Anti Roll Bars

[J66P]

I have been in deliberation about the ARB's on my Cruiser, whats your thoughts are they required or not, only use as a toy and dont use as a racing car

I have a decent lift and have currently extended the rear links to maintain the same geometry for the bar, what are your thoughts.

As anyone made dosconnects for the front or are there any out there, would it make any differnce, the bar does look substaintial so i am thinking it will

 

[sae70]

I too was going to remove both my front & rear ARB's from off of Fiery immediately following fitting the Ironman suspension lift & new tyres. I had quite a lengthy conversation one day with Paul @ WestCoast 4x4 about the possibility of removing Fiery's ARB's as I was concerned about doing this to such a heavy vehicle having only been used to modifying Suzuki’s previously. There was discussion about the fact that not only would the Ironman springs be up rated over the standard springs but the shocks would be as well so compensating someway for the loss of the ARB's & if combined with a set of wheel spacers (something that I've now decided against) it should be very possible to remove the ARB's. As it happened my hand was some what forced with respect to the rear ARB long before I got around to fitting the suspension lift & tyres. As the evening before Fiery was due to go in for her MOT & while I was swearing @ my attempts to set up the handbrake in the dark & drizzle with feet like blocks of ICE I noticed that the drop link joints on the rear ARB had long since demised! And there was no chance they would get through an MOT! So off it came then & there and has remained on the garage floor since with no notable bad side effects in handling before or after the suspension lift & new tyres So that can stay off as I'm sure we all agree an off roader is better without ARB's! Isn't it? While I was removing the rear one (actually just after I'd finished) I slid along for a look @ the front one Now the rear ARB is the diameter of my index finger & really will not be missed but the front one is a totally different beastie! It's mighty & looks as though it's made to do a job! Luckily the drop link joints on this were & are OK so I've left it well alone. I'm now considering a pair of quick disconnects myself for the front ARB as a compromise to complete removal.

I once stumbled over a blog of a chap that spent some time with his 4x4 on a four post lift extensively fully compressing & drooping his suspension with & without the ARB's fitted. From what I can remember he concluded that the ARB's were not limiting the vehicles droop but were limiting its compression & in extreme off road situations the ARB's would become sprung when under compression making the vehicle unstable. Do you think I can find this link now I've looked for it on a number of occasions but just can't put my finger back on it

I think that its safe to say that the way an Anti Roll Bar functions when off road is very different to the way that they function while on the black stuff, but what these subtle differences are we may never really understand

As I'm typing all of this some where in the back of my head I'm thinking that an ARB has very little ill effect on a solid axle when off road but is more of a limiting factor to IFS when off road

What's making me think this Mmmmm..........to tiered to think Someone elses turn

PS - Anyone know where to get some quick disconects from? Or any piccys of them

 

[J66P]

I am gonna have a serious look tomorrow to see if i can knock summat up for the front

 

[sae70]

http://store.jksmfg.com/merchant2/merch ... isconnects

 

[J66P]

there the same as i had on my Jeep

 

[sae70]

there the same as i had on my Jeep

How did you keep the ARB out of the way when it was disconected

 

[AndyCook]

don't forget to tell your insurer if you remove them - as they are sure to invalidate your claim if they are removed and they haven't been informed if you are involved in a prang...

 

[J66P]

had stow points with the roll bar as high as possible, if you look you can just make the stow tube out in the photo 3/4's way up the pic

not the best test in the world but it shows they work

 

[DaveWall]

Before I bought a Landcruiser - I looked at several Nissan Patrols, one good thing they had over the LC was a lever inside to disconnect the sway bars, might be worth looking at how it works on the patrol, and/or seeing if there are any bits worth grabbing from a breaker - would be much nicer to operate from inside the cabin!

Dave

 

[sae70]

don't forget to tell your insurer if you remove them - as they are sure to invalidate your claim if they are removed and they haven't been informed if you are involved in a prang...

I have already informed my insurance company that I've removed the rear ARB & that I'm considering fitting quick disconnects to the front ARB They have said that there will be no increase in premium or excess over what I'm already paying to insure Fiery as a standard vehicle even though I also at the same time increased the estimated value by £1500 from £3500 to £5000. There was in fact no increase in premium with regards to any of the modifications that I had already carried out when I informed them of the modifications (suspension lift, larger M/T tyres, removal of the rear ARB, Snorkel & rock sliders). The only point they made was to specifically ask if I had made any modifications to the engine that would increase its performance if this was the case then there would be an additional premium to be paid.

Before I bought a Landcruiser - I looked at several Nissan Patrols, one good thing they had over the LC was a lever inside to disconnect the sway bars, might be worth looking at how it works on the patrol, and/or seeing if there are any bits worth grabbing from a breaker - would be much nicer to operate from inside the cabin!

I believe that Jeeps have the same kind of thing An electrically operated ARB disconnect system & I've also seen them made by using an old manual Free Wheeling Hub to disconnect one end of the ARB


I'm very tempted just to fit brand new standard drop links to the front ARB with new nuts & washers & plenty of Copper Slip & just tool myself up to undo them for only the most extreme of lanes & Pay&Play days. It's probably only on the very rarest of occasions that the front ARB limits the suspensions compression enough to over spring/unbalance the vehicle & cause any serious concern or appreciable decrease in off road ability!

Unless that is of course you've been out all day & got yourself some mud in the brain That's normally when things start to go, like common sense

 

[Gav Peter]

There was a thread once about using Terrano (IIRC) arb drop links on a 90... Chris was the protagonist on that one... Drop him a wee line Steve - if I can find the thread, I'll post it up...

EDIT:

Found this from the darkside:

The Nissan Terrano trick is an upgrade that I came across when looking for disconnect bars. It involves putting the front links on the rear and putting the Nissan ones on the front. This gives an extra inch of length on the links. When you are off road and really twisting your axle, these longer bars mean that your anti roll bar can drop further before it hits its 'hardest' setting. On road, where you wheels are level all of the time it make no difference at all.

When you really drop a wheel , you can see that the limiting factor is the anti roll bar. The link bar is at an extreme angle and reach. If you change your front struts, you will find that the link bar needs to be undone in order to get the strut out. With the longer set up, you will see the difference, but only in a hole. Have look on readers drives for 'axle twister' and you'll see what mine looks like.

Chris can probably fill in more detail if required

 

[Chris]

Yep, put the longer front ones on the back and put Terrano ones on the front. Err might have been the other way around. Anyway, there is a limit to how long you can make the rear ones as they hit the rear trailing arms. Made a difference though. I would urge some caution about the rear articulation. Without the sway bars it is possible to pop the rear springs out completely. On standard springs you can drive up a bank and pull the spring out without tools. With uprated springs and no sway bars you can still get the springs to rattle. On an extreme maneuver, you could pop one out. The sway bars limit that movement. I found that fitting the longer ones gave more articulation but still acted as a tie for the spring. I don't think that you'd get much more articulation anyway really on the back or the front ar there are other things that limit the movement of the axle. On the front, the suspension can only drop as far as the wishbones will allow - which isn't massive and you and up hitting the springs anyway.

Steve, please use proper grease though if you go down that route. Copper slip is not a good lubricant. It's for use on grease that gets heated and boiled off (like exhaust studs) so that that there is a film of copper left behind. The carrier grease that the copper is suspended in is very poor. All it does is go hard with the crud that sticks to it.

Chris