Mazdaspeed 3 Bushings & Sway Bar Upgrades
This is Part 1 in our 3 Part series in our Suspension Guide for the Mazdaspeed 3. We will be discussing the importance of upgrading your suspension components, exploring suspension upgrades & options for your needs, and an installation guide on installing your coilovers.
Our cars are getting older each year, and this is the best time to upgrade your suspension components, especially your bushings, as they can wear out due to age, exposure to elements, and the stresses of driving. One of the most common signs of worn bushings is clunky noises, a harsh ride, and instability in handling. It's essential to inspect and replace worn bushings promptly to maintain optimal suspension performance and ensure safety on the road.
Our cars are getting older each year, and this is the best time to upgrade your suspension components, especially your bushings, as they can wear out due to age, exposure to elements, and the stresses of driving. One of the most common signs of worn bushings is clunky noises, a harsh ride, and instability in handling. It's essential to inspect and replace worn bushings promptly to maintain optimal suspension performance and ensure safety on the road.
That's why we here at Damond Motorsports offer a vast bushing selection of Powerflex Suspension bushings. First, let's talk about bushings and their role in one of the suspension systems we've discussed.
Why upgrade your ''Bushings''?
Bushings are an extremely important component of a vehicle's suspension system that serve as a pivot point for control arms and other components. They're also intended to absorb road noises, bumps, and vibrations while providing flexibility for movement when going through those tight corners.
OEM bushings are commonly made from a rubber compound which deteriorates with age. Over time, rubber can become weaker due to lots of stress from daily driving, excessive heat, and of course, movement. They become softer, brittle, and dry out, allowing more movement in some of the suspension components, which leads to less control, excessive tire wear, brake instability, and poor handling.
Replacing your old worn out rubber bushings with high quality polyurethane bushings, like the offerings from Poweflex Suspension, will net some drastic improvements in handling, and help restore the driving feel of your vehicle. Here's why we at Damond Motorsports choose Powerflex Suspension.
Powerflex is one of the leading manufacturers of polyurethane bushings and they offer high quality polyurethane bushings for control arms, sway bars, camber arms, toe arms, trailing arms, along with other suspension and drivetrain components. We've been running Powerflex bushings on pretty much all of our vehicles for a lot of reasons, but mainly because of the quality that they offer over other bushings.
First, the polyurethane bushings that Powerflex Suspension makes are generally 25-30% stiffer than OE, but with similar NVH absorbing properties. This helps keep your alignment in check and NVH minimal. Polyurethane bushings are more resistant to wear, and deterioration compared to rubber bushings. They are less prone to degradation from heat, oils, chemicals, and environmental factors, ensuring longer service life and consistent performance over time.
Second, improvement in responsiveness. Powerflex polyurethane bushings offer greater stiffness and responsiveness compared to rubber bushings. They provide better control over suspension movement, reducing flex during cornering, braking, and acceleration. This results in improved steering precision, handling, and overall vehicle responsiveness while still delivering minimal noises & vibrations making the car ride smoothly on the road.
One of the most underrated bushings that a car enthusiast must upgrade are Anti-Lift Kits. Let's discuss why it's important to upgrade them.
The Powerflex Suspension Anti-Lift Kit (ALK for short) is designed to enhance the performance and handling characteristics of the Mazdaspeed 3. Essentially, the ALK addresses a common issue known as lift which occurs during hard acceleration.
When a vehicle accelerates forcefully, the weight shifts to the rear, causing the front end to lift slightly. This occurrence, can lead to reduced traction and stability, especially during spirited driving or track use. The Powerflex ALK is engineered to counteract this by modifying the front suspension geometry to help reduce lift.
The kit typically includes upgraded bushings made of polyurethane in a machined aluminum bushing housing. These kits replace the factory fluid-filled rubber bushings and bushing housings in the front control arms. By installing one of these ALKs, the rear part of the control arms are positioned lower. Thus altering the angles of the control arms, effectively reducing the amount of front-end lift experienced during acceleration.
With less "Front-end Lift", the vehicle maintains better traction and stability, allowing for improved control and responsiveness, particularly in high-performance driving scenarios, and less torque steer. Additionally, the use of polyurethane bushings ensures longevity and reliability, even under demanding conditions. This kit also provides a decent gain of positive caster, which has benefits in itself, which we'll be coving later in the blog series.
Installation of the Powerflex Suspension ALK is relatively straightforward, as it's designed to directly replace the original components without the need for extensive modifications. This makes it accessible to enthusiasts of various skill levels, however professional installation is strongly recommended.
Overall, the Powerflex Suspension Anti-Lift Kit is a valuable upgrade for Mazdaspeed 3 owners seeking to enhance their driving experience by minimizing front-end lift and optimizing traction and stability, ultimately resulting in improved performance and handling characteristics.
If you’re interested in purchasing the Powerflex Suspension ALK but don't want to deal with the hassle of swapping the bushings yourself, we offer a service to rebuild your suspension arms if you wish to send them to us. Contact us at Damond Motorsports for further details.
Other suspension components that you might want to consider replacing your old worn OEM bushings with polyurethane ones are the Rear Camber Arms, Rear Toe Arms, & Rear Trailing Arms.
