Rear Sway bar
Posted by Craig Hendrickson On 2015/6/6 9:21:55
Well, the adaption of the Gen-2 Firebird front anti-sway bar to the Panther went pretty well. Now on to adapting the Firebird rear anti-sway bar.
One might ask: "Why a rear anti-sway bar also, especially since Packard did not use one?" Or one might think that the "S-bar" linkage in the rear of a T-L car is some sort of anti-sway bar too. It is not. It is technically an "inverted Watts linkage" whose sole purpose is to assure the central location of the rear axle under any up/down movement. It has no anti-sway purpose whatsoever.
As to why a rear anti-sway bar also: This is for handling balance. The stock Packard front anti-sway bar is 7/8IN in diameter. The stock Gen-2 Firebird front anti-sway bar is 1.00IN in diameter (the smallest available). This doesn't sound like much difference (1/8IN), but because torsional rigidity increases as the FOURTH POWER of the diameter, a 1IN torsion bar (anti-sway bar) is 70PCT more rigid than a 7/8IN bar! If I don't install a rear anti-sway bar, Panther will "push" badly in turns because of too stiff anti-sway in the front.
As with the front Gen-2 Firebird anti-sway bar, I mocked it up by hanging with coat hanger wire. I won't show any pictures of that because it's pretty self evident except to say it looked like it would work except that the Firebird strut-to-frame length was 4IN too long compared to what I needed for the Panther. So, I had the machine shop shorten (cut and reweld) the struts. Here's a picture of the stock (front) and shorter struts:
One might ask: "Why a rear anti-sway bar also, especially since Packard did not use one?" Or one might think that the "S-bar" linkage in the rear of a T-L car is some sort of anti-sway bar too. It is not. It is technically an "inverted Watts linkage" whose sole purpose is to assure the central location of the rear axle under any up/down movement. It has no anti-sway purpose whatsoever.
As to why a rear anti-sway bar also: This is for handling balance. The stock Packard front anti-sway bar is 7/8IN in diameter. The stock Gen-2 Firebird front anti-sway bar is 1.00IN in diameter (the smallest available). This doesn't sound like much difference (1/8IN), but because torsional rigidity increases as the FOURTH POWER of the diameter, a 1IN torsion bar (anti-sway bar) is 70PCT more rigid than a 7/8IN bar! If I don't install a rear anti-sway bar, Panther will "push" badly in turns because of too stiff anti-sway in the front.
As with the front Gen-2 Firebird anti-sway bar, I mocked it up by hanging with coat hanger wire. I won't show any pictures of that because it's pretty self evident except to say it looked like it would work except that the Firebird strut-to-frame length was 4IN too long compared to what I needed for the Panther. So, I had the machine shop shorten (cut and reweld) the struts. Here's a picture of the stock (front) and shorter struts:
This Post was from: https://packardinfo.com/xoops/html/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?post_id=162723