Calling All Dinan Strut Brace Owners

[chefwong]

Love to hear some feedback on it.

Kinda going over the spring mods list and so far, I do plan to go with the ACS suspension kit. I've been debating about the camber plates and with tires at $300 each.......& my driving style, I've opted not for it.

Strut Brace may be a ++++++.
Love to hear some feedback!

[X5Jay]

WRT to the camber plates, I believe it's supposed to help even out your tire wear, especially if you drive aggressively. Are your front tires noticeably wearing more on the outer edges now? If so, then the camber plates will probably do you good, especially in combination w/the strut brace. I don't have experience with either, but this is what I've read. It'll sure be interesting to hear from the folks who do have them though!

[hayaku]

correct, the camber is not what kills your tires, its bad toe.

remember, the rear is at -4 degrees stock. so changing the front from -2 degrees to -2.8 is not a big deal.

in regards to the strut brace, the hinged design is not ideal. dinan uses the hinged design. it covers about 80% of what a strut brace is supposed to do, but its not ideal... i don't know who else makes a strut brace for the x5, but look for something like the strongstrut design. afterall, if you are going to do it, i say do it right...

[vinuneuro]

I agree about the hinged design of the Dinan bar. How hard would it be to get a strut-bar custom CNC machined?

Since the X5 structure is already extremely stiff, wouldn't sway bars, more specifically rear sway bars be a better investment? One would think that this would reduce body roll significantly without affecting ride quality.

[hayaku]

well... a strut bar doesn't reduce body roll... stiffer springs and sway bars do that.

a strut bar keeps the strut towers from moving independently of each other. specifically moving outwards from each other (thats why the dinan bar is ok in this case). but when each side moves up and down independently, a hinged bar doesn't stop that. plus with the forward/backward lateral motion of each side is not constrained like it should be as there is play in the hinge and forces would eventual wear that out and break it down...

[01X54.4]

I am not a good mechanic at all. I don't even fully understand the purpose of "oil separator" next to the intake manifold. I was very happy with Dinan struct tower brace, for I felt the car more in control when I turn. I could feel the difference after I installed it. The feeling was similar to switching my sport steering wheel to M wheel.

[AlpineMsix]

i love my strut bar. It made a pretty big difference.
And it also looks good!


here is the link :Dinan strut Brace installed!!

[DinanX5]

Originally Posted by chefwong

Love to hear some feedback on it.

Kinda going over the spring mods list and so far, I do plan to go with the ACS suspension kit. I've been debating about the camber plates and with tires at $300 each.......& my driving style, I've opted not for it.

Strut Brace may be a ++++++.
Love to hear some feedback!

I agree on the strut brace. I've been very happy with mine. And in my opinion the Dinan brace does exactly what you want it to do on an SAV (let's face it, we're not talking about a track car here - we're talking about a street vehicle, and in my case, one that sees some very light off-road duty sometimes So you don't want things buttoned-down too tight.)
And sorry to sound like a broken record to those that frequent threads on this topic, but camber plates are absolutely the BEST handling improvement you can do with no drawbacks whatsoever in my experience. Steering and grip are vastly improved, and my tire wear has been perfectly even since I had them installed almost 10,000 miles ago.

[DINANM3]

Yea The strut bar and camber plates are my next mod. Probably within a few weeks i will let every one know what i think abou the mods. I just installed the underride gaurd and full aero body kit last week. I love that and i already had the dinan exhaust back in august. So i cant wait to do this next month

[chefwong]

This forum get's more traffic but check out the group buy forums if anyone's interested. I've got a group buy going on for a strut brace at a pricepoint 33% less than the Dinan version

http://www.xoutpost.com/group-buys/87...-stut-bar.html