I’m looking for technical help or recommendations on: anti roll. sway bars
Project creep has struck! I bought my NC to be a cheap runabout/fun car, but in the knowledge that it might well need an engine. Well, it did, and so I’ve decided to 2.5 swap it. In the meantime I realised that the body’s actually in excellent shape, so I’ve decided to put a bit more money and effort into it over teh winter. It’ll still be mostly a road car, occasional trackdays, but it’s not going to be required to be too sensible.
So anyway, I’d bought a set of RX8 yellow dots, for the usual reason- cheapness! But now that it’s getting more power and a set of meister Rs, I want to revisit that decision and see if it’s still right. What do you guys reckon?
The advantage of the yellow dots is, I already have them on a shelf. But they’ll be easy to sell so there’s no real loss to changing my mind.
I suspect that the matched front/rear yellow might not be the best option- I’d prefer a stiffer rear bar generally. I’d also really like adjustability, that’s something I’ve used a lot on other cars.
So, tell me what to think o internet! What would you put on it? I won’t say “money no object” but most options are in budget.
From my limited experience I think that you will find the yellow dot rear bar is significantly stiffer than the standard or even sport OEM rear bar. If you want a softer rear go for the red RX8 bar or if you want more then the orange is much stiffer than the yellow, maybe too much so. The front yellow should be as stiff as you want to go for road and limited track use. Why not fit them both and see how it goes? Don’t forget you will need new bushes, the stock brackets work ok. The other point is that your shocks may be passed their best in which case changing roll bars will do nothing to solve the problem. There are previous posts on the subject of changing roll bars which include a link to the best method of changing over the front bar, the rears are easy, if you can get the drop links off in one piece. Otherwise budget for changing all 4.
I put uprated roll bars on my nc2.
I went with the ILMotorsport kit from mx5parts, the 30%stiffer, and 30%lighter ones.
there not adjustable.
they made quite the difference, not only to body roll but also to steering wander (especially under hard acceleration) and they also stopped the car from getting dragged around by the “tram” lines that the big lorries leave in the tarmac.
I have Meister R Club race and yellow dot front and rear bars… Not sure how the bars help now as I fitted them when the car was on the OE sport suspension.
Drives well though.
I found a post on miata.net with specs here. It seems like yellow front and rear differs in balance from stock but not that much compared to the sports setup. In that case you’d have to change the front to red or the rear to orange. That will change the balance compared to sports to what you’re looking for I think.