I agree on all points, love the way Isabel handles with 1" front and 3/4" rear sway bars
What is the thickness of the front bar?
I still have the stock 5/8 bar on the front so there’s room for improvement there.
BTW, where’d you get the bushed ends that bolt to the frame?
They’re part of the stock sway bar links from my Cobra II. I had replaced them with heim joints on my Cobra so they were just sitting around waiting to be re-purposed.
I think I would swap front to rear to get the bigger bar in the front. The problem with a stiffer rear bar is that it will make it very difficult to recover from over steer. You always want a bit more lean in the rear than the front to get the rear tires to find traction after breaking lose.
Front:
(1) Stiffer: Will increase overall car stability (reduces roll) and shift the car’s balance toward UNDERsteer (push), thus allowing the driver to be more aggressive with the steering. The compromise can be on bumps and/or braking. A stiffer front bar will reduce compliance, so when one tire hits a bump the entire front axle will be affected through a loss of overall grip.
(2) Softer: Allows more roll and will shift the cars balance toward OVERsteer (or less UNDERsteer.) And the front will improve in compliance, which improves performance in brake zones and over bumps.
Rear:
(1) Stiffer: As you add throttle through the corner while the steering wheel is still turned, the rear anti‐roll bar becomes very effective. Stiffening the bar supports the rear and shifts the balance to less UNDERsteer at corner exit. Again, the compromise is in compliance; a possible SNAP or FLAT OVERsteer may result if rear anti‐roll bar is TOO stiff.
(2) Softer: Allows more roll at the back of the car, which will be most evident at corner exit. If the bar is TOO soft, the car will exhibit exit OVERsteer. In this case, compared to a rear bar that is TOO stiff, the exit OVERsteer condition will be more gradual instead of a snap, hence the phrase “roll OVERsteer.”
This is great thank you so much for info for rebuilding convertable actuaters.Getting ready to do mine you did a good job.I hope I can close to your work.Thanks again Topcat
It’s been a long time since I’ve done any work on my faithful cat, so I spent some time sprucing up the interior. I picked up a cool emblem on ebay a while back and used it to replace my homemade emblem. It looks much better in real life- for some reason, my camera over-emphasizes the black smudges around the cat.
Sweet!
I think it looks great, it really pops with the black and the red!
Here’s my latest cheapskate modification: gas struts for the trunk, salvaged from an old hot tub cover lift (including the nifty rectangular nut that looks like it was made to fit inside the Cougar hinge) . Price: $free. Time: finished before the grill was heated up for chicken. Result: my trunk now opens smoothly with no bouncing and I can add a luggage rack if the urge ever hits me to do so. No cutting was necessary, only a few 1/4" holes (2 per side). The struts fit tucked away neatly along side of the hinges so they don’t get in the way of anything.
Are you going to remove the springs?
They’re not really in the way and if I remove them, I’ll just have to find a place in the garage to store them. So, I think I’ll just leave them be.
Another neat modification Jody. 
Steven
Well, what do you think? I was going to wait until spring to put these on, but I had to replace one of the tires anyway. One down, three to go.
I think the cougar rims look great. I like the wider spokes anyways.
How much was the electric impact?
Wife wants to know what I want for Christmas!
I bought it years ago on sale at Harbour Freight for next to nothing. It has nowhere near the power of most air powered ones, but for things like changing wheels, it speeds things up a lot (thought I have to go back and re-torque the lugs by hand to make sure they’re snug).
Get a cordless one. DeWalt and Milwaukee both make good ones.
Nearing 170k miles on the clock and just got new tires so I figured it was probably a good time to rebuild the front suspension. New upper and lower arms/ball joints. Strut bushings were replaced only a few years back so I left them be.
I soaked everything with PB Blaster a few days ago which definitely helped, as did a homemade ball joint separator and a great big hammer. Everything came apart with minimal violence. While they were out, I took the opportunity to chop a half coil off the springs to give the front a little drop.