As many of you know, I came upon a design problem with the Addco front sway bar #509, which is for the front of the pre 2003 Crown Vic and Grand Marquis. After long discussions with Trey at Addco, they agreed to redesign the sway bar. After 4 months, and much trial and error, I was the first to receive the newly designed 509 Addco bar and have installed it. I must say I am VERY impressed. The redesign is excellent, and the fit was perfect. The initial flaw with the original bar was that the pivot point on the bar was designed so that it would make contact with the vehicle frame, and ended up bending the sway bar mounts. This was a safety concern, thus the redesign in the sway bar. The newly designed bar is about 2 inches longer, which moved the pivot point outside the frame. Now there is no way that the bar can come in contact with the frame. I installed the new bar in less than an hour, and immediately took it through our pursuit course. The performance was identical to the other bar, except there was no "bottoming out" of the bar on the frame during suspension travel.

Kudos to Trey and Addco Performance for their genuine concern for their product and customers, and fixing a problem that was brought to their attention. I am very happy with the end result, and will be happy to be used as a reference for the company. If anyone would like to drive my vehicle to compare the performance difference, feel free to contact me, and I will be happy to set it up. To all of those who contacted me about the bar, your new bar is on the way. Believe me, you will enjoy it!

Below are some pics of the Old vs New bars. Email me at troup1993@aol.com with any questions or comments.

The new bar on top:


The new bar installed, note the pivot point is moved outside the frame:


The old 509 bar, note the pivot point would hit the frame:


This angle shows where the bar rubbed my frame: