We really need to talk about this suspension design on the 2024 CanAm Maverick R

[mrblaine]

Yeah, from a cursory glace it looks correct to me too. I always wonder about the guys doing the design though. They make an assumption on worst case scenarios and design around that. Inevitably, someone comes along that proves them wrong...There is always a more worse, worst case. Do they draw a line in the sand somewhere or is it a matter of they just aren't creative enough?

Most people treat SxS like Jet skis and think that the throttle pedal is digital (on or off). All reason and judgement goes out the window. When I worked for Mercury Marine, the extent to which they tested engines blew me away. I asked about it, and the reason given was that if we don't test full throttle for 5000 hours (I'm making the numbers up because I don't remember the answer from 1998, but it was shocking), their warranty claims would be enough to put them out of business. Yet, they STILL had warranty claims. I'm sure SxS's run into the same issues.

I'm sure you remember the viral video that came around about when Ford released the Raptor? They said you could jump it...So A guy went full send on a MX course and launched it off a double. Broke the frame in half! Worst case is relative....

The only thing I see happening so far is someone making some skids for the upper balljoint to keep it off of the rocks.

 

[sab]

Yeah, from a cursory glace it looks correct to me too. I always wonder about the guys doing the design though. They make an assumption on worst case scenarios and design around that. Inevitably, someone comes along that proves them wrong...There is always a more worse, worst case. Do they draw a line in the sand somewhere or is it a matter of they just aren't creative enough? Maybe @sab can shed some light here?

Since you asked, I'll opine... The old school way was to design, build, and go drive it, and drive it, and drive it. That was found to be very expensive, and it required the test team to really understand how the customers used the vehicle and replicate that to the point that enough miles could be put on the machine to represent a lifetime, but within a very short (2-3 month) timeframe for that model year. The new school way is to design, build, and test it in a laboratory. It can be less expensive, but you now have to figure out how to apply loads in a laboratory that match those in the real world. You still have to understand how the customers use the vehicle, but now you have to figure out how to replicate that in a laboratory.

My career started in the old school way and transitioned to the new school way. Both ways can work, but both require that you develop a test that represents "real-world" use of the product. That's automatically easier to do in old school way, and with both ways, it's the hardest part of the entire process. In the new school way, that's called "developing a load case," which can be done from the vehicle level (using "multi-post rig"), the assembly level, and all the way down to the component level. The trouble is, the loads on a vehicle vary dramatically depending on who's driving, and in what conditions. As an engineer, if I know exactly what you're going to do with the vehicle, I can design it to survive for the expected lifetime of the vehicle, if survival of the vehicle is the only design constraint (it never is), and the expected lifetime of the vehicle is never exceeded (nearly impossible). Of course, as soon as that vehicle gets to thousands of customers, new ways to destroy it pop up, or the twelfth owner exceeds the expected lifetime, and suddenly the engineers are idiots.

As you said, "there is always a more worse, worst case." Designing an off-road vehicle to be used by the general public is very challenging. Here's one tiny example that will forever be in my memory bank:

We had a small aluminum part in the rear suspension of a snow machine that never, ever failed during testing. After we went to production, the first machines went to some cross-country race teams in Alaska because their season started the earliest. Within weeks of them receiving the machines and putting miles on them, every single part they had failed and very quickly. We scratched our heads and wondered what the heck happened? Were the parts defective? No, it ended up being a case of "bad load case development." When those Alaskan racers start their season, they ride wherever they can just to put miles on. In this case, that was on frozen rivers at high speed because there's not enough snow on land to cover rocks, logs, etc. that will destroy a snow machine. The frozen rivers become like smooth, paved race tracks to them.

That type of usage caused the part to be subjected to a high frequency oscillating load, and since all aluminum alloys are subject to a fatigue cycle limit (unlike steel, which, if the stress is low enough, won't break), the part saw more fatigue cycles in a few weeks of their testing than in a lifetime of service to other customers. We sent a couple guys up there to instrument the part with strain gauges and collect data on the loads it was subject to, then we built some beefier versions and quickly tested them in a lab under those conditions, picked the optimum version, and sent them to Alaska for testing - all before their season started. Those beefier parts never made it to any production machines because no one else road like that. We never had any other known field failures because no one else duplicated their load case. We just made them available to those teams so that they could run them on their race machines.

 

[Mike_H]

That’s about as I expected. We had similar constraints when I was designing car parts.

