FJ 280z Posted January 24, 2007 Share Posted January 24, 2007 hey guys, today i bought a strut tower bar at a junkyard for 5 bucks. probably came out a honda or integra, but it was long, shiny aluminum with brackets, verrrry nice . got it back to work to test fit it and found out the brackets are way to wide apart to fit onto the Z strut towers. what i want to do is cut/modify the brackets to bolt on to the stock 3 bolts because the bar is actually a good fit, the end of each heim joint on the bar comes to about the inner most bolt on each side. my question is what would you guys do, try to cut a circular 3 bolt plate and then weld the cross bar to that, or would using the original honda bracket, cut like a "U" shape and use 2 bolts on each side as support be a good idea. or does anyone know a dealer or member that can sell me just the brackets with the 280Z 3 bolt pattern i can modify to use with the bar? or, if anyone has a template of the 3 bolt pattern on a circular bracket they can give me, i can print and trace onto a sheet of metal and maybe plasma cut and drill to save me a little time if i fab the brackets myself. any help is greatly appreciated. thanks........ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nscason Posted January 24, 2007 Share Posted January 24, 2007 i know some things about fabing up stuff. if you could put up some pics of the brace and how it sits around the towers i might be able to help with some ideas. for me its easiest if i can see what im going to be working on. i didnt feel like going through all the hassle so i went and bought the msa strut bar. it looks nice and no problems. its also adjustable. are you going to put it on the front or the rear? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lbhsbZ Posted January 30, 2007 Share Posted January 30, 2007 Just a word about strut tower braces. Most of the "bling" braces are aluminum and use heim joints. Strut bars are not supposed to flex, so Heim joints are not the best idea. if the bar has anything but straight tubing and solid mounts, its not going to do much for you. The best bars are made from tubing, non "adjustable" ridgid welded units. The rest of them are just for show. If yours is one of those, and you are looking for performance out of it, save yourself the trouble. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yorgee Posted January 30, 2007 Share Posted January 30, 2007 Just a word about strut tower braces. Most of the "bling" braces are aluminum and use heim joints. Strut bars are not supposed to flex, so Heim joints are not the best idea. if the bar has anything but straight tubing and solid mounts, its not going to do much for you. The best bars are made from tubing, non "adjustable" ridgid welded units. The rest of them are just for show. If yours is one of those, and you are looking for performance out of it, save yourself the trouble. Yeah, I had some piping laying around and I was going to weld a couple mounts and put heim joints on both ends of the pipe but my friend talked me out of it. So I decided to make something else. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alf Posted January 30, 2007 Share Posted January 30, 2007 Just a word about strut tower braces. Most of the "bling" braces are aluminum and use heim joints. Strut bars are not supposed to flex, so Heim joints are not the best idea. if the bar has anything but straight tubing and solid mounts, its not going to do much for you. The best bars are made from tubing, non "adjustable" ridgid welded units. The rest of them are just for show. If yours is one of those, and you are looking for performance out of it, save yourself the trouble. I agree. I've always thought that the joints defeated the purpose of the bar, which is to ridgidly tie the car together. If the towers are "laying over" a bar with joints is going to still allow them to "lay over". Or am I missing something? I made a bolt in rear strut bar for my Z31. It's solid mounted, and I could feel a noticable difference, it may be because the chassis is rusty and the suspension is worn out, but I don't know. Here's a pic... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mario_82_ZXT Posted January 30, 2007 Share Posted January 30, 2007 Why are adjustable ones bling-y? I thought it was good to put some preload on them. But I agree that hiem joints are the best idea... Mario Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
260DET Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 ............ But I agree that hiem joints are the best idea... Mario You mean not the best idea? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bjhines Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 Whoa on the heim joint bashing... As long as the braces are as straight as possible.. and their mountings are not offset or poorly designed... Heim joints are perfectly acceptable... and mighty damn handy when you want a little preload one way or the other... This is my heim jointed upper front brace.. and the firewall is reinforced as well... I like this strut bar.. but it can be a pain to reinstall... and it is not a triangle brace... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
heavy85 Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 .. but it can be a pain to reinstall... and it is not a triangle brace... ... and the ends need to have a bigger footprint to effectively provide the benefit of not using rod ends. The tiny ends on these would tend to pivot IMHO and would be a lot stronger if there was a single plate that connected the two and maybe even if the mounting plate went around to all three bolts. Cameron Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
260DET Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 Yeh, the point of having pivot joints in a brace which is supposed to eliminate flex and movement as much as possible escapes me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alf Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 Yeh, the point of having pivot joints in a brace which is supposed to eliminate flex and movement as much as possible escapes me. ditto Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AK-Z Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 the standard use of hiem joints on those "bling" bars, are to have an adjustable preload on the suspention. not all cars are made EXACTLY the same. I wouldn't say that those will not help. It will, but the way strut tower bars are to stiffen. (you all probably know this, but for those that don't and for those who can correct me ) Imagine the x-member and the strut towers as a incomplete rectangle. Now when you load one side (as in cornering) it will cause it to warp more into a trapazoid. Now a bar will complete the "rectangle." The "bling" bar will help the towers from changing inward and outward, but will cause it to change to a rombus in cornering. Now a "solid" will keep it more of a regtangle and