My Audi A6 Rear Anti-Sway Bar Modification

Having waited for quite a while, I finally got round to fitting on the rear H&R anti-sway bars for my Audi. Fitting on the anti-sway bar was relatively easy. Just remove the nuts on the exhaust and the stock bar comes off and the replacement is fitted on quite easily.



Placed side by side, the H&R bar (above) is obviously much thicker than the stock bar (below) and much heavier too.



True to form, the H&R bar fitted perfectly without any problems. The H&R bar came with 2 settings to attach to the struts. The outer pair of holes provided a softer setting and presumably a little more comfortable. Naturally, I picked the inner (and stiffer) setting. I wanted to see how it worked first and if it proved to be too uncomfortable, I could always move the setting to a softer one.



The finished result looks great!



Initial impressions after two days of driving were very satisfying. Even with the stiffer setting, ride comfort was not too badly affected. It was much more obvious on uneven road surfaces but take a corner fast or slow and it was easy to forget about the slight penalty in comfort. The car now corners flat with little body roll and I could take turns at much higher speeds with confidence. This was certainly a big grin inducing factor. I intend to keep the current setting for a week or two before adjusting to the softer setting to try it out for another couple of weeks. Once I have tried both settings, I intend to fit on the front anti-sway bars and see how it settles. Watch this space.
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My Nissan Livina Geniss - Strut Brace and Lower Tie Bars

One of my biggest complaints about the Nissan is that in the designing of the car, Nissan seems to have concentrated on trying to bring in as many MPV features into the car that they even brought in the wallow and soft suspension from the larger form factor MPV into this small car too. As a result, bone stock, the Nissan Livina Geniss rocks like a boat being tossed about in a tidal wave as soon as you hit a bump. Even a small one. In speed bump happy China, this made for an extremely bouncy ride which I personally dislike intensely. If I wanted a bouncy ride, I might as well take public transport.

This meant I had to retune the suspension completely. The first part I did was to brace up the chassis to reduce the body roll from bumps and corners. This is done by the addition of a strut brace that holds the two front shock absorbers together under the bonnet. At the time when I made this change, the Nissan Livina Geniss was so new that no parts were available at all. Fortunately, some experimentation found that the Nissan Sylphy (Blue Bird) also had the same dimensions and the aluminium alloy strut brace made for the Slyphy fitted my Livina Geniss perfectly. Hallelujah for platform sharing. Upon fitting the strut brace, the car's handling improved dramatically. Cornering was noticeably flatter than before and the car handled the bumps better by holding firm.



However, I was not finished. I found with the help of some helpful friends, that a Hong Kong company was open to producing the lower tie bars for my Nissan Livina Geniss if there was enough pre-orders for them to kick off production. Happily, I placed my order and waited. The aluminium alloy lower tie bars came in a pair and were installed beneath the car. One slightly up front behind the front axle and the second slightly ahead of the rear axle.






Sorry about the car being a little dirty underneath. These pictures were taken after the modifications were run for more than 20,000 km. The addition of the lower tie bars added a little bit more stability to the car although the effect was less marked compared to the initial addition of the strut braces. The cornering became slightly sharper and the body roll became virtually non-existant. The Nissan's handling and precision of steering was a complete change from the original stock condition.

The lower tie bars and strut brace, paired up with a change in shock absorbers and springs, made the Nissan Livina Geniss a joy to drive in city traffic, especially if you love to weave in and out.
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My Audi A6 - Brake Modification

It was time to replace the brake rotors on my Audi A6 that were wearing thin after 90,000 km. Instead of replacing with OEM rotors, I decided to replace with OEM sized two piece rotors. I also opted to continue with the EBC Red Stuff pads which had served me well when I replaced the OEM brake pads at 50,000 km.

Review of the EBC Red Stuff brake pads.
OEM brake pads lasted for 50,000 km for the first time and the EBC Red Stuff brake pads which I swapped to lasted 40,000 km before I changed it along with the rotors. At both instances, I had both the front and rear sets changed at the same time. The brake oil was replaced at the 50,000 km change but this time, they did not appear to need a change and so I did not.

I chose to swap the EBC Red Stuff pads primarily because I was mainly looking for a small increase in braking performance, and a huge reduction in brake dust. And the EBC pads did all that. Braking was sharper compared to the OEM pads which were quite inadequate for emergency braking. Braking on the OEM pads felt vague and you never got the feeling that you would stop in time when you needed to as the Audi A6 is a heavy car. As a result, I tended to brake early, just in case. The dust from the OEM pads was quick to appear as well. The swap to the EBC pads was just what I was looking for. Naturally, one cannot expect a change of brake pads to instantly produce massive stopping power. And I was not looking for that. Braking was improved slightly, and it was enough to be noticeable. And the brake dust was gone, thanks to the ceramic compound on the EBC pads. Sure, if you looked hard enough, there is still a coating of brake dust on the rims, albeit a light coloured layer.

