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We wanted to reduce body roll for better on street handling. Our sticky Nitto tires had more grip than stock which was causing the truck to heel over in corners which would activate the stability control before the truck was close to losing grip. This was pretty annoying. We did some research and discovered that the front sway bar from a Sequoia SUV would bolt directly on and would be 20% stiffer than our Tundra's bar.
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The Tundra sway bar is tubular as is the Sequoia's bar which has identical external dimensions but a thicker wall. The only way to tell the two apart is that the Sequoia part is much heavier.
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We wrapped the bar with Teflon tape to eliminate chances of squeaking and to reduce friction.
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The new sway bar in place. |
The King Shocks made an amazing difference in our Tundra. Huge bumps like big rain gutters which would previously pitch the truck airborne at 40 mph would now be taken at literally any speed with a hardly felt bloop. Offroad, the truck could be driven about twice as fast. Towing the truck was much more stable. The difference was night and day. The King Shocks have to be experienced to be believed.
The only negative behavior was the early activation of the stability control which was easily rectified by turning it off. The addtion of a stiffer front swaybar helped reduce this early activation greatly. With the stability control off, the truck is super fun to drive and probably corners better than sports cars did just a few years ago. In the near future we will be experimenting with a stiffer rear anti sway bar to see if it further cleans up the truck's behavior with the electronic nannys on.
Next we will be fixing one of the trucks biggest problems, getting rid of the stock open differential that is crutched with an electronic ABS based active limited slip and replacing it with a real clutch type limited slip from Auburn Gear.
Sources
Mackin Industries (Volk Wheels)
To Read More about Project Tundra click here!