isnt that bad to actually take it off and drive around?

 

the sway bar is there for a reason you know...

look forward to enjoying your camry without any handling! you probably increased your chances of spinning out on turns quite a bit...

 

sway bar

I'll let you all know if it adversly affects handleing, but this isnt a rally car , it's my daily(saving me money) car, so unless I have to drive in high speed pursuits or go racing through curvy mountain roads I doubt I'll notice much difference. + the end links on the sway bar are actually miniture ball joints so the purpose of the bar isnt really to reduce body lean becuase thos sway bar end links are going to rotate. The sway bar on camry's is more to keep the up and down travel of the rear level or keep the rear end planted during hard breaking(with the sway bar off the rear willl probably rise when applying the breaks in hard stops) other than that it isnt doing much of anything. It's too small in stock form to really do much. An aftermarket sway bar with a larger diameter and poly bushigs would probably help handleing an breaking a lot more than that tiny stock sway bar. If I don't like it I'll just upgrade the sway bar mount bushings to eurothane so they wont wear out. But the up and down motion of the body kills the rubber ones over time leading to the horrible rattleing that everyone complains about. I bet 90% of the time it isnt the strut mounts making the rattleing as SO MANY people on here have said fixed the rattle. Worn struts will make the sway bar bang around more, after people relpace rear struts and mount it will help the car stay flat do to the renewed dampening of the struts, and you'll think it was bad struts all along. Suspension shops and dealerships must be making a lot of money on toyota owners who replace their struts and mounts because of the rattleing noise when in fact the sway bar mount bushings are worn. Takes 20 minutes to remove it. a couple of hours and hundreds of dollars to do the struts, but if the struts are worn replace them anyway, the noise from the sway bar bushings will be lessened.

 

I've driven a Gen3 Camry without the swaybar and lemme tell you, don't do it. The car drives like crap. It's there for a reason, and no, it is NOT too small to make a difference! I forgot the diameter, but its something like 15mm of steel which makes a huge difference. To fix the squeak, you could have simply bought new rubber bushings for $4. Then, just wrap the bar in cloth tape and there goes the squeaking.


This is not the way to repair a squeak.

 

i knew that didnt sound right so you should get that properly fixed man.

 

Yeah, your car is gonna get squirrely in unpredictable ways. It's amazing what the rsb does for you. You *might* be able to get away with it in clear weather with no traffic, but snow, rain, offramps, pedestrians... your car will probably feel like the back end is hopping around, on occasion.

 

Hey Brink!!! I haven't seen you postin' around lately. Just thought I'd say what's up... P.S. Thanks! "This is the part of the buffalos that the indians didn't use".

Anyways, don't do it guy! Ghetto fix it if you must but Toyota wasn't going "Jeez, how do we make a secret rally car and put a Camry body on it?" If they did, this big bitch isn't winning a rally unless the other cars are slower and give it a head start

 

Replace it. It is there for a reason. It will affect handling and emergency manuvering. If you can't afford a new sway bar, go to a salvage yard and pick up a new one with the end links for a few dollars. I do recommend new sway bar bushings (aftermarket ones are around $8 each) and sand the bar where the bushings go on it, and add some grease to those points before installing it. Just my 2 cents.

Mike

 

swa bar bushings

Ok I have been following this thread. I to have that terrible rattle coming from the back. I checked out the sway bar bushings but what makes them bad? They are not brittle and look to be in one piece. However, I can grab the sway bar and get over 1 inch of movement from side to side. Should the bar be tight in the bushings? They look easy enough to change. Also wondering if I have problems with front sway bar since I have noises up there when breaking hard and I am sure it is not breaks or rotors because I changed them.

It is a noisy 1994 4cy camry with 171,000 miles.

 

I have been driving with out a Rear Sway since I did my struts/springs the spring. I does handle differntly, but it's not as bad as everyone is making it out to be. I ended up torching the endlinks when I did the suspension cause I couldn't get the bolts on. My car handles better with Tokico's and H&R's with no rear sway then it did with the stock stuff.

That said, dont' worry about it. But I jsut got a WhiteLine so that will be going on as soon as I can get the broken bolts outta the holes in the mounts under my car. I'm pretty excited, should be amazing.

 

Ok I have been following this thread. I to have that terrible rattle coming from the back. I checked out the sway bar bushings but what makes them bad? They are not brittle and look to be in one piece. However, I can grab the sway bar and get over 1 inch of movement from side to side. Should the bar be tight in the bushings? They look easy enough to change. Also wondering if I have problems with front sway bar since I have noises up there when breaking hard and I am sure it is not breaks or rotors because I changed them.

It is a noisy 1994 4cy camry with 171,000 miles.

It's the diameter of the hole that goes over the bushing that wears. The inside diameter get's larger as the rubber looses it's ability to spring back and put tension on the bar. The bar is no longer tight in the bushings as you have suspected. The bar then moves both side to side and up and down. It's usually the up and down movement that can cause the noise as the bar can hit the underside of the car. The side to side movement effects handling more than anything else. Change them out. They are cheap and easy to change. I have seen aftermarket ones for around $8 each.

As far as the front swaybar bushings, you can jack up the front of the car and check for movement there.

Mike

 

Sell your car and take the bus, you obviously have no idea what a sway bar does or what happens to a car when it's removed.

 

Actually, for each sway bar-to-frame bushing, there is supposed to be a smaller bushing that is clamped around the sway bar itself. This smaller clamp keeps the sway bar from sliding though the bushings laterally.

I have read that some people put a piece of hose of the right diameter and a hose clamp around it just outside the bushings for this purpose.

 

I have a car that got hit and damaged rear anti roll bar. When driving, the bushings would slide out of its mounting bracket.

The rear anti roll bars just decreases the time when one side is higher than the other since a sway bar is just a torsional bar.

It should be fine to drive so long as you don't mind the higher body roll time.