Similar to you, a situation that will forever be burned into my memory, I was working on the outside rear view mirror for an SUV. There was a certain car wash near the vehicle engineering center that would knock the passenger side mirror off the door, like, right now. It was the only failure we were getting. All the “data” said we were good, but the proof was in the broken mirrors. We had to completely retool the mirror bracket to get that test done, because if it could happen at one car wash, there was likely another that would perform the same way (general public, not race teams, unfortunately). That is a month of my life I’ll never get back.

 

[freedom_in_4low]

I've seen this making the rounds today and all the associated handwringing but all it looks like to me is an updated take on the double wishbone suspension under a typical Honda. Most notably that instead of running the shock down to the lower arm in front of or behind the axle, they just wrapped the lower arm around the axle and put the shock and axle in the same plane.

 

[psrivats]

<snip>When I worked for Mercury Marine, the extent to which they tested engines blew me away. I asked about it, and the reason given was that if we don't test full throttle for 5000 hours (I'm making the numbers up because I don't remember the answer from 1998, but it was shocking), their warranty claims would be enough to put them out of business. Yet, they STILL had warranty claims. I'm sure SxS's run into the same issues.</snip>

One of these days I have to tell you how we test our server chips When I was new .. I had the same shock that you describe when I first learned about the extent of testing and the time it takes

 

[Mike_H]

One of these days I have to tell you how we test our server chips When I was new .. I had the same shock that you describe when I first learned about the extent of testing and the time it takes

It was crazy. When they were explaining it to me, the question they asked me was, "how do people drive boats?" I said, Wide open? They said, yeah, you got it. There are two speeds that a boat motor operates at...Idle, and WFO. So, that is what they test...and not just once or twice, but strapping that thing into a dyno and letting her eat until it goes POP! Then they figure out what broke, and go fix it...to make it last longer. Its nuts...and also why the original Corvette ZR1 engine is so great. That was a Mercury Marine design and build...and its built like a boat motor...Zoom, Zoom.

That was the outboard side...I also had a change to tour the High Performance/skunk works/Racing area while I was there. That was incredible to me too. At the time, all the I/O engines were GM sourced. Mercury would buy a short block of an 454...well, not one, but pallets full of them. The very first operation was to strip the block down. There were three scrap gaylords in that area...One for cranks, one for connecting rods, and one for pistons. That's right...they were buying brand new engines, and throwing the rotating assembly away. It wasn't good enough to handle the stress of the engines they were building (which at the time were supercharged, 900 horsepower big blocks. They've way surpassed that now). That will stick with me forever too.

 

[Shank]

Since you asked, I'll opine... The old school way was to design, build, and go drive it, and drive it, and drive it. That was found to be very expensive, and it required the test team to really understand how the customers used the vehicle and replicate that to the point that enough miles could be put on the machine to represent a lifetime, but within a very short (2-3 month) timeframe for that model year. The new school way is to design, build, and test it in a laboratory. It can be less expensive, but you now have to figure out how to apply loads in a laboratory that match those in the real world. You still have to understand how the customers use the vehicle, but now you have to figure out how to replicate that in a laboratory.

My career started in the old school way and transitioned to the new school way. Both ways can work, but both require that you develop a test that represents "real-world" use of the product. That's automatically easier to do in old school way, and with both ways, it's the hardest part of the entire process. In the new school way, that's called "developing a load case," which can be done from the vehicle level (using "multi-post rig"), the assembly level, and all the way down to the component level. The trouble is, the loads on a vehicle vary dramatically depending on who's driving, and in what conditions. As an engineer, if I know exactly what you're going to do with the vehicle, I can design it to survive for the expected lifetime of the vehicle, if survival of the vehicle is the only design constraint (it never is), and the expected lifetime of the vehicle is never exceeded (nearly impossible). Of course, as soon as that vehicle gets to thousands of customers, new ways to destroy it pop up, or the twelfth owner exceeds the expected lifetime, and suddenly the engineers are idiots.

As you said, "there is always a more worse, worst case." Designing an off-road vehicle to be used by the general public is very challenging. Here's one tiny example that will forever be in my memory bank:

We had a small aluminum part in the rear suspension of a snow machine that never, ever failed during testing. After we went to production, the first machines went to some cross-country race teams in Alaska because their season started the earliest. Within weeks of them receiving the machines and putting miles on them, every single part they had failed and very quickly. We scratched our heads and wondered what the heck happened? Were the parts defective? No, it ended up being a case of "bad load case development." When those Alaskan racers start their season, they ride wherever they can just to put miles on. In this case, that was on frozen rivers at high speed because there's not enough snow on land to cover rocks, logs, etc. that will destroy a snow machine. The frozen rivers become like smooth, paved race tracks to them.

