swaybar update

Twin twin,

did you modify your rear suspension at all prior to the addition of the swaybar? Just curious if you had adjusted the compression to stiffen the rear or swapped out the OEM shock...

Can you share with the group how to contact this guy? Thankssssssssss!! steve

Iam no expert on this subject but the swaybar unifies the sidecar and the tug to act as one unit so it is more stable under the forces when in a left turn and a right turn. This is independent of adjusting the rear suspension on the bike. It makes the whole rig act as one unit when stress is applied..there is a short video on the HP sidecar website that shows how it works...
A torsion bar will enhance the suspension and together the ride will be better INDEPENDENT of what you do tho the shocks and suspension of the bike...
The swaybar is also more cost effective than an expensive shock upgrade which can cost over $1000.
these rigs(GS) have a high stance(CoG) and are softly spring. Neither of these characteristics are favorable when a sidecar is added. The new shock will not change the potential for roll in the corners.A swaybar takes much of this away and one can still easily unhook one end for rough/off road riding.

Yes... you can reach Claude at
CStanley@sunlink.net or cell# 1:570:837.5182
I had reservations, being a noobie, about my purchase honeslty till Claude installed my swaybar... I can NOW ride up the extreme twisties and it sticks!!!... plus my dog does not complain anymore regarding the leaning... as an addition you will never meet someone as nice as Claude, unassuming and humble... a true Artist with his welding... cutting... bolting... itwas quite an experience to watch the progress...
Good luck and don't think about it twice!!!
Hi Twintwin!!!... HI Claude...!!! Did I mention... I NEED a vacation!!!
Be well... Ara

Claude has the full technical understanding of swaybars well in hand.

I've been 'playing' with my own swaybar design over the past two years - I do have a few nuggets of wisdom to pass on, for those interested in understanding some of the technical dynamics of one.

A swaybar works best, if you have trailing swingarms on both the sidecar, and the motorcycle (obviously, the motorcycle trailing arm design is pretty well expected from the factory 🙂 ) It's best to set the swaybar up, so that the pivot point is located as close to/parallel to the pivot point of the respective swingarm - using equal length swaybar arms, locate the attachment points to the arms at an equal distance length relative to each other, if at all possible. You are in essence, setting up equal geometry parallelogram swaybar arm/pivot/linkage setups - and equalising the way forces act upon both the sidecar and motorcycle swingarms, working both in concert, and seperately from each other depending on applicable road conditions/demands on the suspensions at any given moment.

The reason why i bring this up - this is my second version of a swaybar setup. My first was based on a sidecar suspension that was leading swingarm design.

A swaybar setup, with a trailing motorcycle swingarm, and a leading swingarm on the sidecar, is of limited effectiveness due to torsional dynamics on the swaybar arms. In effect, to impliment a swaybar on this type of suspension setup, you need to maximize the length of the arms on the motorcycle, and minimize the length as much as possible, and shorten up the mount point on the sidecar side, IMHO. The reasoning behind this, is that with going with a leading swingarm setup on the sidecar side, you've effectively doubled up the length of the swaybar arm on the sidecar side as compared to the motorcycle side. The fulcrum forces have been doubled, and are unequal. The weakness in this sort of design really shows up, when cornering forces come to play. In left-hand cornering, with the weight shift transfer going to the sidecar suspension, the suspension loads up, and at a given point, overwhelms the ability of the swaybars torsion and suspension equalisation functions to resist and transfer the load. The sidecar suspension then has a tendancy to drop suddenly, which can, in turn lighten the motorcycle rear wheel, in extreme cases, breaking traction. Caution MUST be used, IMHO, with this sort of setup - it's akin to the swaybar 'breaking' in a corner. The nose of the sidecar will dip suddenly, and the sidecar wheel will 'dig in', affecting the line of travel that you are steering.

All this noted, a swaybar on this type of suspension setup still has limited usefulness - it still has torsion bar qualities to augment your stock suspension setup on either wheel for additional suspension resistance, and it still has limited effectiveness as a swaybar, as long as you recognise the limits of the design, and adjust your speed to reflect cornering limits appropriately.

This is all based on personal experience, and experimentation to date, only. I am not an engineer, nor do i have the background of one. It's been a slow work-day... *addendum* my experiences are those of a quite aggressive rider, swaybar behavior with a trailing motorcycle/leading sidecar suspension setup may be less aggrevating to the more conservative rider.

