I raced a 1200 coupe for a year and a half. There were two other people also racing coupes at the same time as me, both with different powerplants. I had a hot 1200, one had a very hot 1400 and the other ran a 4age. All of us ran uprated rear springs and good shocks, nothing more. Im now putting a hot 4agze into my two door sedan and Ive been looking around for trick rear suspention to get the power to the ground and very few (infact almost no one) seem to be running panhard rods, anti tramp bars, swaybars or any other links. WHY? is it just because the cars so light it doesnt need much controling? Or are there only a few people who see the importance of a well located rear end?

I personally like the idea of a panhard rod, if not for only lowering the rear roll center a bit. Although that would only be an issue if you had changed the front roll center. Unfortunately it's all theoretical as i don't have a race car.
People are split on whether it is worth it or not i would say there are just as many people for and against a panhard so i guess it comes down to you.
it's been said if you have a number of locating holes in your panhard brackets so you can set up your panhard at different heights then you can adjust your rear roll center.
If i had a race car i would want all the adjustability i could have so by using the above you have another degree of adjustment
could be worth investigating some more.

Nick

Just ring John Taylor in Sydney set of konis and his special springs is all you need...no sway or panhard and the rear will be a giant killer.

I saw the springs and shocks on this site they looked real nice and I can see how they would help with axle tramp by having the half spring but how do they stop sideways movement? Surely you would still need a panhard. Has anyone gone to coil-overs in the rear of a sedan?

Quin I run the Nismo rear spring , anti tramp rods and anti roll bar. Because I run treaded tires the panhard rod doesn't seem to be an issue. When I put super soft formula ford slicks on the car for Autocross (gymkhana) then it started to be an issue , as I don't run those anymore I haven't worried about it. I run some track days as well and with the current set-up I'm glued to the back bumpers of Lotus Elises in corners.
I have noticed a differance before and after the tramp rod on rippled pavement but not sure if it's enough write home about.

Tom

I've gone to coilovers on a 1200 sedan.

Not gone too far with tuning the setup just yet. I'm currently in the planning stages of adopting the Ford Falcon's watts linkage to suit.

With 205/60x14 (perfectly centralised in wheel arch, I had to run a shortened AE86 Panhard rod.

With my current panhard rod setup, I still get some sideways movement as the diff swings through an arc, this results on slight rubbing on the inner guard at full bump, but I am running 205/55x15 these days.

I'm the only person I know with coilovers on a Sedan. I've seen it done on a couple of utes, where the flat underside means you can do almost anything...even go to IRS (But not seen anyone do that yet).

Nope with Johns springs and decent shocks panhard is not required.

even with slicks Craig? I'm going to try running on slicks this year but the two things I'm worried about are the tyres trying to rip the diff out of the car and the standard sump letting all the oil run away from the pickup... trial and error I guess but possibly quite expensive errors....

You should be ok on both counts Morgan. Std sump is ok and slicks will be ok with rear setup you have.
Only super high revving A series sprint cars which only turn left need sump modification and that is dry sump.

thanks guys I dont want to have stuff on my car just for the sake of saying 'I run a panhard' But I ran treaded tires (Toyo RA1s) on the track and in hard cornering I noticed the axle moving side-to-side quite a bit, that was with 13x5.5s running 185x60x13s and Im going to be running 205 so I need a panhard. Hey Rallytwit how much difference did you find the anti-role bar made? do you run an lsd? I want to be able to do a few trackdays and Im becoming very interested in drag racing so a few runs down the strip will be had. I know a few of the escort guys deleaf the rear and run one strong leaf to cut down on weight.