Camber & Toe adjustment plays a significant role in fine-tuning the vehicle's handling characteristics, particularly for spirited driving or track use.
Your old OEM bushings can lead to vibrations, poor handling, steering, and driving feel over time from excessive wear. It's like a mushy feel that makes the car unstable, especially at the limit.
If you’re interested in purchasing the Powerflex Suspension ALK but don't want to deal with the hassle of swapping the bushings yourself, we offer a service to rebuild your suspension arms if you wish to send them to us. Contact us at Damond Motorsports for further details.
Other suspension components that you might want to consider replacing your old worn OEM bushings with polyurethane ones are the Rear Camber Arms, Rear Toe Arms, & Rear Trailing Arms.
Camber & Toe adjustment plays a significant role in fine-tuning the vehicle's handling characteristics, particularly for spirited driving or track use.
Your old OEM bushings can lead to vibrations, poor handling, steering, and driving feel over time from excessive wear. It's like a mushy feel that makes the car unstable, especially at the limit.
Replacing these bushings with Powerflex Suspension bushings gives the car a more precise alignment and improved cornering performance. This makes the car feel solid and have less tire wear, which is extremely good for your safety when replacing your old bushings with new Powerflex Suspension bushings.
After installing the bushings on our cars from Powerflex, our cars feel way more planted as you're driving on the road with those tight corners and aggressive acceleration. Yet when driving normally, the car drives like a brand-new car, and it feels comfortable to drive with no excessive noises whatsoever.
Replacing your trailing arm bushings is very common because they wear out quicker than most of the other bushings on the car. These bushings tend to help a lot with rear-end stability, especially at higher speeds. These bushings are extremely underrated, and it's one of the best investments you can install to optimize performance and comfort while enhancing handling.
We highly recommend that you replace your bushings with Powerflex, as they offer superior bushings for most suspension components, and they even offer a Lifetime Warranty.
In conclusion, if you want to make your Mazdaspeed 3 drive like a new car again, improve tire wear, improve fuel efficiency, and have a safer vehicle, with no clunky noises and enhanced handling, check out our bushings as we provide them from Powerflex Suspension here at Damond Motorsports.
What are Sway Bars ?
Sway Bars are designed to reduce body roll and improve stability during cornering. These bars connect the left and right sides of the suspension and work by resisting the rolling motion of the vehicle when it enters a turn, effectively minimizing body lean and keeping the vehicle more level and stable through corners.
What role do Sway Bars play ?
By transferring force from one side of the suspension to the other, sway bars help maintain even weight distribution across all four wheels, maximizing grip and traction. This enhances cornering ability, reduces the risk of understeer or oversteer, and improves overall stability and control, especially during aggressive driving maneuvers.
Why upgrade your Sway Bars ?
Sometimes, the sway bars in a car are not as strong as they could be, and cars need a little extra help to stay balanced, especially if you like zooming fast and taking those tight corners quickly like a race car driver! Upgrading your sway bars with special ones that are stronger and stiffer can make your car even better at staying balanced. This can make driving more fun and safer too. It's like giving your car superhero powers to handle corners like a pro!
So, by upgrading your sway bars, there will be an increase in stiffness that provides greater resistance to body roll, thus improving handling. Most aftermarket sway bars offer adjustability, giving the driver the option to set their settings between soft for daily driving or harsh for track use and precise cornering. It's pretty much like giving the car a different type of character, which allows them to have a different type of driving experience and performance.
So, by upgrading your sway bars, there will be an increase in stiffness that provides greater resistance to body roll, thus improving handling. Most aftermarket sway bars offer adjustability, giving the driver the option to set their settings between soft for daily driving or harsh for track use and precise cornering. It's pretty much like giving the car a different type of character, which allows them to have a different type of driving experience and performance.
What brands offer upgraded Sway Bars ?
We at Damond Motorsports are now offering Whiteline sway bars as they are a reputable company and known for producing aftermarket suspension components and performance upgrades for vehicles. The company specializes in sway bars, suspension bushings, alignment products, and chassis bracing systems.
Whiteline's products are designed to enhance the handling, stability, and overall performance of vehicles, making them popular among automotive enthusiasts, racers, and drivers seeking to optimize their vehicle's suspension setup.
Now for those who don't want to spend a lot of money on sway bars, we also offer bushings from Powerflex Suspension to replace your stock sway bar bushings for your vehicle if they are worn out from deterioration. Installing sway bars can be tricky, especially the front sway bar, as you will need to drop the entire subframe in order to replace the front sway bar with an upgraded one.
By replacing your front sway bar bushings alone, you can install them without dropping the subframe and takes less effort to do so. By removing the control arms, the studs of the control arms are now out of the way not blocking the nuts of the sway bar bushings bracket and can be easily done.
Overall, if you want to replace those worn bushings to eliminate those clunky noises and sloppy handling, explore the Powerflex Suspension front sway bar bushings.
Check out our Powerflex Suspension rear sway bar bushings.
And if you want to replace your sway bar, we recommend an upgraded sway bar from Whiteline for a stiffer and more responsive steering feel.
Check out our Mazdaspeed 3 Suspension & Coilover Upgrades Part 2
Blog written by Ahmad Almoghraby
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