Sway Bar

I wanted to upgrade the sad little pencil like front sway bar to something a little more robust. In my perusing of posts and forums it was mentioned that later model large Fords yield a sway bar that can be used on the '65-'68. Armed with that a couple years ago I set off the junkyard to pillage a couple of thicker sway bars. We came back with two, one from a early 70's El Ranchero and one from a 1978 T-Bird.

Well time to see if they truly will fit.

The thickest one was from the T-Bird. The endlink distance was correct but the frame mounting was pushed forward.

I'm holding up the rod against the frame and you can see the mounting difference. Now I assume these people that suggested this bar had to contrive a new mounting scheme. However the bar would be a little lower with the bushing and you want it off the frame and this puts it in the path of the radius arm rod (strut rod) on a full upward suspension deflection and they would make contact most likely resulting in a bent radius arm rod.

This did not bode well with me.

Here's the sway bars. The top is the '65-'68 full size bar. The middle is the El Ranchero and the bottom the T-Bird.

You can see the difference in mounting positions more clearly.

I had clearly wasted my time and money buying these, so I had enough of this and tossed all three in the pile to take to the dump. Then I bought this Hotchkis HSS-22389F

I remember seeing the Jay Lenos garage video of Hotchkiss making this and other suspension parts for his 1966 galaxie 500 7 litre. I figured if any aftermarket part is going to fit properly it'll be for his car.

It came tonight. Summit doesn't waste time shipping.

Bloody hell. This takes overkill to a whole new level. It's a hollow tube too, which is good because it weighs twice that of the original.

It's borderline obscene, very cool, but borderline ridiculous. Funny they make a rear sway bar as well, but with this do you really need one....... This resembles a 1 ton truck sway bar.

Credit where credit is due. It fits pretty well and clears everything. I also mounted the brake hoses to the frame.

Aside from another redo on another steering gear the front is done. Time to start focusing on the rear axle. I have everything sans the 31 spline 1541h axle shafts from Moser. They are in transit.

The 3rd gen full size bar is very wimpish. I honestly do not know why they even bothered with one. How much did it actually do when I can deflect it a decent amount using body strength alone off the car?

As for the rear swar bar, the body will roll about the centre of the long axis because of the rear suspension moving different amounts on either side. A bar tethered to the axle then at each end to the body will help negate that. Either that or tie the lower control arms together with a bar to keep them at the same position as GM does on the 4 link. It would also work the same on the 3 link. I know the '69 and '70 Chevrolet full size had the same style rear suspension as the 3rd gen Fords I'll have to see how they attached a sway bar or even if they offered one back then.

Cheers

Note: Regarding the ramifications of having a larger front swaybar without the rear, my 1973 Caprice Classic has a factory large front sway bar and originally no rear sway bar and that car is bigger and much heavier than a '65-'68 full size Ford.

I'm not advocating that having only one sway bar is correct or OK, just saying it is what it is.