Regarding the shocks, I have the stock suspension, and have stiffed to the max, rear and front. Before the swaybar I thought that the shocks were the main trouble of the very unsafe handling of the rig, because they were so soft. But now, with the swaybar, the shocks (especially the rear one) are very stiff, and I even do not think any more to change them. You really have to ride with a sway bar to believe it!!
Isn’t it, Ara and Claude. Thanks Bill for all your technical explanations. I'm only a HAPPY and SMILY sidecar rider now. Well almost because I just have experienced some slippage symptoms on the GS and the appointment to the doctor dealer is schedule for May the 17th. But nothing to do with the swaybar, the bike is just tired 34K. I cannot wait to put back together the rig and enjoy again the 3 wheels riding.
Didier

Originally written by twintwin on 4/27/2006 1:22 PM

Regarding the shocks, I have the stock suspension, and have stiffed to the max, rear and front. Before the swaybar I thought that the shocks were the main trouble of the very unsafe handling of the rig, because they were so soft. But now, with the swaybar, the shocks (especially the rear one) are very stiff, and I even do not think any more to change them. You really have to ride with a sway bar to believe it!!Isn’t it, Ara and Claude. Thanks Bill for all your technical explanations. I'm only a HAPPY and SMILY sidecar rider now. Well almost because I just have experienced some slippage symptoms on the GS and the appointment to the doctor dealer is schedule for May the 17th. But nothing to do with the swaybar, the bike is just tired 34K. I cannot wait to put back together the rig and enjoy again the 3 wheels riding.Didier

When the rig first went together, I had also stiffened up the rear suspension on my motorcycle, hoping it'd cure some of the handling issues, not to mention the static, sacked-out state that the rig had pre-swaybar days - went from a 550 lb spring, to an 800 lb spring - all it did was make it stiff and wobbly. With swaybar, it is now a little too stiff.. but not unbearably so.

Wow..after being away from the computer today and coming back and seeing all of this I felt I had to reply somehow..whew.I must say thanks to Beemerchef and Twin Twin for their nice comments.
In another thread there is much explanation of how a swaybar works etc. I think the thread was called 'torsion bar' or close to that. There is one piece there written by Bill Ballou that is really good and also some links to a video that actually shows what effect a swaybar can have on a rig.
To be frank about it there is still a lot of question on what the best combination is for a swaybar. It WILL vary from rig to rig no doubt.
What bar length, bar size and arm length is best? There is more to it than that though. Think spring rate. Not initial but overall.Do we use a larger diameter bar with long arms or a smaller bar with shorter arms?

Long bar or short bar? This is usually dictated by the width of the rig. I have however used a short bar with extensions on it with decent results. Problem there was that the short bar was over worked and bascially wore out quickly.

Also varibles on where the arms should be hooked to the swingarm of the bike and sidecar. I have tried them with little movement and also with a lot of movement. On our K100 rig I had extensions on both swingarms to hook the swaybar arms to. This meant that is the suspension moved ,say, 2" the arm on the swaybar would move maybe 4" ....yes it worked.

Also the question of whether the bar should be pre loaded or not. Also whether the arms should be the same length or not....and so on and so on.

The means of linking the swaybar to the swingarms is important. The attachment points MUST be strong!! You do not want a swaybar system to fail when in a turn 'leaning on it' so to speak. This is not something to take lightly.

There is a lot related to the actual design of the rig, the width etc etc that could be tabulated to suposedly create the 'perfect' swaybar design. I say 'suposedly' because so much of how it works will still come down to the seat of the pants feel of the rider.

The dual sport type rigs are high in the air...they also typically have a softer long travel suspension. These two elements alone do nothing for hard road or street handling performance. A swaybar setup on one of these can make a real difference. It can on any rig but can be especially dramatic on a high rig with lots of potential movement through bump and rebound. If the rig is taken off road into rougher terain then one end of the swaybar can be unhooked and allowed to just 'float'. By doing this all of the original suspension will work as it did before the addition of the swaybar.

Notes to Bill: I have put swaybars on Terraplanes that have the leading swingarm on the sidecar. Yes, it can be done and works well. I use a bell crank of sorts to reverse the motion between the bike and sidecar. The swaybar actually runs straight across the sidecar near the rear in this design. I actually have two Terraplanes here to do right now.

I think I did my first experimental swaybar back in the late 1980's. They do work and do make a difference on any rig. Note that friend Gary Haynes(The Sidecar Magic Shop) also does swaybars out of his West Virginia Shop.

Hi Claud,

From the pictures it looks like you use a large diameter sway bar, is that right? In which case it's different to a torsion bar. In that a torsion bar is a spring which allows differential movement between the wheels, but a large diameter "sway" bar requires that they move in unison. Like a "wide swing arm" style trike convertion. Or have I misunderstood?

(By torsion bar I don't mean just a torsion spring for the sidecar, I mean a bar hooked up just like your sway-bar. But it can twist, so the linkage between the two wheels is not as solid. So it allows a small amount of sway. Like this http://hometown.aol.com/sidebike00/Page31.html )

I'd love to fit a sway-bar/torsion-bar to my K100 outfit so I'm trying to get as much info before I get it done.

The sidecar suspension has a leading link swingarm, so do you have any pics of how you setup the Terraplane swaybar?

