Shine rear sway bar broke rear axle?? Help.

[AutoX Matt]

I autocross my scirocco 16V. I've had Shine Racing's springs & rear bar w/ 205/50-15 Yokohama AD08s for about 2 full autox seasons.
At a recent event I noticed the rear tires had started rubbing against the springs. Nothing was obviously amiss, but when the alignment was checked, the left rear camber was -0.9 and toe was -1.50 and right rear camber was -1.6 and toe -0.43. I had a new axle installed and during that process the mechanics found this:






The rear axle was replaced and the SCCH Rear Beam Toe Stabilizer kit was installed, but for now I only have a stock rear sway bar. I'm concerned the Shine bar broke the rear axle, since the break seems to be around the mounting point for it. I would really appreciate some advice on what to do for a rear sway bar. With the toe kit installed, would it be safe to put the shine bar back on? What caused this?

Please help.

[Chris16vRocco]

It's not the first time this has happened…

http://forums.vwvortex.com/showthrea...-the-Yellow-75



If I were you, I'd get a Neuspeed or EuroSport swaybar, or any other brand that mounts like the factory ones do. Well, they typically mount to the lower shock bolts rather than being clamped to the beam like the original bars. But they don't localize the torsional forces of the beam to the distance between the ends of the beam and the mounting bolts like the Shine bar.

[Mtl-Marc]

Paging cholland...

[BluDemon]

With rust in the crack it looks like it's been cracked for a while right where you drilled the mounting holes. That sucks.

[crazyaboutrocs]

I'm concerned the Shine bar broke the rear axle, since the break seems to be around the mounting point for it.

Damn, another one?

[ginster86roc]

It's not the first time this has happened…

what ^he^ said....

[TheTimob]

That part of the suspension is designed to twist. It will twist more than you expect. Even without holes drilled into it, those welds see a LOT of stress.

Think about drilling a similar hole into a coil spring, and you can see how this has happened.

[cholland_]

Well, I guess now all those people who blamed the car and not the bar, and complained about me trying to soil Dick Shine's name can officially shove it.

OP, read those first couple pages of the link Chris posted. I don't really have anything else to say about it, but if you have any questions feel free to ask.

[AutoX Matt]

It's not the first time this has happened…

http://forums.vwvortex.com/showthrea...-the-Yellow-75



If I were you, I'd get a Neuspeed or EuroSport swaybar, or any other brand that mounts like the factory ones do. Well, they typically mount to the lower shock bolts rather than being clamped to the beam like the original bars. But they don't localize the torsional forces of the beam to the distance between the ends of the beam and the mounting bolts like the Shine bar.

Thank you. That thread was very helpful. I searched the forum for "shine racing" but didn't think to try "srs". In the thread some people asked questions about the installation of the bar on cholland's roc. Mine was installed the summer of 2010 by the Bosch certified shop that has been keeping my roc running since I bought it in 1998. In the time I've owned the car the only damage it has sustained is light front-end body damage. I like to think I take pretty good care of it.

Regarding a new rear sway bar: I was surprised to not find any on the Neuspeed, Eurosport, and GermanAutoParts sites. Is Autotech the only company still offering them? Are the Autotech ones good? Do they have issues? I hope my toe stabilizer kit won't interfere with it.

[punchbug]

What he said...(by he, I mean cholland)

[polov8]

Dumbest design of rear sway bar I've ever seen. Anyone who has one of these fitted is living on borrowed time.

[BluDemon]

Dumbest design of rear sway bar I've ever seen. Anyone who has one of these fitted is living on borrowed time.

Heck have you ever seen the mk4 rear bar mount from them ...... you have to drill four 3/8-1/2 holes through your beam to mount the bar. It's just asking to be cracked in half.

[polov8]

There's no way I'd trust any product from someone who clearly has no understanding of how the STOCK parts on the car work.