That type of usage caused the part to be subjected to a high frequency oscillating load, and since all aluminum alloys are subject to a fatigue cycle limit (unlike steel, which, if the stress is low enough, won't break), the part saw more fatigue cycles in a few weeks of their testing than in a lifetime of service to other customers. We sent a couple guys up there to instrument the part with strain gauges and collect data on the loads it was subject to, then we built some beefier versions and quickly tested them in a lab under those conditions, picked the optimum version, and sent them to Alaska for testing - all before their season started. Those beefier parts never made it to any production machines because no one else road like that. We never had any other known field failures because no one else duplicated their load case. We just made them available to those teams so that they could run them on their race machines.

Awesome response and makes me wish I was more on that path in my ME career and not how it’s going.

 

[freedom_in_4low]

It was crazy. When they were explaining it to me, the question they asked me was, "how do people drive boats?" I said, Wide open? They said, yeah, you got it. There are two speeds that a boat motor operates at...Idle, and WFO. So, that is what they test...and not just once or twice, but strapping that thing into a dyno and letting her eat until it goes POP! Then they figure out what broke, and go fix it...to make it last longer. Its nuts...and also why the original Corvette ZR1 engine is so great. That was a Mercury Marine design and build...and its built like a boat motor...Zoom, Zoom.

That was the outboard side...I also had a change to tour the High Performance/skunk works/Racing area while I was there. That was incredible to me too. At the time, all the I/O engines were GM sourced. Mercury would buy a short block of an 454...well, not one, but pallets full of them. The very first operation was to strip the block down. There were three scrap gaylords in that area...One for cranks, one for connecting rods, and one for pistons. That's right...they were buying brand new engines, and throwing the rotating assembly away. It wasn't good enough to handle the stress of the engines they were building (which at the time were supercharged, 900 horsepower big blocks. They've way surpassed that now). That will stick with me forever too.

I miss that side of product development. I can't claim knowledge of any well known engines but its fun doing stuff like completely filling a $250k rotary screw compressor prototype with (incompressible) liquid refrigerant and hit the go button just to see if the fancy new drive could recognize the pattern in the inrush current and shut it down before it self destructs.

 

[Mike_H]

I miss that side of product development. I can't claim knowledge of any well known engines but its fun doing stuff like completely filling a $250k rotary screw compressor prototype with (incompressible) liquid refrigerant and hit the go button just to see if the fancy new drive could recognize the pattern in the inrush current and shut it down before it self destructs.

Fun, and a little nerve wracking, if you're the designer of said software that will or will not recognize the inrush and shut down (or not!).

 

[freedom_in_4low]

Fun, and a little nerve wracking, if you're the designer of said software that will or will not recognize the inrush and shut down (or not!).

Fortunately I was not that person, or even the one that selected the drive, and the components had been tested at the component level by their respective design teams but as the "system design engineer" it was up to me to understand how all the components behaved and interacted together. I determined the load case and designed the test plan, as well as model the performance of the system and validate the model, and use that model to find the extremes of the operating range and test at those extremes (like "can we start after an overnight cold soak at -20F without shelling a compressor?" followed by figuring out the exact sequence of compressor and fan speeds to follow for the first several minutes of operation to make it happen and building that into the control software), review the test data, etc.

 

[mrblaine]

Fortunately I was not that person, or even the one that selected the drive, and the components had been tested at the component level by their respective design teams but as the "system design engineer" it was up to me to understand how all the components behaved and interacted together. I determined the load case and designed the test plan, as well as model the performance of the system and validate the model, and use that model to find the extremes of the operating range and test at those extremes (like "can we start after an overnight cold soak at -20F without shelling a compressor?" followed by figuring out the exact sequence of compressor and fan speeds to follow for the first several minutes of operation to make it happen and building that into the control software), review the test data, etc.

Ya'll are fancy with your tests. When I worked at the ambulance company, we have a big problem with back boards. They started out as very well made baltic birch with hardwood runners and a sprayed urethane finish to slow down bodily fluid absorption. On a call, the "help" would be standing there ready and holding it upright on end. Boredom, idiocy, or whatever caused them to bounce the end of them on the ground or they would slam them into their storage cubby. That blew out the ends around the oblong hand holes. They would destroy 5-6 a week at 250-300 bucks each.

Owner put me on the hunt for something that didn't do that and the industry was just moving into plastic versions. We tried one, tough, reasonably lightweight, but, oddly for a medical device, they had an artifact in it for reinforcement that showed up on X-rays. No good.

