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MG MGB Technical - Rear Tramp bars/ sway bar

I am looking at fitting Tramp bars and a Rear swaybar to my modified B. I was looking at different ways to mount the swaybar. There is the Rubber bumper way, the bar mounts on top of the axel and extends forward to the body. And the RV8/Ron Hopkins way, the bar mounteds to the boot floor and extends to above the axel and is connected via droplinks.

Does the Rubber bumper sway bay act like a top mounted tramp bar aswell, seeing as thought it's mounted to the to axel and body, would it stop the axel from twisting?

So I thought using this principle I could kill 2 birds with one stone. What if I mount a sway bar under the axel with some heavy duty saddels mounted on the end of the inner U bolts. It would then curve forward to connect to the body using the front tramp bar mount. Yhis way it would work as a sway bar and tramp bars in one.

Why haven't I seen this been done before????
Maybe it doesn't work?
Do you think the twisting would flogg out the saddle bushed quickly, even if I use urithane ones?
MD Johnson

In theory what you propose would indeed work as both a sway bar and anti tramp bars, but in practice I think that you'll find that the small size sway bar required in the rear will be too small to act as a proper anti tramp bar. What you could do is to attach the arms of the sway bar to a properly sized anti tramp bar. GM used this design on most of their RWD cars during the 70s and 80s and if I remember correctly Jag did something similar with the locating arms on the XKE. What you don't get with this method is any reduction in weight, you still have to run seperate bars. I'd recommend mounting the sway bar to the chassis if you have room, mounting to the axle just adds unsprung weight. As clearance is pretty tight on the B chassis you'll probably wind up mounting the bar just as the factory did, on the axle though, I did in my midget.
Bill Young

The Ford Capri used a similar rear sway bar setup as the
RB MGB.

Like you, I had thought that, in theory, the bar should also
work as an anti-tramp setup. As such, it would be a great
weight-saver.
Daniel Wong

This guy didn't think so
http://www.britishv8.org/MG/AdrianAkhurst.htm
scroll down a bit.
Perhaps the antisway bar is too far from the spring. It still could reverse and allow the axle to move forward. With the bottom antitramp bar this is not possible.
These are pretty good,
http://www.mgbmga.com/tech/mgb27b.htm
They were easy to fit.
If you are not fitting the composite springs
http://www.mgbmga.com/tech/mgb14d.htm

then you do have the option of these simple set ups
http://www.mgbmga.com/tech/mgb4A.htm
You could get the arms made for about $110 each and just make the rest yourself, simple enough.

My car was a rubber bumper, I've lowered it 2 inches, put on the composite springs and antitramp bars. The addition of a 22mm front antisway bar (no rear) plus an panhard rod has made a huge difference in handeling. The car has no oversteer at all, is dead neutral and goes around corners very flat. I've even got a heavy tow bar on the back.


Peter Sherman

This thread was discussed between 09/06/2008 and 10/06/2008

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