[16VScirrocco88]

Heck have you ever seen the mk4 rear bar mount from them ...... you have to drill four 3/8-1/2 holes through your beam to mount the bar. It's just asking to be cracked in half.

friends MKIV rear beam

[Doug T]

A few things need to be understood.

1) The Shine rear sway bar is a good performance design as far as a rear sway bar goes. The Shine rear bar stiffens the rear beam instead of fasting the trailing arm ends (at the shocks) together. The Shine bar concept is one of the best solutions if you want a stiffer rear beam.

2) The Shine rear bar is not a good bar for longevity just like many other high performance aftermarket parts. The A1 rear beam was not designed to have stress points added nor an alternate twist / push brace. If you insist on using the Shine rear sway bar you need to consider your beam as a serviceable maintenance item. Very high performance race cars have a life expediency as does a Shine rear sway and A1 rear beam assembly.

3) Matt you don't need a rear sway bar at all. If you really think you do use a stock 16V rear sway bar that does not go all the way to the trailing arm ends. I have a Neuspeed and Autotech rear sway bar and both of them work very well but for Auto-x they are terrible. Rear sway bars such as the Neuspeed and Autotech induce snap over-steer. Auto-x is a series of harsh transitions and the rear bar needs to twist to maintain rear wheel traction and prevent harsh snap over-steer. Road races will tell you that front wheel drive cars under-steer and the only way to prevent it is to add a big rear bar. The truth is you don't need a rear bar at all unless you are running bone stock with stock springs.

[polov8]

A few things need to be understood.

1) The Shine rear sway bar is a good performance design as far as a rear sway bar goes. The Shine rear bar stiffens the rear beam instead of fasting the trailing arm ends (at the shocks) together. The Shine bar concept is one of the best solutions if you want a stiffer rear beam.

Are you on crack? Are you sponsored by Shine? It might stiffen the rear beam, but to do so it requires 4 holes to be drilled through a vital part of the cars suspension. These now weakened parts are now the prime points fr a rear beam failure WITHOUT the sway bar being fitted, but the idiotic design of the sway bar puts the ENTIRE twisting force of the rear axle directly into the two weakened points of the axle, meaning it's a case of when, not if, the rear beam fails. I've never seen another design of sway bar that inherently weakens and ultimately destroys a vital part of the cars suspension.

2) The Shine rear bar is not a good bar for longevity just like many other high performance aftermarket parts. The A1 rear beam was not designed to have stress points added nor an alternate twist / push brace. If you insist on using the Shine rear sway bar you need to consider your beam as a serviceable maintenance item. Very high performance race cars have a life expediency as does a Shine rear sway and A1 rear beam assembly.

Name another performance add-on that tries to destroy vital pieces of the vehicles suspension, and cannot be compensated for in chassis bracing or other strengthening? The two failures I've seen on this forum have not been race cars, they've been road cars, and failures are not just putting your life at risk, they're jeapardizing the safety of other road users.

[Doug T]

Are you on crack? Are you sponsored by Shine? It might stiffen the rear beam, but to do so it requires 4 holes to be drilled through a vital part of the cars suspension. These now weakened parts are now the prime points fr a rear beam failure WITHOUT the sway bar being fitted, but the idiotic design of the sway bar puts the ENTIRE twisting force of the rear axle directly into the two weakened points of the axle, meaning it's a case of when, not if, the rear beam fails. I've never seen another design of sway bar that inherently weakens and ultimately destroys a vital part of the cars suspension.



Name another performance add-on that tries to destroy vital pieces of the vehicles suspension, and cannot be compensated for in chassis bracing or other strengthening? The two failures I've seen on this forum have not been race cars, they've been road cars, and failures are not just putting your life at risk, they're jeapardizing the safety of other road users.

When winning a race is more important that your car's longevity (you drive like Mario Andretti i.e. win or die trying) the Shine bar is good. A race car is NOT a street car. A race car is used on the track only. It does not run that many miles. A race car is rebuilt more than a street car.

