I read a bunch of bickering about this on another thread..I have a Crawford Bar
and a JIC suspension. i regularly ( at least twice a week) drive my car in excess of
130/140 mph for substantial periods of time on a stretch of road between SF and San Jose, curves, bumps and a and all.

No problems with the Crawford Bar...in fact..it's better than stock..as you can ADJUST it. In fact, I would recommend getting it whether or not you use their plenum, which you should also get as it has definately improved my cars performance.

I am also extremey pleased with the JIC suspension, as it really kicks in and smooths the handling out above 120 mph or so. The car actually handles better at high speeds than normal speeds. smooth and precise. nary a wiggle or vibration.

 

i recently got the crawford strut bar and i must say it looks damn sweet and it assembles easily.

the part i am unimpressed with and i think needs an immediate fix is that the bar is flexible. i can easily bend it when it is sitting there. the stock bar i can;t bend at all.

or did i install it wrong?

victor

 

? on mine...when I pull on it the whole car moves. it's like a rock.

 

but does it flex?

 

not that I have noticed. I'll check it out tommorrow.

anyway..the first thing that would 'shear' due to stress would be the sheetmetal on the chassis, either bar set up. Thats the weakest link. or you'd snap a bolt.

but, that would only happen after repeat and extreme conditions.

 

A strut bar is primarily there to resist the flex of the outside front of the car flexing under hard cornering. If the corner flexes, the strut tower/wheel loses camber by rolling under with the tire contact patch being the pivet point. The strut bar ties the two sides of the car together and the forces now must bend both sides. The bar is in tension (pull) for this primary purpose (it also resists flex when hitting bumps and this would be compression). In other words, it could be a cable to do its primary pupose since it is usually in tension and I have seen this in autocrossing to save weight.

With that said, the Crawford bar is straight, as opposed to the bent stock bar, and should do better with lighter materials. The issue here is that it is cantelevered forward from the attachment point. This will force a twist into the srtut tower and I do not know what effect that has. This configuration by Crawford is common for strut bars and I would not worry about the "forward" design.

What this all means is that the bar should be set with the car on the ground and pre-tensioned/tightened to maintain as much camber while cornering. The only time the car might corner better without a strut bar is if you have too much camber from lowering and losing some camber actually helps.

Any mechanical engineers want to chime in.

 

patsaunders Thats exactly what I have telling people couldn't have said it better myself.

Doug

 

I have a similar set up as you it seems and also do many HPDEs. My question is what settings do you have your A2s set at for reg. driving and when you go to the track.

 

So I don't have to worry about the bar being flexible?

 

pretty much got them somewhere in the mid range...I dropped the front 20 mm and the rear 23 mm. I dont track the car so i just use the one setup.

driving around town can be a little annoying, but i know all the bumps and potholes and sort of just avoid them. my car lives for the freeway.

 

Mike,
No, you do not have to worry about it flexing when not installed, but it should be firm when installed with no play.

 

nothing actually moves, everything is down tight. but the bar bends when i tug on it or push on it.

also, is the bar supposed to be stretched out as much as possible once it is installed? or is it supposed to be shorted as much as possible?

Thanks,
Victor

 

Those with the strutbar, can you feel a difference and, if so, what difference?

Also, I thought the plenum was mostly for show? If not, please explain function and gains obtained (i.e. dyno)?

Lastly, where would I buy Crawford products?

Thanx

 

no, no the plenum is for power, a good load of it too. you can buy crawford products from crawford themselves or strictlyz.com

http://www.strictlyz.com
http://www.crawfordzcar.com

 

Mike, you got the link to strictly z wrong

www.strictlyz.com

I dont see any crawford stuff there though

 

ooops, corrected. yeah it's not on their website but they can get the parts i believe.

 

Mike,
Shorten the bar to keep maximum camber in corners.

 

I am DIGGING this up from the graveyard.


i recently installed the crawford plenum and as such, installed the crawford strut bar.

patdsaunders above mentions to SHORTEN the bars as much as possible, which is what i had been trying to do... but to follow up on that, the question is HOW? did you just loosen one end (example: right side) and then used a wrench to tighten the other side? -- if so wont that kind of mess up the amount of threading per side left and right joints? ie: the joint on the left will be threaded into the bar more than the right

 

btw, the bar is quite nice. fairly obvious when cornering and you dont feel the front chassis flexing as much.. i think i noticed significant differences because i had been driving the car without ANY strut bar for a few days (due to the crawford plenum, i had to remove the stock bar and wait for the crawford bar to arrive)

well done