Does Prius III has anti-roll bars?

Is our children learning?

 

Has anyone tried the Cusco F&R sway set? I'm already lowered on htechs but I have coilovers on the way. The car still has a ton of roll even with stiffer springs so I'm wondering if just the rear is enough to tone down that roll.

Also for those who have done the RSB, does your steering feedback improve? Or is the little to no feedback one of the things we have to live with due to the electric driven power steering?

 

Many times a vehicle with a torsion beam rear axle does not need an anti-roll bar. This is because a torsion beam rear axle is essentially an anti-roll bar. This is one of the major engineering advantages of a torsion beam rear suspension. In addition to its inherent packaging advantages, by designing the beam with sufficient torsional rigidity, engineers can attain sufficient the roll stiffness without separate anti-roll bar.

To increase roll stiffness one would have to make the torsion beam more rigid. This is usually done a little differently than an independent setup. The usual method is by inserting a straight bar into the middle of the beam to increase its torsional rigidity. Unlike an independent setup there is no bend in the anti-roll bar to provide a lever arm that translates the vertical movement of the suspension to a twisting motion at the anti-roll bar. The trailing elements of the torsion beam suspension translate the vertical movement of the suspension to the twisting action at the beam/bar.

 

Josh,

Thx for the heads up on the compatibility of the XB (08+) sway bar with our Prius. This was my next intended upgrade and the substitution of the Scion part works great! I wasn't looking forward to the long wait for something that's more pricey coming in from Japan.

I ordered my part from trdsparks.com (parts.com also carries the part PTR11-52091) and got it over the weekend. Installation took about an hour as I had to figure out how to torque down the top nut of the linkage inside the swingarms without having to remove the lower bolts of the shock towers. It was tight, but I got it done.

So far I have the Tanabe Strut Tower Bar and Lower Body Brace as well as a Cusco Center Power Brace and 17" wheels. Suspension is still stock, but with the Anti-Sway Bar, body roll has been minimized to my liking. Steering has been quickened. As you said, the car is now a blast to drive.

I was looking at the Hotchkiss setup (fox Scion XB 08-10) which has a 32mm Front Anti-Sway Bar and a 25mm Rear Anti-Sway Bar, but thought that might be too much. Perhaps down the road I'll give it a try, but for now this is it for performance mods to the car. The car is where I wanted it to be. Any further mods will be either cosmetic or further functionality.

Although as an afterthought, do you know the compatibility of the springs for the XB in our Prius? I think I was looking for a little stiffer spring rate without losing the ride height. I have too many speed bumps in my neighborhood and the thought of touching down anything underside in NYC doesn't bode well with me.

Creaky

 

That's right. It's different than a solid rear axle car where the joining beam is directly center line with the wheels. In this case, the fact the linking bar is offset means when one wheel is pushed up or down, it applies force to the other side to make the other wheel move in the same direction. This twists the beam and adding more stiffness to the beam applies more force. It's a neat design....

But of course adding a rear bar will add roll stiffness.

 

NICE. I was wondering when people could start putting in reviews of these parts. Before you added the RASB, how did the braces help the car?

My biggest gripe with the Prius is the suspension feels jouncy to me over small sharp bumps. I'm trying to figure out if this is coming from the spongy tires or chassis flex.

My last car was a 2001 Mazda Protege MP3 which had the factory installed Racing Beat suspension on it. The Protege was already a very stiff little car and the suspension made it tight. (Albeit very rough over crappy roads and choppy freeways.)

When I needed to take a tire off, I didn't need a jack! I could just drive one wheel of the car up the edge of a driveway and it would lift the other wheel on the same side of the car completely off the ground. In fact, more than once I would just be driving along normally and turn right into a store driveway and often I would two-wheel where the left front wheel and right back wheel would be completely off the ground! Since it was FWD with no LSD, I would sometimes have to roll backwards to get both front wheels on the ground and try again with more speed (so momentum would carry me up enough to touch both front wheels again.)

Even after I owned the car for 8 years when I did this there was zero creaking in the car's chassis from flex.

 

Realllllly. All those dire warnings about not driving while in inspection mode in the service manual. Clearly you have not broken your car having it on while auto crossing.

So does it just disable traction control or is stability control also disabled? And how much does it help your times to do this? I have not gone Autocrossing in my Gen III but I certainly find traction/stability control isn't too obtrusive in the Gen III. It certainly lets you have a little fun before it steps in.

I assume it also prevents ICE shutdown even when stopped....

Do you keep an eye on temperatures with a SGII or laptop?

 

It doesn't change much. The Toyota system gives you a little slide before it kicks in. I honestly wouldn't worry about the stability control.

I don't think the chassis is that soft on the 3rd gen, stiffer shocks/springs would help a lot. If anything, I need to know how I can get the car to fully charge the batteries before each run.

Car won't charge the battery even if you leave it in test mode and has the car running

 

I was wondering if inspection mode charged.... I wonder if there is some charge mode? That would be cool... especially if you knew you had to park the car for an extended period and you wanted to put more charge in the traction battery.

When the traction battery gets low is there a noticeable drop in performance?

 

Can OP please change title from has to have? That's just driving me crazy.

 

Maybe him can has the moderator does it for he.

or maybe he can haz cheezburger?

 

Don't worry about your English, the message gets across.

不要担心你的英语。

 

I would like to know, I got some slicks for my Prius for fun. I cant wait to try it again

 

Does anyone know anything about the tower bars available? So I've read that there are 2 options out there, the Cusco and Tanabe. Anyone have experience with either? Any notable improvements with this mod?

I just spoke to some guy at Tanabe and he said that the installation may require removal of some panels/covers but would not give me the exact details. I remember installing one on my Civic many years ago and basically just removed 3 nuts on each side that secured the front struts, but from what he was describing, it sounded a little more complicated than that.

 

I had the CUSCO brace installed at one point. It does tighten the handling of the car tremendously. There's less wandering with crosswinds at higher speeds.
As for installation, I had mine installed by a shop, but I know you have to remove the black plastic paneling that houses the windshield wipers. You'll need to do that to access the top of the strut tower, otherwise you are working in very tight quarters.

 

^^ You'll have to remove the whole wiper assembly and cowl if you want to install the strut brace. There was no way to access those bolts easily when I installed my springs (which is needed to remove the top mounts for)

 

I'm considering the rear sway too. so for those that have em, does it make a noticeable difference for daily driving (quick lane changes, cornering at speed, body roll, steering response). Also how difficult is the install? how much needs to be removed to install? Can it be done on jacks?

 

If you add a rear sway bar you should also install a beefier one in the front, otherwise you will increase oversteer and the chance of the car suddenly swapping ends on you in a corner. Too much rear bar on a FWD car can feel great until you exceed the limit, then it suddenly breaks loose and the rear passes the front. Often all it takes is backing off the throttle in a hard corner to cause a spin.