[AutoX Matt]

3) Matt you don't need a rear sway bar at all. If you really think you do use a stock 16V rear sway bar that does not go all the way to the trailing arm ends. I have a Neuspeed and Autotech rear sway bar and both of them work very well but for Auto-x they are terrible. Rear sway bars such as the Neuspeed and Autotech induce snap over-steer. Auto-x is a series of harsh transitions and the rear bar needs to twist to maintain rear wheel traction and prevent harsh snap over-steer. Road races will tell you that front wheel drive cars under-steer and the only way to prevent it is to add a big rear bar. The truth is you don't need a rear bar at all unless you are running bone stock with stock springs.

I've pretty much decided the shine bar is not going back on. I'm looking for a good autocross setup that is still viable as an occasional daily driver. As of this moment I have shine real street front and rear springs, no front sway bar, a stock 16V rear sway bar, an SCCH rear toe-control kit, Boge Pro-Gas shocks, 205/50-15 Yokohama AD08s on 15x7s, neuspeed upper front tie bar, autotech upper rear tie bar, polyurethane front control arm bushings, and poly rear axle beam mounts. I have poly upper rear shock mounts & GoKraut's front cross member brace waiting to be installed. What do you (and anyone else) suggest I do from here? Sounds like you're suggesting I keep the suspension as it is? I have been having occasional sudden spins the last few events. I also could use front alignment advice. I'm currently at -1.1 front carmber and +0.40 front toe. I honestly can't figure out who decided on those settings. I think I want to keep the camber but go to -0.25 front toe. Advice please.

Thank you very much everyone who has contributed so far. You are very helpful.

[cholland_]

I've pretty much decided the shine bar is not going back on.

When my axle broke and I posted about it. I had a million people send me PM's on this forum offering me literally hundreds of dollars for it. In light of the fact that it very nearly killed me, instead of taking the money, I took a sawzall to it making sure it doesn't happen to anybody else again.

Excuse my language, but **** Dick Shine.

[Chris16vRocco]

The name Dick Shine alone is worth a few immature chuckles.

[scirocco*joe]

The name Dick Shine alone is worth a few immature chuckles.

I always have fun making my Dick Shine.

[echassin]

I'm sure this bar has been on many a winning race car, but IMO to emphasize that and brush off potential beam failures as "what it takes to win" misses an important point:

There are superior ways to anchor the bar that can make the rear beam equally stiff without weakening the beam, and without excess cost or complexity.

Therefore, the Dickshine design is inferior and there's no excuse for it.

[Rocco_julie]

A better design would be to weld attachment points to the rear arm and attach that bar to those. Any hole drilled in a metal causes weak spots, allowing flex (over time) to cause the cracks at the weakest points.

The original design is fine for most drivers and have lasted many millions of miles in 10's of thousands of cars.

As Doug says, race cars are constantly being worked on and monitored by the mechs. The mechanical advantage is worth the price, if the races are won. That alone, out weighs the cost of a new swing arm.

For a majority of us, some of these performance parts add stresses to the mechanical systems that we dont notice till failure.

And again, for a majority of us, these parts are really not nessisary and installed primarily for penile support.
(Again with the Hal comments...)

[OorsciroccO]

I love reading some of Dick's rants:

"There is no real reason to lower most cars except peer pressure from knuckle draggers!"

'Dem be fightin' werds - eh Randy?

"There is no intrinsic reason to use a coilover suspension."

I can think of several intrinsic reasons.

"On VW'S the firewall does a great job of holding everything together and needs no help!Most (strut braces) turn every day maintenance jobs into a chore."

Disagree. Big time. Our unibodies are noodles, and need all of the help they can get. Good thing that racing forces the use of a roll cage, otherwise Dickshine would say those are a waste too. I bet a conversation with Dickshine would be pretty much a one way conversation.

[Doug T]

Are you on crack? Are you sponsored by Shine? It might stiffen the rear beam, but to do so it requires 4 holes to be drilled through a vital part of the cars suspension. These now weakened parts are now the prime points fr a rear beam failure WITHOUT the sway bar being fitted, but the idiotic design of the sway bar puts the ENTIRE twisting force of the rear axle directly into the two weakened points of the axle, meaning it's a case of when, not if, the rear beam fails. I've never seen another design of sway bar that inherently weakens and ultimately destroys a vital part of the cars suspension.



