Whitelines Adjustable Rear Sway Bar Fitted |mk3

[madmole]

Well after fitting the Spider tuning chip to my 1.6 tdci 115 (now 150) I was really noticing the body roll and the wife was complaining and the dog Barfd!. So it was either drive slower round corners (where's the fun in that?) or sort it., The 40 profile 18's were not helping either

Just fitted the BMR78XZ whiteline Rear adjustable Sway bar (anti roll bar for us brits), and am very chuffed

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/141436716578?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

The car stays flat around corners and roundabouts now, but still has suspension, I purposely drove over speed humps and did both wheel and one wheel up jobs and the suspension of course hasn't changed, but stick her in a roundabout or a fast sweeping bend and she stays really flat and feels less stressed (its raining at moment so cant go too mad), Rear feels much more planted now

Fitting wasnt too bad as the car is newish still so all bolts were clean. However the bush mounts did need a tap on the socket handle to free them up (all 13mm). The front arms were easier and need an 18mm spanner for the nut and a 10mm spanner to hold the centre from spinning

Only issue was that the holes in the new bar were 2mm too small for the front bolts to fit through. This was remedied with a circular file and 15 mins of elbow grease, rather than a drill. Then the holes were greased up to stop corrosion. The new bar doesn't have stops for the rear bushes like the original, only two orange metal clamps to be applied. I used the old bar to set their position before I put it on the car. The new bushes have Teflon liners so are grease free for life. Went back on easy. Old bished come out of the metal clamps (reused) pretty easily as well with a small prybar

There is just enough room to do this without jacking up the rear

I put mine on the stiffest straight away. seems a great setting

All in all a good investment and modification. Got 400 miles to do tomorrow with dogs in car so that will be a good test

S

[iantt]

I recognise that bar, exact same one fits mazda 3 2004 onwards, just shows mazda 3 bk, bl , focus 2005 - 2014 all very simular underneath (I had a mazda bl )

[trevken]

Sounds like a good idea. Coming from the handling of a Fiesta Zetec S to a Focus Zetec S (similar ages) I can feel lots of extra body roll which I put down to the extra weight of the car.

I might look at adding this in future because cornering with the extra horsepower (180 in this car) can feel a little ropey - especially if I upgrade it and add even more like I am considering :)

[madmole]

Mine is really planted now. Just done another 400 miles today including some high speed motorway corners and she really is nicley flat and balanced

I'd say go for it​, wished I'd done it sooner, Doesn't make the ride harsh or thumpy, just much better stability when cornering. The wife actually noticed the improvement and dog didn't puke!

[WES180]

Does this replace a factory fitted Ford part then or is it an additional brace that you add like a strut brace? Im not really clued up on them to be honest. :)

[madmole]

Replaces, unbolt old, bolt this back on, easy to get to

[WES180]

Is it a thicker bar then to reduce any flexing?

[madmole]

yes, 24mm as opposed to 20mm and has 2 mount points to change the leverage for 2 settings, but it works so well I would suggest you just go for the short (stiffest) one straight away

[WES180]

Cool. Have you fitted Eibachs too?

[madmole]

Nope, rest of the suspension is its normal soft and high self. have to chaffeur the wife and mother in law too often and we have a ton of speed humps round here

Oh and Wes, you don't need Bluefin, you need Spider tuning chip, I can give you a 30% discount code as well

http://www.dieseltuning.co.uk/

[WES180]

Cheers Stephen, mine is a petrol but i see they cater for that too. Where are the prices and applications though?

[madmole]

Apparently original bar is 19mm

Chip is around £270 with the discount code. Go to the store section of their site and select your car, it will give you the specs and gains you can expect in race mode

Unlike bluefin it's removable without a trace. The focus ECU is clever enough to record the count of maps sent to it. The spider just fools the ECU's into changing the timing and fuelling, so it's still in control and parameters can never go outside those set by Ford. It also can change the map on the fly based on your driving style in realtime

[WES180]

The box is £375 for mine and quotes an increase from 182 - 231ps. I cant see how thats possible using no additional hardware, intercooler, exhaust etc. I tend to get set in my ways and would look more to the Bluefin although that only increases to 200ps and leaves a trace on the ecu. I just think because they have been around for so long it would be a safer bet.

