rolling along pretty well I also was tapped to be involved in their performance suspension component design and suspension tuning programs. This went on for several years where we designed and build show cars for SEMA and race cars for SCCA clients and partners. Lately (the last couple of years), I've grown very bored with the computer business and have returned to my first career as a photographer, hence SportsPix.
For a DD street car that you don't want to dump a BUNCH of money into and have to maintain heavily I'd look into a set of Steeda or H&R Sport Springs, a set of Tokico D-Specs, an Eibach camber bolt kit, an adjustable Panhard bar and HD PB brace. For less money than the FRPP "Handling Pak" this setup will net you a better handling, faster more comfortable car with near stock ride and NVH levels. If you are a more "experienced" driver you may want to add a good set of adjustable anti-roll bars. The A-R bars will help you to improve your car's handling and get the ass-end to rotate more easily in the tight stuff (like the canyons off Mulholland Hyway). Get an alignment using a stock or slightly more agressive camber setting and be happy! The secret is to not go too low on the S197 chassis. Trust me. 8^)
Cheers
Quote:
Originally Posted by 05GTCB
pix,
what exactly do you do for a living?:thumbsup
good info. i am thinking about getting the FRPP package as well but wasnt sure if the price was justified or not. Didnt want to pay $1100 for a name.
So for everyday driving you do not recomend the FRRP stuff?
__________________
'05 S197GT Premium Coupe, Mineral Grey, M5, IUP, ICAP
Mods: too much to list here but see my profile if interested
I am by no means a motor head and that is my problem, im still learning.(I used to be a SWAT cop, unfortunatly I cant start a conversation with "so do you prefer the MP5 or the M4 as your primary?" to most people!
I have posted on two other sites getting opinions and just like everything else, everybody has a different one.
I do know I want to get a Saleen S/C because its a good name and the throtle body is in the same place so I wont have to get rid of my CAI.
Anyway, I have resigned myself to the fact that im just going to have to wait till i get to San Diego and join a club there in order to get behind the wheel of some other modded stangs and see what I think myself (that and my wife gets sick of me talking about cars all the time, gotta find car guys to hang with!)