Thanks and regards,

Steven (Melbourne, Australia)

Steven wrote:
>>Hi Claud,
From the pictures it looks like you use a large diameter sway bar, is that right? In which case it's different to a torsion bar. In that a torsion bar is a spring which allows differential movement between the wheels, but a large diameter "sway" bar requires that they move in unison. Like a "wide swing arm" style trike convertion. Or have I misunderstood?
(By torsion bar I don't mean just a torsion spring for the sidecar, I mean a bar hooked up just like your sway-bar. But it can twist, so the linkage between the two wheels is not as solid. So it allows a small amount of sway. Like this http://hometown.aol.com/sidebike00/Page31.html )
I'd love to fit a sway-bar/torsion-bar to my K100 outfit so I'm trying to get as much info before I get it done.
The sidecar suspension has a leading link swingarm, so do you have any pics of how you setup the Terraplane swaybar?
Thanks and regards,
Steven (Melbourne, Australia)<<<

Hello Steven,
What you see in the pictures of swaybars that I ahve done is not the actual swaybar but the tube it passes through. There is a bushing at each end inside the tube. The swaybar can be various lengths and diameters. The wall thickness, length and length of arms all affect the effective spring rate of the bar. So, yes it is a spring and not a solid bar that does not twist as suspension movement is put into it. Why do I use the tube? Well on many bike the sidecar is away from the bike quite a ways like 14' and up on some. I want to support this portion of the swaybar between the sidecar frame and the bike to help insure the swaybar twists as it should and does not flex up and down. Any flexing up and down will take away the action wanted. By placing the bar in a tube the bushing (support)on the bike side can be placed right near the end of the bar.
Sidecars such as the terraplane, with leading swingarms can be a challenge to mount a swaybar to. There are various ways to do this. What I do on terraplanes is to run the bar straight across the sidecar in the cutout area behind the seat. The arm on the sidecar side runs forwawd under the sidecar swingarm and is linked to the swingarm to allow fee movement. On the bike side I use a link to a bell crank of sorts to reverse the motion before it gets to the swingarm of the bike. This allows the arm to run from a foward pivot on the bike side and still move in an arc the same as the bike's swingarm.
In your case with the sidecar mounted on the left, and it being a K Bike, you will have to 'reach' the bike's swingarm which in on the right side of the bike. I am thinking that maybe the 'bell crank' shaft could run under the bike to the swingarm of the bike and possibly mount to the center stand area. This assembly would have to be stout enough to curtail any flexing in it as you want the swaybar to do all the twisting and not the bell crank. If your subframe is also mountd in this area it could get a little busy but I am sure it could be done. The connection of the arm at the rear end housing of the bike is also important of course. On a non para lever (K100)you can build a bracket that mounts to the connection at the the drive shaft housing and also to the shock mount for additional support. This would be all bolt on of course and operate through lonks made with heim ends or some other sutable option.
Steven, keep in mind that all connections, welds, hardware etc on swaybar installation and fitments are big time critical. The last thing you want is to have a swaybar fail in a turn when you are leaning on the bar at speed.
Too bad the big bridge isn't built as you could just bring it over and we could do it for you 🙂 If you are interested I could still possibly do some component parts that would help out. I know it is a long ways away for a call but feel free to call me if you wish. (570) 837-5182
or email me offlist at cstanley@sunlink.net.

Hey Claude,

Thanks for that overview, very helpful. You have thought of everything! - Including the problem of the swingarm being on the wrong side. I had thought about that, but I didn't want to confuse the matter in my first post.

(BTW: Sorry I got your name wrong last post.)

Would you mind sending me some pictures of the setup for the terraplane? Particularly the link to the sidecar suspension and also the bell crank. I understand what the bell crank does, but I can't visualise it. Please email pictures if that's ok and you have some - my email address is below.

Do you have bushings just at the end of the tube - or along it's length also?

The swing arm on the sidecar will typically have a different travel to that of the rear swingarm of the bike. Also they are subject to different forces (weights). Do you have to factor that in to the sway bar? Maybe with the sway bar arm lengths?

My K is a very early one - so no paralever. Here's a pic:
http://pic.greenguzzi.com

The subframe is mounted to centrestand mount as you suspected - but like you said, I'm sure I can work it out once I get my head around your ideas.

I know of a guy here in Melbourne who does great work with trikes. I'm sure that if I can get him interested he can do the work at the required standard, but I need to get my head around the problem so I can tell him what I want.

I'd rather drop over to your place though, but like you say - there is no bridge! 🙂

Although I may ask you to help with some components.

Thanks again for all your help.

Best regards,

Steven G

sidecar@greenguzzi.com

Steve my responses are in your text below in the >>> <<<>>Don't worry about the name I have been called all kinds of things...lol<<> I do not have any pictures at this time but have two to do here now.<<>On each end<<>>You can get way technical with this type of thing but if it is kept within reason many things are not as critical as one would think. I have done a lot of experiments with various arm lengths , mounting points , bar sizes and lengths etc and altough all work okay the setup depends a ton on the bike/ sidecar combination and even driving style.<<>I should have wrote mono leaver, as that was what I meant..a duh for me (again)<>Let me know and ,as I said, feel free to contact me off list<<

Thanks again for all your help.

Best regards,

Steven G

sidecar@greenguzzi.com

Hey Claude,

All is clear. Except for the bell-crank.

Very much appreciated!

Thanks,

Steven

I'm new to this sidecar stuff. got the sidecar this week and put it on the bike. The bike is a 1981 GS850L Suzuki, and the sidecar is 2006 Velorex 563T. I was suprised that the bike with the sidecar leans like a car. The sidecar lifter during a right turn ( need some balest ). How hard would it be to put a swaybar on this rig.