Anti Roll Bars & Anti Roll Bar Kits with Fitting Position Front Axle

A sway bar is a steel bar running across the vehicle, connected to the suspension at each end and mounted to the chassis in the middle. When one wheel rises relative to the other, the bar twists, and the resistance it generates transfers load across to the other side.

What Is a Sway Bar and What Does a Sway Bar Do

The easiest way to understand what a sway bar does on a car is to picture what happens without one.

Turn into a corner and weight transfers to the outside wheels, compressing that side and letting the inside extend. The body leans over, the inside tyre unloads and stops contributing, and the outside tyre ends up carrying almost everything on that axle while sitting at a worse camber angle than it should.

A sway bar car setup limits how far that goes, and a car sway bar of the correct rate stops the lean before it costs you traction. Because it connects both sides, the outside wheel compressing forces the bar to twist, and the bar pushes back, resisting the movement and pulling some load back onto the inside tyre. You get a flatter vehicle, tyres closer to their intended angle, and more cornering traction from the same set of tyres.

What it does not do is affect ride quality over bumps that hit both wheels together. Go over a speed hump squarely and the bar barely notices, because both ends move the same amount and there is nothing to twist. That is the whole reason the part exists, since you get the cornering improvement without the harshness a stiffer spring would bring.

Not the Same as a Caravan Sway Bar

Worth clearing up early, because the terms collide and the products are unrelated.

Caravan sway bars and anti sway bars for towing control a trailer moving around behind the vehicle, and they attach to the towing setup rather than to the suspension.

What is on this page is suspension sway bar parts, which bolt to the vehicle itself and control how much the body leans in a corner. If you are towing and chasing stability, a rear suspension sway bar genuinely helps, though it is not a substitute for proper weight distribution and trailer sway control.

Front Sway Bar or Rear Sway Bar

Both ends do the same job and they have opposite effects on how the vehicle behaves.

A stiffer front sway bar resists front lean more, which loads the outside front tyre harder and pushes the vehicle toward understeer, where the nose runs wide. A stiffer rear sway bar does the same at the back, which frees up the front and lets the vehicle turn in more readily.

Most road vehicles leave the factory tuned toward understeer because it is predictable and safe for the average driver, which is why fitting or upgrading a rear sway bar is the most common handling change people make. It settles a nose heavy vehicle without touching springs or dampers.

Pick-ups, wagons and 4WDs respond particularly well to a rear bar, since they usually have very little rear resistance from the factory and gain real stability under load or while towing.

Sway Bar Bushes, Rubbers and Linkages

A sway bar cannot work on its own, and it is almost always the parts around it that fail rather than the bar itself.

Sway bar bushes at the centre hold the bar to the chassis so it twists rather than moves around. Once a sway bar bushing softens, the fixed point stops being fixed and the bar delivers less than its rating suggests. These are the parts people know as sway bar rubbers, and they are the most replaced component in the whole assembly.

Sway bar linkages carry the load from the suspension to the ends of the bar. Any play in a link is load the bar never receives, and worn links produce a light rattle over small sharp bumps that is easy to confuse with something more expensive.

Brackets, mounts and lateral locks hold everything where it belongs, and on a raised vehicle relocation brackets bring the bar back to a sensible angle.

Bars themselves almost never fail, since they are shaped spring steel doing what spring steel does. A vehicle that felt planted three years ago and feels vague now has not developed a soft bar, it has worn out what holds the bar.

How a Sway Bar Kit Differs From Upgrading the Bar Alone

Worth understanding before you spend, because the two are not the same purchase.

Replacing a worn sway bar bush or a tired link restores what the vehicle had when it was new. The bar rate does not change, the geometry does not change, and what you get back is the resistance the vehicle lost gradually over years without anyone noticing.

Fitting a heavier bar is a different thing entirely. That increases the rate, changes the balance between the front and rear of the vehicle, and puts more load into mounting points that were sized around the original bar. It is a modification rather than a repair.

Most people who think they need a bigger bar actually need fresh bushes and links, because a worn assembly gives away a surprising amount of what the standard bar was always capable of. Do the wear parts first, drive it, and then decide whether the vehicle still needs more.

How Long Sway Bar Parts Last

There is no service interval for any of this, because how long it lasts depends on climate, road surface and what the vehicle does.

Factory rubber bushes commonly start making noise somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 kilometres, and vehicles in hot climates, coastal areas or on rough dirt roads get there considerably sooner. Heat, UV and grit all attack rubber, and the sway bar mounts sit in an exposed position collecting all three of them.

Links wear on a similar timeline, though a ball jointed link fails once its boot splits rather than gradually, which is why one side often goes well before the other.

The awkward part is that none of it fails suddenly. The noise is the last symptom to arrive, which means the bar has usually been delivering less than it should for a long while before anyone investigates. If your vehicle has covered serious distance on original rubber, the parts are due whether or not anything is rattling yet.

Symptoms of Worn Sway Bar Parts

• Clunking or rattling over bumps, driveways and speed humps at low speed
• Squeaking or creaking from the front, often worse in cold or wet weather
• Noticeably more vehicle sway through corners than you are used to
• The vehicle taking longer to settle after a lane change
• A vague, loose feeling with no obvious cause at either end
• Play felt by hand at either end of a link, or at the bar within its brackets
• Visible cracking, splitting or missing material in the bushes
• A bar sitting at an angle rather than level, usually after a lift
• An upgraded bar that never delivered the improvement you expected

Sway Bar Kits and What They Include

Kits group the parts that work together, which matters because replacing one component and leaving the rest rarely delivers what you paid for.

A sway bar link kit supplies both sides together, since one new link against one worn one leaves the bar working unevenly across the vehicle. Bush and bracket kits cover the mounting end. Service kits refresh the wear parts on a bar already fitted rather than replacing the bar itself.

If you are upgrading to a heavier bar, look at the links and bushes at the same time. A new bar working through tired ones will not deliver what it is capable of, and the mounting points take more load from a larger diameter bar than they were originally asked to carry.

Clamping Sway Bar Bushes Hard Enough to Hold

Sway bar work is among the more approachable jobs on a vehicle, since the bar unbolts at four points and nothing needs pressing.

Expect corrosion at the bracket bolts and the link nuts, because both live in poor positions for it and are usually the hardest part of the job.

Clamp the mount brackets down properly, because the bar has to rotate inside the bush rather than the bush turning inside the bracket, which means torquing to specification rather than easing off out of concern for crushing the polyurethane. An under clamped bush spins and destroys itself quickly.

Set link length with the vehicle on all four wheels at ride height, not hanging at full droop, and never force a link into position to make it reach. A preloaded bar is already part way through its travel before the vehicle has moved and works unevenly side to side.

Fit both sides before final torquing so the bar sits square, grease the bush bores with a silicone or PTFE based lubricant rather than a lithium or petroleum based one, and check clearance through the full range of suspension travel. No wheel alignment is required after any of this work.

Find Sway Bars and Sway Bar Parts for Your Vehicle

For lifted or modified vehicles, sway bar relocation kits restore the bar's working angle, and sway bar brackets replace rusted or broken mounts. Find more repair parts across our suspension parts range.

Select your vehicle to see the front sway bar and rear sway bar components available for it, including links, bushes, brackets and complete kits. Every Nolathane component is backed by our warranty, a fitment guarantee and 60 day returns.