Rhema

<B>1.</B> Do thicker sway bars have any negative impact on ride comfort/quality?
<B>2.</B> How thick are the OEM bars on the sport pkg?
<B>3.</B> Does the <I>front end</I> have a sway bar, if so... since the A4 has a fantastic 4-link suspension, is a thicker front sway bar useful?

TIA

Chard

1. thicker sway bars will stifen up the ride in turns, which is good because that's the purpose it serves. the bars just connect to two sides of the car, which reduces flex in the chassis.

2. sorry, don't kno the thickness of the oem bars, but the sport package bars are thicker.

3. a thicker sway bar makes a big difference. even one mm will make a difference, so i've heard. it isn't always good to get a HUGE sway bar tho, because it can crack your struts or whatever it connects to...so i've heard.

personally, i'd get springs/shocks or coilovers b4 getting sway bars to improve handling. i don't know what your goal is, whether it is to improve handling and looks or just handling, but if you want a good suspension set-up, i'd get a spring/shock combo in conjunction with some swaybars. if you're worried about the ride quality, go with a "modest" set-up like H&R sport springs instead of race. i don't know what mods you already have on your car, but this is just what i think. hth<p>Chard
99.5 1.8tqms Silver, APR, clear corner mod, polished tips, some stereo stuff...

stevews

While a largewr anit-sway bar will reduce body roll, the downside is that a larger bar in trhe front will increase understeer, so although may end up with little roll, you also may end up with lousy handling. (The balance between the sizes of the front and rear bars can help with this.)

flan

Why would a larger front bar increase understeer?
I believe that it would reduce front end roll and hence the amount of presure that the outside front tire would receive. If the outside front tire received less psi because of a larger front sway bar (because the sway bar evens the pressure between the front tires) than why would the car have more understeer?

ARK

Larger sway bar increases pressure on the front outside tire, increasing the slip angle (understeer)

ARK

Say bars do not reduce chassis flex, thats what a strut tower, or "stress" bar is for.

flan

If a sway bar works properly than it distributes the turning pressure from the front outside tire more evenly unto both front tires. If this happens more effectively with a larger front bar than how could this cause MORE understeer? If this theory were ture why would Audi put larger sway bars on sport sus., or for that matter why any sway bars at all?

ARK

As the chassis rolls, the difference in suspension compression (versus the other side, where the other end of the sway bar is attached) causes the outside wheel to have additional (or supplemental) downward spring force applied, so as to cause the coil spring on this outside wheel to be less compressed (reduced force on that coil spring=reduced compression=longer spring dimension=reduced roll), however the tire has more downward force on it now. Don't forget, the term understeer or oversteer is the RELETIVE comparison of front to rear tire slip angles. That is why larger sway bars should be used in front / rear pairs, as the rear bar will also increase the slip angle of the rear outside tire. If the sway bar sizes are adjusted, relative to each other, (and therefore the resultant front and rear tire slip angles, and there ratios) the basic characteristic of the car can be altered from understeer, to neutral, to oversteer extremes. The net benifit of a larger MATCHED sway bar upgrade is the reduction of roll angle, which maintains a flatter tire tread contact patch, therby maximizing the absolute limit of the tire. You will notice that 99.99% of all cars have larger front sway bars than rears, That is because all car manufacturers deam it safer (lower liability) to sell understeering cars, because that is an easier situation for the average driver to control (rather than the car swapping ends!)