Rear strut brace...

Simon said:
Depends on where the suspension towers are in the vehicle. Ones at 'strong' points in the car won't need a brace as they will be pretty rigid anyway.

Fitting one to a car with a big tailgate will certainly see an improvement
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i think he was referring to cars fitted with braces at the factory matey.
 
Simon said:
Yeah I know, I didn't say aftermarket fitment ;)
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i'd really like to be able to say i can feel the difference, but in most cars you just can't push hard enough on the road.
the thing is, because YOU know it's there you end up convincing yourself you can feel a difference.
 
The_Dark_Side said:
i'd really like to be able to say i can feel the difference, but in most cars you just can't push hard enough on the road.
the thing is, because YOU know it's there you end up convincing yourself you can feel a difference.
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Where do you live lol. Do you not have quiet roads or something :p
 
I've a older Nissan Primera GT and it has a strut brace in the front. It also has extra stiffening around the bulkheads. Maybe the standard Primera isn't that stiff, but the handling on all of them is decent. So I dunno. Was trying to remember what other cars I've seen with strut bars as standard MR2 Mrk1, I think my CRX mrk2 had it aswell. I suppose on road cars its too much effort to reduce weight by modifying the body shell. You'd only do that for track/race cars.
 
when it comes to racing, no ordinary production car is stiff enough not to need a strut brace or two.
when talking about road cars it's unusual to find a manufacturer that's fitted a brace to improve things.
they're almost always fitted because due to the design of the car it NEEDS a brace to compensate for a lack of rigidity.
 
Sparky191 said:
Therefore the rigidity is noticable in the handling of such a car. If it wasn't noticeable they wouldn't fit it.
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no, with certain designs they HAVE to fit one.
without a brace certain bodyshells don't just suffer from a slight flexing under hard driving, they would fail over time.
 
Cars where the turrets are very close to the bulkhead, for example, are ones that rarely require a strut brace.

Mine does though. Hasn't got one yet mind! :D
 
The_Dark_Side said:
no, with certain designs they HAVE to fit one.
without a brace certain bodyshells don't just suffer from a slight flexing under hard driving, they would fail over time.
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The Honda Integra is a car that comes with no strut brace. However on the Type R they fit a upper and lower rear brace, despite the shell being even stiffer than the base model.

Flexing in a shell is good for achieving long lifetime. A rock solid stitch welded shell has a habit of fatiguing over time. No flex means the stresses end up ripping panels or welds apart.

I really don't see where you are going with this though, I dont think you have a background in BIW design ? As it seems to be a lot of speculative comments. A lot of cars will feel a benfit from one, Rover or not.
 
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Simon said:
The Honda Integra is a car that comes with no strut brace. However on the Type R they fit a upper and lower rear brace, despite the shell being even stiffer than the base model.
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of course it's improved with a brace, any car that leaves the line without one will be improved by fitting the thing.
whether you can feel much of a difference is of course a different matter.
 
Sparky191 said:
If the body shell fails without it.
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which is why designs like that have a brace fitted at the factory.
there are other cars that come with a brace from new, typically thinly disguised racers but these are improvements to make a car more hardcore.
 
You really seem to be contradicting yourself.

It seems your more interested in making a point about drivers not noticing rather than the actual effects of a brace, of course this is purely down to the driver of the car.

No strut braces are fitted to hold the car together, they are simply fitted to the sportier models to sharpen up handling.
 
Sparky191 said:
Why (where its not structural) does it in one case does it make a care more "hardcore" and in another it has no effect. :confused:
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i didn't say it had no effect, i said on the road it's unlikely you'd feel the benefits of one.
that's not the same thing.
Simon said:
You really seem to be contradicting yourself.

It seems your more interested in making a point about drivers not noticing rather than the actual effects of a brace, of course this is purely down to the driver of the car.

No strut braces are fitted to hold the car together, they are simply fitted to the sportier models to sharpen up handling.
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no, i just seem to be having difficulties getting my point across.
 
The_Dark_Side said:
i didn't say it had no effect, i said on the road it's unlikely you'd feel the benefits of one.
that's not the same thing.
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A lot of drivers probably won't notice, especially normal driving. The road is certainly able to deliver a near track experience in some places though ;)
 
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