[mlifxs]

No big revelations here, just thought I'd share some info.

Yesterday, I bought an H&R front sway bar from Jetbill's part-out.

Below is a not-so-great picture of the H&R bar, next to the stock sport package front sway bar. H&R bar is the top bar, stock bar on the bottom.

The H&R bar is 28mm while the stock bar is 26.5mm. From the picture, you can see that the stock bar narrows somewhat in the middle, at the label. The H&R bar appears to be uniform throughout.

The bushings are very similar and appear to be made from the same material. The H&R bushings have a mesh lining in the bushing, where the bushing makes contact with the bar. I really couldn't tell if the H&R bushings were firmer. You use the stock brackets for them and they go into the brackets easy, no need to coerce them in.

The most noticeable physical difference is weight. Jetbill tells me the H&R bar is solid and the weights of the two bars support this. Using my bathroom scale, the stock bar weighed 7.6 lbs while the H&R weighed almost double at 14.2 lbs.

Install was easy, took about an hour.

Initial driving impressions:

Before this mod, my mods included M3 control arms (more neg camber, around -1.1 up front), bmw performance suspension v1, and a square tire setup, 245's all around. With each mod my car seemed to loose some of its plowing understeer.

After installing the H&R, I don't think I've created any understeer, at least not at spirited driving speeds. I don't track my car or turn my DSC off so I can't really comment about behavior at the limit.

As you would expect, there is much less body roll. The car feels very stable in S transitions where before, the body roll was a little un-nerving for a non-tracker old guy.

In a straight line, front end of the car feels stiffer. Over small bumps (our roads are pretty good here), no unusual behavior or noise.

Anyway, my overall impression is this is a decent mod for us DDs. Car definitely feels more stable. Cost is reasonable and install (and future part-out) is easy. There are numerous threads discussing and debating if stiffer front sways are good or bad with respect to understeer. I'm inclined to say GOOD.

[StealYourFace]

Sweet! I cannot fathom an modern BMW showing understeer on the street, but I am glad you like how your changed in a manner you like with this mod.

Get yourself to a cca hpde school- you have an extreamly capable machine! You'll love it, thank me afterwards!!

[mlifxs]

thanks for your suggestion
coincidentally, someone pm'd me something similar early in the day. I think I will check it out more...