Hotchkis Tuning 350Z/G35 Sway Bar and Spring Data

Actually....Graham, Bryan S. and myself (at least to my knowledge) all run our sways at max soft front and rear. I believe, before I started running a square tire setup, I ran 2 hole front and 1 hole rear. Though now I run 1 hole front, 1 hole rear.

For the longest time I had my my sways set full stiff and was having a terrible time keeping the back planted in tight turns. Bryan finally got it through my head that I need to adjust things...well...in adjusting things I made the car want to turn less, so I ended up getting more in depth with it (which is when I posted here: http://www.carolinazclub.com/simpleczc/index.php?topic=500.0).

Here's part of the e-mail where I'm figuring this out:

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At the AutoX today, I was having an incredibly hard time getting the car to turn sharply....and I know why now. We'll call it a Duh/Lightbulb Moment. Please tell me if this makes sense. When the adjustable sways went on, I set the front bar at 2855 lbs/in (mostly because the instructions said to use the middle hole on a four hole bar...and in a fit of stupidity I went full stiff) and
the rear at 655 lbs/in. Basically I increased the front to 229% of what it was from the factory and the rear to 225% of OEM. Now, a couple weeks ago, I stepped the rear bar back to it's lowest
setting - 520 lbs/in (180% of OEM). Now the bloody thing won't turn for shit. Now this part is remedial...but I'm going to go through it anyway. The 350Z understeers from the factory thanks to
the staggered setup of the wheels. Dunno if you recall the AutoX we went to in Greenville last Novermber, but I put equal width tires (245/45) on and promptly spun my ass around in a circle. Now, I'm thinking that due to the understeer induced by the staggered wheels, Nissan may have dialed a bit of oversteer into the OEM Sways. Now, I took the front and rear and jacked the
rates through the roof and then I went and removed the major source of the understeer....thus creating an oversteer setup. So along comes ZDayZ and I'm kicking the rear end around on my new
again-staggered tires. So in an attempt to calm the back end down, I go and adjust the rear bar down to 520 lbs/in (180% of OEM) and leave the front at 2855 lbs/in (229%). I then go off to AutoX and instantly start going slower. The first event I did on the 12th, I chalked it up to rust and mis-reading the course. But today I'm out there and I'm plowing turns and I can't turn worth a damn. Once I got home I popped onto Google and did some reading....and hence the Duh Moment....found that I'd created an even worse understeer situation than I'd previously had. Talk about shooting myself in the foot (no wonder I'm getting slaughtered out there). So, I'm thinking this: Obviously I need to get rid of this huge pile of understeer I've created for myself and in order to do so, I thought that perhaps I would adjust the front bar down to 1845 lbs/in (148% OEM) and leave the rear at 520% (180% OEM and the lowest possible setting) in order to trim things out a little. I could go down to 1525 lbs/in in the front (122% OEM), but I didn't want to over do it and cause the car to really oversteer.

And here was Mr. Settle's response:

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I told you a long time ago, go full soft on all sways, then move one hole at a time unitl you dial it in where you want it. My swap bars are setup as follows:

Front, one away from full soft
Rear, middle. even with my wide tires that seems to work

When I go to R compounds I'll have to return the suspension.

You are over torsioning the suspension for the tires that you have.

Great breakdown though. Soften it up.