Andreas Langhoff

Hi to all,

does someone know what kind of steel is used for the sway bars in general? I am interested in having a sway bar fabricated, but I need to know the type of steel used. For the early 911 the front sway bar is pretty easy to fabricate, so I would like to try...

Thank you

Andreas

James Achard

Andreas, I would use 4130 Cond N or 4340. Both are available in bar stock and seamless tube.

Cheers, James

Peter Kelly

Typically they will be heat treated after fabrication to raise their tensile strength (yield strength) so that they do not permanently bend.

threesticks

I took the front anti-sway bar off of my 911 and took it to a place that burned a small amount of metal away and then ran the smoke through a spectrum analyzer and they told me that the metal was a silicon manganese steel. They also did a hardness test and it was a 32 on the Rockwell C scale. I did some research and found that it is not as good a spring material as spring steel but a little better that 4130. It is however more common in europe and not as easily found as 4130.
I ended up using 4130 that was solution heat treated and then hardened to a 32C Rockwell after I had the machining performed.
That was three years ago with many auto-Xs and track events with no problem.

I hope that this helps, Steve Frew.