Fitting a Whiteline Rear Sway Bar to a Ford Fiesta Mk.6 By Chris

Fitting a Whiteline Rear Sway Bar to a Ford Fiesta Mk.6
By Chris Navarro
So, you’ve decided to improve your car’s handling and purchased a rear sway bar (RSB). Congratulations, this is one of the easiest and
most effective modifications you can do to help achieve your goal.
Whiteline (www.whiteline.com.au) make a sway bar in two sizes (22mm and 24mm) for the WP/WQ Fiesta.
The 22mm RSB pictured here is more suitable for street-driven cars like mine, while track cars would benefit more from the stiffer
24mm bar.
The Whiteline kit contains all the hardware you need (but not the Stanley knife - that's mine!), plus 2 extra bolts and a little packet of
what appears to be thread lock (which I didn’t use). The instructions are clearly illustrated, but there's not much descriptive text.
The installation can be done with the car on the ground, but a big bloke like me needs more room to move so I borrowed a pair of
ramps from a mate. You can use jack stands, but you'll need to put them under the rear trailing arms to keep the springs compressed.
Keep the rear beam clear and don't forget to use chocks on the front wheels.
These clamps fit perfectly on the rear beam. If your car is ABS-equipped, you'll need to be careful not to trap any cables or hoses under
the clamp.
The yellow polyurethane D-bushes slip easily onto the sway bar. Getting the metal D-bush bracket onto the threaded ends of the clamp
was much harder. It took a little perseverance and a lot of elbow grease, but I managed it in the end.
My wife's old yoga mat made a comfortable surface on which to lie. Leave the nuts loose at this point.
The bolt at the bottom of the gas strut needs to be undone, which is why the springs need to be compressed by the car's weight. Using
a steel bar over the end of the socket wrench (lengthening the handle) allows you to exert a lot more torque on the bolt. Once
extracted, slip the drop link bracket on the bolt and screw it back in tightly.
The completed left-side drop link. I hadn't tightened the nuts at this point - I waited until the car was on level ground.
Both drop links attached to the sway bar. A detailed diagram for the washers and bushes is included on the instruction sheet.
Off the ramps and back on level ground, I finally tightened all the nuts. Don’t be an idiot like me and forget to remove the front wheel
chocks before trying to drive off the ramps!
All done! The job took me about 90 minutes, but skinny guys with better tools could probably do it in less than an hour. The hardest
part was getting the D-bush brackets onto the rear beam clamps. If desired, the excess length on the clamps can be cut off with an
angle grinder or hacksaw. Note: the photos on this page show that the drop links are too low. You’ll need to raise them as far as
they’ll go for better ground clearance.
Now take your car for a test drive (preferably through some twisties) and enjoy the immediate benefits of your new RSB. Good luck
and drive safe!