I think all the bad press regarding tuning boxes is the problem to be honest. Ive not seen Spider Tuning equipment on any Fast Ford feature cars either yet so is it still a new product?

[madmole]

Try FOC30 code that will get you 30% off that price :) ​

Spider have been around a while too, very popular in the BMW and Audi/VAG foums. Spider is a 3rd gen tuning box and leagues more sophiticated than the others, eg, it has voltage smoothing and spike/reverse protection, A warm up feature that lets the engine warm before it starts changing things, user selectable settings (changeable by bluetooth, while driving). It dynamically changes the tuning based on your driving style, so when the wife is in the car and your driving sensibly, it will drop the tune and favour economy, start to use the throttle and it will bring in the full tune. I got my first ever 700 miles on a tank after fitting the spider (OK it was a long motorway cruise). after 400 miles yesterday on a fresh tank I am averaging 61.9 mpg and was cruising at 75 when I could on the M1. But for me the extra torque is very useful. Sitting at 70 and want to overtake, foot down and she goes, no need to drop gears

Its not a fixed map like the others, its constantly (20,000 times a second) analysing the fuel pressure and mainly the engine load, and can then tweak the fuel pressure signal and load readings to fool the ECU into changing the injector cycle, timing etc. for more power. As its not actually controlling this its very safe as it the Ford ECU that's still in control so all the Ford safety parameters are still intact. It cant even take the fuel pressure or MAF readings outside of those it learnt from your actual car. Can you guarantee the Bluefin map doesn't take parameters outside of Fords?

There is a lot of rolling road dyno data to back up its claims (although must admit I haven't seen any for the focus yet), but the figures stated by Spider do seem to match what other folks see. Also its tuned for your car, not a generic car. Add a K&N or a better exhaust and you can just send it through a relearn cycle to make best use of the mods

Have a read of their website and do a search for reviews of spider. I was originally going to get a Bluefin, but I am still under warranty. Did a ton of research and came to the conclusion the Spider was the state of the art currently.

[vindi93]

On 29/08/2015 at 5:17 PM, madmole said:

Well after fitting the Spider tuning chip to my 1.6 tdci 115 (now 150) I was really noticing the body roll and the wife was complaining and the dog Barfd!. So it was either drive slower round corners (where's the fun in that?) or sort it., The 40 profile 18's were not helping either

Just fitted the BMR78XZ whiteline Rear adjustable Sway bar (anti roll bar for us brits), and am very chuffed

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/141436716578?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

 

The car stays flat around corners and roundabouts now, but still has suspension, I purposely drove over speed humps and did both wheel and one wheel up jobs and the suspension of course hasn't changed, but stick her in a roundabout or a fast sweeping bend and she stays really flat and feels less stressed (its raining at moment so cant go too mad), Rear feels much more planted now

 

Fitting wasnt too bad as the car is newish still so all bolts were clean. However the bush mounts did need a tap on the socket handle to free them up (all 13mm). The front arms were easier and need an 18mm spanner for the nut and a 10mm spanner to hold the centre from spinning

Only issue was that the holes in the new bar were 2mm too small for the front bolts to fit through. This was remedied with a circular file and 15 mins of elbow grease, rather than a drill. Then the holes were greased up to stop corrosion. The new bar doesn't have stops for the rear bushes like the original, only two orange metal clamps to be applied. I used the old bar to set their position before I put it on the car. The new bushes have Teflon liners so are grease free for life. Went back on easy. Old bished come out of the metal clamps (reused) pretty easily as well with a small prybar

There is just enough room to do this without jacking up the rear

I put mine on the stiffest straight away. seems a great setting

All in all a good investment and modification. Got 400 miles to do tomorrow with dogs in car so that will be a good test

S

I also fitted one of these and had the same issue as you holes too small had to run a drill through them. I forgot which holes i was supposed use and ended up going straight for firm lol. Does make a big difference in cornering.

Just wish i could find a front one

[madmole]

Whiteline does fronts as well, just not an easy fit, you need to remove other stuff to fit them.. The rear on its own is great, cuts down understeer (not that the focus is bad for that, unlike Vauxhall's) but doesn't get into oversteer and doesn't hurt the ride