The PAD Rear Sway Bar is manufactured from heat-treated steel, providing a significant strength advantage over traditional sway bar upgrades. During the heat-treating process, the steel is hardened to improve torsional strength, durability, and long-term performance under heavy loads and demanding road conditions.
With a substantial 1 1/2" diameter, the PAD heat-treated rear sway bar is larger and considerably stronger than the factory sway bar. Traditionally, each additional 1/8" increase in sway bar diameter can deliver roughly a 30% increase in stiffness and strength.
Heat-treated sway bars can provide approximately a 60% increase in strength for every 1/8" increase, resulting in a dramatic improvement in roll resistance from what appears to be a relatively small size change.
The result is improved vehicle stability with reduced body roll, sway, and driver fatigue — especially beneficial for RVs, camper vans, and other high-center-of-gravity vehicles.
Especially helping reduce flex and long-term fatigue. Each kit also includes premium polyurethane bushings for improved responsiveness and durability compared to standard rubber bushings.
In addition to our heat-treated sway bar offerings, we also offers a high-performance rear sway bar manufactured from 4140 chromoly steel for many Sprinter 3500 applications, including platforms such as the Winnebago EKKO.
However, for larger and heavier coach configurations — such as Leisure Travel Vans (LTV) models with substantially extended rear overhangs compared to a typical Sprinter 3500 or EKKO chassis — the heat-treated sway bar provides an ideal solution for increased roll resistance, chassis control, and long-term durability under the additional leverage loads created by the longer rear body design.
As discussed within portions of the EKKOnesters community and other Sprinter-based RV forums, larger rear overhang vehicles can place substantially greater leverage forces on the chassis and suspension system, making sway bar tuning and material strength increasingly important for overall handling confidence and stability.
