…but still no word if it comes with the two end shafts, the 4 shell pieces and the two collars/sway bar link mount? I’d want to know what all it came with and what I needed to install it before I handed them any cash for it.
Alright...this was probably the last time that I spoke with Frank until the bars ship later on in March, however we did talk this evening about this very thing.
Short answer: ONLY the bars, the urethane bushings and the wide plate for the pivot bushing is what is included in the kit. Current price is $1,200 for the 1-1/4" bar. You need to re-use the shells from the OEM install.
I asked whether he's considered doing up the required tooling work to be able to stamp out NEW shells...he said: yup, but for the volume of parts they've been historically selling for our rides (F/M/J-bodies) the up-front cost to develop the product is simply far too large and not something they'd ever see a return on. He did say they had steady sales of suspension stuff, primarily the rear-end, but some good amount of front-end as well, overall though this just wasn't in the cards.
Further on, one clarification: he is NOT intending on stocking the bars in the future. They will remain a "special order" product, which means that he will have the ability to run a batch as the demand materializes with a much shorter leadtime, but there will be some waiting time to get enough orders in the queue.
For my part, I "throttled back" a tad on my desire to source these: I booked my order for 1 kit. Once I have these installed on the coupe and manage to get some reasonable street miles, I will make a call on whether the '81 coupe gets the big or the small bar. For now, Frank put me in the queue for the 1-1/8" order.
All in all, yeah, these are pricey, but there just isn't another cheaper way to deal with the linguine T-bars we have on our rides, especially if you intend on pushing the chassis further. My coupe has 7 summers of cruising on it from a full-time rebuild (all new soft parts, and majority of hard stuff replaced at that time). I am actually running a set of adjustable KONI shocks, which do an awesome job of providing some tunability, but even with those in place, the steering gear having no slop and the pressure tuned down to take away some of that over-assist, things are still a little too squirly.
I look forward to installing these and will start the prep work on the pivot bushing shell setups in the meantime.