THE BLUE BIRD BOUNCE

[davidbrady]

Paul worked with ITB to have a custom anti-sway bar made for his steer axle - the '97 came from the factory without a steer axle sway bar. The 1997 has the Wide Body Ridewell suspension which has two hangers in the rear - one for the drive axle and a separate one for the tag axle. The early LXi's used this same setup but the later ones went to a single drive/tag hanger. Ernie's coach has the liftable tag option which as far as I know wasn't carried thru to the LXi's. Is the '97 the only coach that had this as an option?

I've been after Paul for many moons to get the specs on his steer axle sway bar, but I never got them. Once upon a time I looked under his coach to check it out. The bar is mounted on the I-Beam axle with vertical links connected to the frame rails and it's a shadow of the monster that BB burdened the LXi's with. I'd guess 1 5/8" in diameter. The LXi's bar is mounted in the reverse; i.e., the bar is secured to the frame rails with D bushings and the vertical links drop down to the suspension carrier.