Name another performance add-on that tries to destroy vital pieces of the vehicles suspension, and cannot be compensated for in chassis bracing or other strengthening? The two failures I've seen on this forum have not been race cars, they've been road cars, and failures are not just putting your life at risk, they're jeapardizing the safety of other road users.

I personally don’t use and most likely will never use the Shine rear sway bar because I don’t need or value the BRB setup for my racing or street driving application. I understand the advantage of using it however and it does work for some racing applications. I think the Shine rear sway bar is completely inappropriate and unnecessary for use on a street driven passenger A1 chassis car. Just because you (passenger car drivers / builders) don’t like the race solution for your street driven car does not make the race application / solution invalid for the class of racing it was designed for.

Please understand that most people don’t have race cars. Passenger cars can be modified within the local and federal laws. Understand that RACE cars are built to RACING RULES. If you are not building a car to racing rules you are not building a race car at all. Rules restrict modifications and often times racers will try to get the desired performance advantage with compromised solutions that are legal for the racing class. Rules are worded to say, “Holes can be drilled to allow mounting of a single sway bar but no other modification other than the bracket holes are allowed to the stock car part.” Even if you wanted to and were capable of fabricating an entirely new rear suspension system the racing rules would most likely prevent you from using it.

It is not uncommon for high performance alterations or aftermarket products to cause serious damage to other parts of a car. Perhaps many aftermarket products are not designed as well as they could be but often racers are attempting to make the car do something it was never intended to do in stock trim. I have seen many sway bars bind and break brackets and even separate the welded flanges for control arms on other cars. The binding of sway bars can help some cars perform better under some conditions such as getting a car to corner flat with soft stock springs and stiff aftermarket shocks. Why use the wrong springs for the job? Some racing rules prevent upgrading springs but do not prevent upgrading shocks and a single sway bar. That is just one example and rules will vary.

Mazdas are known to break stock cams if the rev limiter’s RPM is increased. It is not uncommon for LSD differentials, half shafts or wheel bearings to fail as a result of tire upgrades and suspension or ride height modifications. Offset bushings and geometry alterations can make CVs and sway bar brackets fail. I have seen cross drilled brake rotors fail that were used to reduce un-sprung weight. I have seen wheels fail on cars that won races weeks earlier. We are having conversations about Fiat 500s with better griping tires flipping over on some other message boards. Just changing tires on some cars can cause unwanted consequences.

Racers are taking risks for performance gains in many cases. The racing rules force or encourage the racers to take the risks. As soon as one driver gets the advantage the new standard is set so all drivers must consider taking the new risk. When you are forcing a car to over perform outside of its natural limits or change the way it works to increase track speed you may see an increase of other parts of the car failing. When you are attempting to compete with cars that have independent rear suspension and your car does not have independent suspension you may have the desire to use parts that help solve your problem (but may cause other components to fail). If you don’t need that much performance and you don’t need to skate around racing rules please don’t use aftermarket parts that are known to cause failure to other parts.

If you use parts that are intended for racing and the parts fail don’t blame the supplier unless they told you that it would not fail under any circumstances. Good suppliers will often try to warn you if they know your application is not appropriate but I say you have to take full responsibility for all the modifications on your car and you and you alone are taking the risk. Shifting the risk and blame to the suppliers (when the user is to blame) does not help the community and keep suppliers shelves stocked with performance A1 parts. It is unfortunate that some rear beams have failed and I think it is a good idea to warn others but do it in a way that puts the facts on the table. Some people are having great experiences winning races with the Sine rear bar. It works when used appropriately. Not every product is appropriate for every application.