keep it camber, toe-in and other suspension settings stable and more static as far as the frame is concerned in cornering. (go ahead and correct me if I'm wrong) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest TeamNissan Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 Yeh, the point of having pivot joints in a brace which is supposed to eliminate flex and movement as much as possible escapes me. Same Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tube80z Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 As long as the braces are as straight as possible.. and their mountings are not offset or poorly designed... Heim joints are perfectly acceptable... and mighty damn handy when you want a little preload one way or the other... I've often heard this preload argument and think for the most part I have a hard to believing it. Are you putting 500 to 1000 pounds of load onto the part? That would be the only way I would think this would work. You'd need to make sure the parts were always under tension or compression to keep all the tolerances tight. Cary Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 You guys are sounding like you think that if you make a strut tower bar with heims that it won't work. It will, I can say that with a lot of confidence since I ran one for years, after not running one for years. The difference was amazing. The real issue is that it will let the strut towers raise or lower in relationship to each other without any resistance. But even a strut tower bar without heims isn't going to help much if at all with that problem. Take the same bar without heims isn't really all that great at stopping that up and down movement either, you're loading the bar in it's weakest direction. Think of it like a diving board. A diving board is very stiff if you were trying to pull the end straight out, but trying to prevent the end from moving up and down is not what it's good at. The strut tower bar is a long small diameter bar and as such doesn't require much force to deflect at the other end. Now in the rear where you can WELD IN A LARGER TUBE, there I think you have an argument. In my humble opinion the front bar should be there to prevent LATERAL movement of the strut towers. The triangulated bar to the firewall should be there to prevent FORE/AFT and LATERAL movement. They are not placed correctly to prevent up and down movement of the strut towers and should not be relied on to do so. That job is better handled by some bars from the rocker to the upper frame rail, or a cage that attaches through the firewall, preferably at a good angle to the strut tower, or an X in the radiator core support. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Mike Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 ^^^ Makes sense to me ^^^ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bjhines Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 Dudes... Have you ever noticed how thick the upper mounting plate in the tower is???? Besides that.. the upper insulator is a mighty thick piece as well...The strut bar mount does not need to wrap around the top or anything crazy like that... There are already several layers of thick metal... The bar is pretty easy to bend... So what if you have hiem joints or not.. the damn bar will twist with very little resistance... hiems or not.. the bar only ties the 2 sides together... It works in tension and compression.. not in sheer or twist... I cannot believe no one here has really addressed the issue I have with many of the designs out there...!!!??? High offets from the mounting plate to the actual bar itself... Now that is friggin stupid... I realize they needed engine clearance... but I would rather have a slight bend in the bar instead of the highly offset/raised bar in relation to the mount... I think a lot of you are imagining that these bars do more than is reasonable to assume... Explain to me how a Heim joint is any worse than a nut and bolt..???? especially considering that the damn strut bars ONLY WORK IN TENSION AND COMPRESSION??? splain me that one... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gretchen/jason Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 A simple but affective rear strut tower brace i made was made out of Black Pipe . The metal pipe they use for natural gas lines in homes and offices . I took a piece and on each end welded a pice of weldable steel to it about 1 1/4 square . Then i cut the pipe directly in the center cutting it in half . I then measured from my cut 3 inches and took that much more off each piece . I then found a threaded rod that fit snugly inside the black pipe and found nuts and washers to fit . Once i sliped the threaded rod inside the pipes i put the pipe in between the towers and then used the nut to put tension on the rod . i could actually seperate the towers by 1/4 but didnt do so just tried it once to see if it could be done dont ask why just stupid curiosity . All in all i spent 30$ to build a strut tower brace and let me tell ya i noticed a big difference in body flex or should i say the lack of . . after a few weeks i removed the bar and the car was back to it creaking and groaning going in and out of drive ways and parking lots . Just a idea for a cheap rod if anybody wanted a idea for one . hard part will be fabing one up for the front to clear the blower on the V8 i have now . Jason Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted February 4, 2007 Share Posted February 4, 2007 I cannot believe no one here has really addressed the issue I have with many of the designs out there...!!!???High offets from the mounting plate to the actual bar itself... Now that is friggin stupid... I realize they needed engine clearance... but I would rather have a slight bend in the bar instead of the highly offset/raised bar in relation to the mount... I disagree with this. In my case I have some tall mounts, but the mounts are stout and boxed in (at least they are now) and they should be a hell of a lot stiffer than a bent thin wall tube. I think it's much more important to have the tube straight than the mount low. You can make the mount strong, but the tubing size is limited with hood/engine clearance, so I think that is the weak link. Keeping the weakest piece straight makes it much stronger in tension and compression. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bjhines Posted February 5, 2007 Share Posted February 5, 2007 I see your point... Bent bar vs. high offset mounting... That would require a detailed analysis to determine which designs are actually better... this would depend on the type of tubing and size.. as well as the structure used for an offset mount... there is a happy medium in there somewhere between the 2 approaches... But Hiem joints are a handy dandy way to build a better bar... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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