DIY Cheapo Sway-bar a la CTENG...pimp style!

[CTENG in KS]

I have decided to reveal the secrets of my sway bar creation as it seems to be working well, although it has gone through a revision.
To start you must obtain the torsion bars from your favorite flavor of Toyota IFS truck...pre Tacoma of course.
Make sure that you get at least one bar...two is nice if you mess up...and BOTH sets of splined mounts.
You can see the mounts I speak of here:


The first thing I did was get the splined mounts set up.  You will notice that one end of the swaybar has a larger diameter than the other, therefore one of your Y-shaped splined mounts will fit, the other must be "resplined."

To do this, cut the female splined section of one of the other mounts off like this:


Then cut the outer ring off one of your Y-mounts:


Next you weld the female splined section you cut before to the end of the Y-mount you just trimmed.  This effectively "resplines" the Y-mount.  Note that you want to put all these parts onto the swaybar along with the other side Y-Mount so that when you weld the new splines on you can make sure that both sides are parallel:


For mounting tot he frame I used 1 inch pillow blocks...these need to be ones made of cast steel, not iron, if you want to weld them to the frame like I did, otherwise you are better off bolting them on:



I made my arms out of Al stock...cut, drill...yada yada...bolt to your Y-mounts:


I noticed later on that if you position the bar here you will hit it with the tire at full lock, so I made some spacers and it clears just fune now:



More coming...

[CTENG in KS]

You will have to shorten the torsion bar...it is a great length for a full size.
The first one I did I cut a peice out and welded it together and used a short section of a larger tube to sleeve the weld for extra strength...turns out I should have though a little smarter.  The spring steel and tube having different moduli and twisting at different rates ended up cracking the tube while the torsion bar held up ok.  Therefore, I revised my method and did this:

Started by taking approx. 7 1/2 inches out of the middle of the torsion bar...try to set it up so that the weld will end up in the center.
Jack stands help for this project:

[KWP]

 Have you had a chance to test it yet?

[CTENG in KS]

You are gonna want to put a real good angle on each end of the torsion bar so you can be sure the weld gets through the entire thing.
I used some scrape square tube and a couple of quick grips to make a jig to help keep it straight.  As you turn the bar to weld readjust the clamps to pull it back to straight if needed.

Also, I slid the mount/Al arm assembly on each end while welding to make sure that the arms would remain straight and parallel:

[CTENG in KS]

On to installation...
The bar is slightly smaller than the pillow blocks so I used some rubber matting I bought at a surplus store and wrapped the torsion bar.  This does two things...allows you to match the diameter of the pillow block and acts as a bushing to keep vibrations to a minimum.

[CTENG in KS]

Conclusions:

So far I have only been able to drive the truck around the block, but I can say that the difference on road is significant.  Don't get me wrong, there is still body roll, but the truck is MUCH more driveable.  Part of my problem is the rear shocks mounted like /\...the sway-bar really picked up the slack co to speak.

As for off road, I have not tried it yet, but the spring rate on the bars is not very stiff so I don't think it will inhibit articulation too badly, and I expect sidehilling will have a bit less pucker factor.  The nice thing is that I can dissconnect it with one nut on each side.
My only worry in off camber situations is wether the weld will hold up to that much torque, but I welded it really well so I have confidence that it will be OK.  The only other thing to look out for long term will be issues with the heat treat of the steel due to the cut and weld.  We will have to see.