91diesel

I just did an F150 leaf swap into my 91 extra cab and netted about 3" of lift. I have the ifs with bj spacers up front almost leveling it out. I took off my front sway bar years ago after never hooking up the disconnectors I made for it. There just wasn't that much body roll at stock height. Well now there is. I'm wondering if there is (or if anybody has tried) a thinner set of sway bars for the front and rear that would help on the highway but not limit articulation on each axle as bad as the thick factory front one. I don't know if a 4runner rear sway bar is that stiff or if I can fit it under the leafs or not. Any 4runner comments would be welcome. Maybe a 2wd sway bar on the front? And yes I know I can just do disconnects, I was just thinking of trying a more balanced system.

4Crawler

iTrader: (3)

I've recently added an Addco rear sway bar with disconnects on my '85:


I am quite happy with the handling with just the rear sway bar, really helps stabilize the vehicle on the highway.

91diesel

I'm going to go take measurements to confirm but....
there is an 86-87 toy and it looks like the front sway bar is thinner than the one that was on my truck. I also noticed that ford explorers? have a nice small diameter sway bar on the rear axle and it looks to be an easy swap to mine as long as the ends aren't exactly as wide as my frame! I was looking for a system where I wouldn't want/need to do the disconnects as I've found they usually stay always connected or disconnected.

tc

I liked the way mine drove with just a rear swaybar. While there was very little difference losing the front (going from 2 to 1), there was a huge difference going from rear swaybar only to none.

91diesel

So I've found something interesting, an 'upgrade' if you will. The earlier IFS (86-88?) had a different front sway bar than what came on my 91. They are slightly thinner and the 'arms' are longer by about 2". I just put this on this weekend. I was able to use the original rear bolt hole for the frame clamps' front bolt hole. I just need to drill out a rear hole in the frame. I have it spaced down because of my diff drop and the rear part of the clamp is bolted to the spacer but the spacer isn't tacked down to the frame yet. It is already working wonders though and it even still flexes! (I'll post pics later). I went to an online sway bar calculator and taking some not so accurate measurements I calculated the 91 sway bar at 485 lbs/in (body roll) vs the 87 sway bar at 284 lbs/in. I think combined with the ford ranger rear sway bar it'll be really nice. It's already considerably better.
The whole reason for going against disconnects is that I use my truck as a DD and to haul wood a lot. I'm just not going to disconnect the sway bar every time I leave the highway. I'm hoping with the 2 thinner/lighter set ups I'll gain the anti-roll on the road with out losing so much articulation that I'll want disconnects on it.