Hotchkis Bars on a Miata?

[Nails]

Anyone try these yet? Just ordered some from Lightning Performance's ebay store. Had a 10% coupon code good for any ebay purchase thru paypal till 11:59 pm June 30th.

CJUNE0810P if anyone else is shopping today.

Anyway, been looking around at different vendors and Lightning seemed to be the best price for these. I know the norm is FM, Eibach, or Racing Beat but I liked the 3-way adjustability of the front and back bar plus they can get near 1000% stiffer than stock which was one of the few changes made to the 1G NC by Mazda Engineers.

[Miatamaniac92]

Is this a sway bar company? Never heard of them.

This thread is useless without Links/Pics.



Chris

[Nails]

Sorry bout that.

http://www.hotchkis.net/p-748-mx5-sp...y-bar-set.aspx

[Miatamoto]

I've never heard anything bad about Hotchkis products, but why spend all that money when the stock RX-8s bars work well?

[Nails]

Stock RX-8's won't give me torsional resistance as high as the Hotchkis plus I've heard that the RX-8 is a front bar swap only. No rear bar. I'm needing much more in rear to counter understeer I'm having now with larger tires.

[Miatamoto]

Stock RX-8's won't give me torsional resistance as high as the Hotchkis plus I've heard that the RX-8 is a front bar swap only. No rear bar. I'm needing much more in rear to counter understeer I'm having now with larger tires.

There are plenty of people running both front and rear RX-8 bars. Yes, I'm sure that the Hotchkis bars are stiffer, but are they worth 3x's the money?

If you're having problems with understeer, you might also want to look into your alignment. I'm running about the same camber front and rear and don't have problems with understeer with the RX-8 front bar and stock rear.

[Nails]

Yea I remember you telling me that at Pennington. I walked up to you while you were changing wheels on your RX-8 to see if you had a sway bar for sale.
Anyway, I've since gone from the 205/50/16's to 235/40/17's. Also had BAM! align 'em for me. He drove it before and after the alignment and agreed it still has push. I have "over-shod" my horse. It sticks in the rear to the point that I have to try alot harder to spin the tires or pitch it sideways in a corner.

However, if Cosworth ever finishes that supercharger and gets it to market. I plan on waiting 6 months for de-bugging and then installing it. I'm guessing the extra tire width and heavier sways will be ideal at that point.

BTW I haven't seen any used RX-8 sways for 100 lately; especially the set.
But you're right Miatamoto. If I were on stock rims, I would go for the RX-8 bar.

http://www.oncars.com/# Scroll down to the video of the grey NC for the 1G info.

[MX-5EE]

Slightly off topic: Didn't Hotchkiss use to make machine guns in WWII?

Ooops, looked it up. This is Hotchkis (1 s), the French car and weapons maker is Hotchkiss (2 s's). Sorry for my OT stupidity.

[Nails]

Got the bars this afternoon but it's too hot to put them on now so I'll do it in the morning. If anyone's interested in helping or just watching to see how to do a sway bar swap on an NC let me know by PM or ask me tonite at Hooters for address. I'll probably get started 7:30-8:00 am.

[CosmosMpower]

Yea I remember you telling me that at Pennington. I walked up to you while you were changing wheels on your RX-8 to see if you had a sway bar for sale.
Anyway, I've since gone from the 205/50/16's to 235/40/17's. Also had BAM! align 'em for me. He drove it before and after the alignment and agreed it still has push. I have "over-shod" my horse. It sticks in the rear to the point that I have to try alot harder to spin the tires or pitch it sideways in a corner.

However, if Cosworth ever finishes that supercharger and gets it to market. I plan on waiting 6 months for de-bugging and then installing it. I'm guessing the extra tire width and heavier sways will be ideal at that point.

BTW I haven't seen any used RX-8 sways for 100 lately; especially the set.
But you're right Miatamoto. If I were on stock rims, I would go for the RX-8 bar.

http://www.oncars.com/# Scroll down to the video of the grey NC for the 1G info.

If you're already having understeer problems from the rear sticking too well a larger front sway bar is going to make it worse. If they're adjustable I'd put the fronts at soft and stiffen up the rear bar to help the balance.

[Nails]

Yea I am setting the front to softest and the rear to middle and getting a new alignment when I can find someone since AJ isn't available. I think bring all four corners to -1.6 will help with the understeer and if not I'll still have an extra rear bar setting.

[altiain]

Just to further muddy the waters...

Nails, I don't remember what your experience level is, but in my experience most of the understeer that novices tend to experience is due to overdriving the car, not setup.

I've always firmly believed that people should spend a lot of time learning how to drive their bone stock car to the limit before throwing parts at it. Until you really know what you're doing, chances are you're just going to f&*% it up.

[Nails]

Yea we talked about that at Filmores and you're right. I'm not that experienced. Was gonna take that last class at Motorsports Ranch but Novice section was filled up. Guess I'll sign up for the Fall class.
Thanks Altian.

[altiain]

Apex has a couple of events scheduled in September. I'm not sure if you can officially register for them yet, but you can probably contact them through the website and "pre-register" if you're interested in attending.

[Nails]

Yea Altian I wanna sign up for the class you'll be instructing and I think I read somewhere else you're not available on an upcoming event due to wife's medical needs?

Anyway, I got the bars on and did a quick trip. I set front at lightest and back at middle. First impression is the steering feels heavier, especially at slow speeds. The understeer seems reduced a bit but so far it still seems inclined to understeer rather than oversteer. I need to get another alignment before I do anything else because I think some of the understeer is due to -.9 camber up front and -1.4 rear. I want about -1.5 all four corners. The corners are definately flatter than with stock.

I took pictures and made some notes so I'll make a tutorial on it later.