I don't know what size my swaybar is. My car (92 RS V8) has about 180k miles (mostly original stock susp. components - I think the rear shocks are new) and I am upgrading to poly front end bushings. I need to know the size of the stock bars (front and rear) to order the right part. If anyone can enlighten me, I'd be much obliged. Also, on that note, I am wondering what I should do for the rear end. I don't have the money to go replace the rear control arms with a good rod ended setup and I do want to steer away from poly bushings in the rear. Should I replace them with some new OEM rubbers? Should I buy a poly rear kit and just use the front poly and rear rubber? Should I leave as is? Save and buy a good rod ended one? The car will mostly be used for autox and street.


Thanks,
Bryan

 

With a stock car, rubber bushings are fine in front and back. Going from rubber to poly without changing swaybar size is not going to help a whole lot.

If you get a bigger swaybar though poly's will benefit you, since the car will be putting more stress and pressure on the bar.

I believe stock is 30mm front and 19mm rear. WS6 and some Z28/IROCs got 32mm fronts and 21mm rears.

 

I had the same question, but I went ahead and measured it. My front sway bar is 34mm......Was there an option to get larger sway bars on 91 RS Camaro's?? I thought it was going to be much smaller, but its not the case on my 91 RS. I still havn't measured the rear sway bar yet.

I thought IROCs got the 36 mm sway bar? Is that wrong?

 

Your best bet is to measure the sway bars to know for sure. Most parts places will let you borrow a set of calipers. There were a wide assortment of bars available up to 36mm front.

I'd try the poly bushings up front before deciding if you want to do the rears, but you'll probably be fine with rubber back there for your control arms. Check the price before replacing them, a set of lakewood CAs is less than $100 and plenty of people seem to like them.

I think Z28cross-fire means that larger diameter sway bars will provide more RESISTANCE to the forces (moment, stress, shear) that the car's suspension places on the bar. Poly bushings and endlinks will allow more of these forces to act on the bar because they will deflect less than rubber.

 

Some Camaros 89-92 and some Firebirds 86-92 were equipped with the 36mm hollow and solid 24mm. My 85 IROC originally had a 34/24 combo.

JamesC

 

That's what I meant. Basically the swaybar is resisting the roll of the car, creating stress on the bar, and the more give there is in the bushings, obviously the less resistance the bar will have. Polyeurothane bushings give less and don't move as much as rubber so the bar can stay in place, and then the bar offers more resistance.

Does anyone know if some cars came with a harder rubber than others? I bought a 32mm front and it came with really really hard rubber looking ones. I didn't think they were poly, but they might be. The stock rubber ones were really easy to bend with my hands, but the ones with this bar were hard as a rock.

 

They may have been black poly if they were aftermarket. Why mess with a 32mm when the 36mm is hollow and lighter?

 

The stock 1LE bushings, which fit the 36mm, are of a higher durometer rubber. By the way, I believe the 1LE rear control arms with the higher duroment rubber are still available from GM.

JamesC

 

If you look at the RPO list in your center console, you will probably see code F41, which is the performance suspension for the RS. It is very similar if not the same as the Z28 suspension.

I believe the IROC's and WS6's did come with the 36mm front and the Z28's and F41 RS's had 34 mm front, compared to the RS's standard 32mm front.

 

The above info is from Hollander. The following is a link to Ed Miller's contribution (apparently from a Camaro parts cat only):

https://www.thirdgen.org/techbb2/sho...threadid=59687

JamesC