When the S550 Mustang’s independent rear suspension debuted in 2015, many Mustang die-hards resisted the change from a stick axle. However, the past decade or so has seen many enthusiasts and companies embrace the change. However, that doesn’t mean there isn’t still room for improvement. Enter Livernois Motorsports’ S550 and S650 differential brace, which was awarded SEMA’s Best Performance Street Product at the 2026 SEMA Show.
“We designed this to reapproach what the suspension upgrades on the S550 and S650 chassis really look like,” says Livernois Motorsports’ Andy Ricketts. “Everybody throws on stiff bushings, or locks them out completely, or does all kinds of crazy stuff. We tried to identify the real issue with the chassis, which is that there should be a third line of bushings to balance the movement of the diff out.”
Livernois approach aims to fix binding that occurs by not letting the differential fully articulate. “If you’ve ever driven one, and it wants to buck and bind and all that, that’s part of it, because you have a weird harmonic back there. So, by designing this brace, we add that third line of bushings, and it actually balances the movement front to back and side to side, and takes the load the way it’s supposed to, which fixes the factory issue,” Ricketts explains.
However, it’s not just adding bushings, but the design of the bushings themselves that makes the Livernois brace unique. “We designed all the poly bushings in the kit. Instead of the usual small round bushings, it’s an elliptical bushing, so when you side-load the bushing, it’s designed and shaped to take the load, rather than compress a certain amount and hit a hard stop. It does what it’s intended to do.”
Livernois manufactures the brace using their in-house CNC machining capabilities, which has led them to be able to modify the original brace that has been on the market for most of this year to now be compatible with factory differential coolers found on GT350s, GT500s, and Dark Horse Mustangs.
“While the cooler would physically fit the old cradle, you’d have to ditch the temp sender and a bunch of other stuff. Now we’ve found a way to retain it and provide a more accurate measurement by putting it in the coolant path, getting real coolant temp, instead of transferred temperature,” Ricketts shares. “The kit includes everything you need, and it comes with ARP hardware, so it can handle really any power level you want. Our S650 is cutting 1.2-second 60-foot times, and this is the only non-OEM suspension part on it.”
Both the standard and the new differential-cooler-compatible differential brace are available now directly from Livernois Motorsports.
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