[VWsEatRice]

The name Dick Shine alone is worth a few immature chuckles.

he should get an honorable mention

http://philly.sportscolumn.com/showthread.php?t=14232

SFC’s Top Ten Unfortunate Names in Sports

Posted on March 8, 2011 by Pete D
by Pete D (special props to Chris Turner for submitting the topic)
Parents often get too caught up trying to give their children a unique name. This usually ends up with a bunch of parents picking that same “unique” name at the same time, rendering the whole exercise a huge waste of time. Then there are these poor bastards.


Honorable Mention
Dick Butkus – He was awesome, but his name isn’t.

10. Misty Hyman – Her parents must have smoked up before pulling this name out of the hat.



9. Yoshie Take****a – Just make sure you light a match and flush please.



8. Craphonso Thorpe – Sometimes combining two names into one first name is not such a good idea.



7. Milton Bradley – Talk about tarnishing a celebrated name.



6. Coco Crisp – Cereal is not that cool.



5. Ron Tugnutt - Ouch.



4. Karen Cockburn - Enter at your own risk (rubbers not included)



3. Dick Pole – You’re my hero.



2.Rusty Kuntz – I’m sure it’s not pronounced Cun…



1. Dick Trickle – He should be the spokesperson for Depends.

[CALAWAYMK2]

Well, let's see what Reeves Callaway did to stiffen up that beam.



Simple, he welded a big ass bar to the beam.

[chois]

There are some other ways to stiffen the rear beam without poking holes in it. I replaced the rubber bushings with delerin. This forces the beam to twist about the bushing axes, rather than the middle of the beam section. I also added an autotech/neuspeed style rear bar, and run a GLI front bar (the biggest stock A2 option). Now I am not autocrossing, so I may not have the same perspective as you folks, but I have not found that a rear bar induces "snap" oversteer (though drivers certainly can make that mistake more dramatically with one).

There are some alternate schools of thought that getting good rotation can be done by softening the rear beam bushings - see Mike Ogren's fwd VW racing guide for more info.

[AutoX Matt]

There are some other ways to stiffen the rear beam without poking holes in it. I replaced the rubber bushings with delerin. This forces the beam to twist about the bushing axes, rather than the middle of the beam section. I also added an autotech/neuspeed style rear bar, and run a GLI front bar (the biggest stock A2 option). Now I am not autocrossing, so I may not have the same perspective as you folks, but I have not found that a rear bar induces "snap" oversteer (though drivers certainly can make that mistake more dramatically with one).

There are some alternate schools of thought that getting good rotation can be done by softening the rear beam bushings - see Mike Ogren's fwd VW racing guide for more info.

How do Delerin bushings differ from poly ones? Where do I find them?

[suki101]

When winning a race is more important that your car's longevity (you drive like Mario Andretti i.e. win or die trying) the Shine bar is good. A race car is NOT a street car. A race car is used on the track only. It does not run that many miles. A race car is rebuilt more than a street car.

This is true; whether you like the design or not, the SRS bar is not intended for street use. I know many racers that run this bar on rabbits, sciroccos, golf.....and have never had this issue. For me I would never run one on my street car because it's overkill and it does put more stress on the beam. I have toyed with putting a similar type of bar on my '75 but I think I'd rather weld it to the beam and not drill holes.

[AutoX Matt]

This is true; whether you like the design or not, the SRS bar is not intended for street use. I know many racers that run this bar on rabbits, sciroccos, golf.....and have never had this issue. For me I would never run one on my street car because it's overkill and it does put more stress on the beam. I have toyed with putting a similar type of bar on my '75 but I think I'd rather weld it to the beam and not drill holes.

The only problem is they marketed it as part of their "real street" suspension. They should market it as a race only part and warn anyone who wants to use it on a street car that it may damage the axle over time.

I agree that it definitely does work. (For awhile )

[chois]

How do Delerin bushings differ from poly ones? Where do I find them?

It is a stiffer material than poly. I don't know exactly who offers them, but a few racing focused vendors have had them in years past. They should be fairly straightforward to make if you have access to a lathe or a shop with one.