It's not a "sway bar!"

Sometimes it is a heavy burden to be an uncompromising linguist. I recently saw a meme that resonated profoundly: “My life is a constant struggle between the need to correct grammar and the desire to have friends.” While I never, ever criticize or correct others in public—well, virtually never—anyone who has ever submitted an article to me discovered quickly that I did not let sloppy grammar, spelling, or usage slide. Queries that failed to employ even a smidgen of proper English went straight to the trash.

Certain things in particular set me off. I’ll fight to my grave the now-embedded acceptance of “their” to indicate a singular person, or the use of “altitude” when “elevation” is the correct term. Apostrophes in a plural? Mandatory jail time, I say. Or how about . . .

Sorry. Where was I? Right: Overland Tech and Travel. Let’s continue.

Many modern vehicles are equipped with an auxiliary suspension component, sometimes on the front suspension, sometimes on both front and rear. The component is in essence a spring—a rod usually shaped like an “E” without the middle horizontal. Each end is connected to one side of the suspension, usually by a link that can pivot slightly. The middle is connected to the chassis. When the vehicle enters a turn at speed and begins to lean toward the outside of the turn, the rod resists twisting and thus reduces the amount of lean.

This device is called an anti-roll bar, because the proper term for the “lean” a vehicle experiences in a turn is “roll.” Refer to the above graphic.

Unfortunately, the anti-roll bar is frequently referred to as a “sway bar”—an utterly incorrect term as you can see from the graphic. An anti-roll bar will in fact do nothing to control sway.

So ingrained is the mis-use that the switch for the brilliant and useful driver-disconnectable anti-roll bar on the Jeep Rubicon is labelled “Sway bar.” Aargh.

Anyway, please join me in insisting on the proper term.

Now, about those comma splices . . .