On the surface, it would appear that the EBC pads had a shorter lifespan - 10,000 km less than the OEM pads. In fact, it is hard to make a comparison as I was driving harder on the EBC pads. In the first 50,000 km, I was mostly doing short trips within the city and at most a 150 km run to Zhuhai or a 120 km run to Guangzhou. All of which was on flat ground and decent roads. After I made the change to the EBC pads, I had made a total of 6 long trips that were between 1200 km to 1500 km each way round and along the way there were long mountainous stretches with long stretches of downhill runs where opportunities to use the brakes were plentiful. In addition, I had also started to drive the car harder.

In all, I was very satisfied with the EBC Red Stuff brake pads.

Replacement Two Piece Rotors
In a luxurious sedan like the Audi A6, you cannot and should not turn it into a sports car. What you can do is to make small improvements so that it becomes a little more fun to drive. My modifications have centred around improving the handling of the car slightly with small adjustments. Even then, I have mostly adhered to the principle of replacing OEM parts with lighter and stronger aftermarket parts as the time for replacement comes. With the brake rotors wearing thin, it also presented me with an opportunity to swap the OEM rotors with something lighter. Swapping out for lighter rotors reduces unsprung weight. A reduction in unsprung weight theoretically leads to lighter load on the suspension and this translates to better suspension response and subsquently, better ride comfort and ability to soak up the irregularities on the road surface. In addition, the loss in unsprung weight also reduces the moment of inertia which means less energy is required to get moving. And in theory, this leads to faster acceleration and throttle response. In practice, the weight reduction from taking a kilogramme off each corner could well be meaningless, or virtually impossible to detect. Experts or enthusiasts tell me that I would expect to see greater improvement if I were to swap rims and tyres for lighter versions since the weight loss at each corner would be more like 3-4 kg or more. I couldn't agree more. However, it is not the time to replace the rims or the tyres and it is the time, however, to have the rotors changed. As such, I chose to go ahead and replace the OEM rotors with lighter aftermarket ones anyway. And even if it did not produce a noticeable effect, when the time comes to change the rims and tyres, I believe the effect certainly would be very noticeable when the aftermarket rotors were paired with lighter rims and wheels.

This is the front rotor and I have also opted for a slotted rotor since it looked nice and sporty too. I do not expect to need the slots to help counter brake fade since even with the hardest driving I have done so far, I have not had any problems with brake fade. The hub is aluminium alloy and lifting it and comparing it with the OEM rotors, the weight difference was obvious. Unfortunately, I did not have a scale on hand to measure the weights but I would put it as about 1-1.5 kg weight savings.



The brakes were installed with no drama and they fitted perfectly.



The rear rotors are also slotted. The electronic parking brake proved to be a bit of a challenge as my VAG-COM kit had not arrived. After some headscratching, we figured a solution to the problem and the brakes were installed without further drama.



And then the moment of truth. Would that few kg savings make enough of a difference, if at all? I am happy to say, YES! Braking performance was improved significantly and pedal feel certainly improved. It took me a few days to get the hang of the brakes and adjust my braking to the improved brakes. I am afraid I am unable to quantify this but I would be able to hazard a guess that my braking distances could be improved by a metre or two. Ride comfort was harder to perceive. I think there is a slight improvement but it is not really as obvious. But I would not expect a huge difference considering the small weight reduction. And some improvement is better than none and they will all add up as I continue to make more replacements.

Having driven a further 6,000 km in the new brakes, I am very pleased with the results. Braking is a lot more consistent than with the OEM rotors and pads. The new rotors work perfectly well with the EBC Red Stuff brake pads. I am looking forward to light forged rims and a new set of tyres to see if an additional reduction in unsprung weight would pay off in spades then.
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My first love - cars

Cars have always been a passion for me but I've never had the chance nor the time to explore it fully till the last few years in China when I finally settled down. My current rides are a 2006 Audi A6L and a 2007 Nissan Livina Geniss.

The Audi A6L is a long wheelbase version of the C6 A6 designed for China and produced in the joint venture factory in Changchun, China. I have the 4.2l version which is fully optioned as I feel it is the only engine in the line-up that actually does justice and has enough power to run a very heavy car. The car currently has 95,000 km on the odometer and so far I've made the following modifications to the car:

• Evans NPG+ coolant
  
• EBC Red Stuff ceramic brake pads
• lLumar tints on the windows
• Aluminium custom pedals set
• Custom-made two-piece slotted rotors for front and rear in OEM sizing
• Michelin Pilot Sport PS2 tyres in OEM sizing (245/45R17)
  

Future modifications include H&R anti-sway bars, 19 inch forged rims and tyres, upgraded DVD system and Sat Nav, and maybe a sports exhaust.


The Nissan Livina Geniss is a small 7 seater that was developed in China. It serves as a great runabout in city driving. I didn't care too much for the handling of the car when I bought it and most of my modifications were to enhance ride comfort and handling. With 32,000 km driven, the following modifications have been made:

• Monroe shocks and Espelir springs for front and rear, resulting in a drop of about 1 inch
• Michelin Energy XM1+ tyres
• Strut brace
• Lower tie bars
• Soundproofing
• Vifa speakers
• V-cool window tints
• Evans NPG+ coolant

More on cars
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