Several companies brought by samples. I asked if I could test for impact, they always obliged in the affirmative. I'd take them out to the parking lot, throw them up in the air so they would land on one end, if they didn't break, we'd talk price and quantity. If they did and most did, they got to take their broken bits back and try again. There were lots of sad back board vendors.

My favorite one that was done very well did fail and I wished it hadn't. Rigid structural foam inner core, high quality thermoformed shells that overlapped on the sides with the lower shell going up into the upper shell and then full perimeter bonding that was sealed. Very nice piece but it couldn't handle the impact which exploded the corner it landed on.

 

[lowranger]

You know, I read nothing but complaints online from other RZR owners who are always pissing and moaning about how Polaris sucks and yada, yada.

I've never had any issues with mine whatsoever. Granted I don't drive it like a moron, but we take it in the rocks, washes, and on every sort of terrain they have out here and it's been great to me.

As with most off-roading I think it does indeed come down to driving style. I don't load the driveline and then dump it, it's modestly built on 32s, etc.

Not to say something couldn't happen, but I must read a million failed ball joints, blown diffs, and blown driveline threads from other RZR owners that it really starts to make you think, how many bad drivers could there be?

That last one is rhetorical, I know the answer.

@Chris do you have the 4 seater RZR?
I started out with the RZr and really liked it. Saw a few people not knowing how to drive one eat up a belt in a brand new RZr. In Aug 2020 I bought a new Honda Talon 1000X 2 seater. I'm really liking the transmission vs the belt.
In California, Nevada, Arizona and Idaho that I have ridden, there are a lot of SxS friendly places to ride. Just don't haul ass everywhere and be stupid. Use common since. There will be places on the trail if you want to open that throttle more you can.
You have picture of your ride? They are lots of fun!

 

[Chris]

@Chris do you have the 4 seater RZR?
I started out with the RZr and really liked it. Saw a few people not knowing how to drive one eat up a belt in a brand new RZr. In Aug 2020 I bought a new Honda Talon 1000X 2 seater. I'm really liking the transmission vs the belt.
In California, Nevada, Arizona and Idaho that I have ridden, there are a lot of SxS friendly places to ride. Just don't haul ass everywhere and be stupid. Use common since. There will be places on the trail if you want to open that throttle more you can.
You have picture of your ride? They are lots of fun!
View attachment 451970

I've heard good things about the DCT transmission in the Talon.

I've got a 2018 RZR XP Turbo Dynamix. I've upgraded the turbo with a stage 4 Aftermarket Assassins setup and it just hauls. Of course I don't drive it like that unless we're in a wide open wash. Like you said, there are sections of the trail where you can go fast and it's wide open, and then there are more technical areas where you go slow. It's really not that difficult and yet so many people drive these things like they stole them.

I think they're a lot of fun when you use them right. I need to find some photos of mine to upload. It's a 2-seater though.

I also have to add that I absolutely LOVE the Fox live suspension on this thing. It just soaks up the terrain like it's not even there.

 

[lowranger]

I've heard good things about the DCT transmission in the Talon.

I've got a 2018 RZR XP Turbo Dynamix. I've upgraded the turbo with a stage 4 Aftermarket Assassins setup and it just hauls. Of course I don't drive it like that unless we're in a wide open wash. Like you said, there are sections of the trail where you can go fast and it's wide open, and then there are more technical areas where you go slow. It's really not that difficult and yet so many people drive these things like they stole them.

I think they're a lot of fun when you use them right. I need to find some photos of mine to upload. It's a 2-seater though.

I also have to add that I absolutely LOVE the Fox live suspension on this thing. It just soaks up the terrain like it's not even there.

I sent all 4 of my shocks to Wheller there in Arizona, he re valved them and put on new springs. Huge difference!

 

[freedom_in_4low]

Ya'll are fancy with your tests. When I worked at the ambulance company, we have a big problem with back boards. They started out as very well made baltic birch with hardwood runners and a sprayed urethane finish to slow down bodily fluid absorption. On a call, the "help" would be standing there ready and holding it upright on end. Boredom, idiocy, or whatever caused them to bounce the end of them on the ground or they would slam them into their storage cubby. That blew out the ends around the oblong hand holes. They would destroy 5-6 a week at 250-300 bucks each.

Owner put me on the hunt for something that didn't do that and the industry was just moving into plastic versions. We tried one, tough, reasonably lightweight, but, oddly for a medical device, they had an artifact in it for reinforcement that showed up on X-rays. No good.

Several companies brought by samples. I asked if I could test for impact, they always obliged in the affirmative. I'd take them out to the parking lot, throw them up in the air so they would land on one end, if they didn't break, we'd talk price and quantity. If they did and most did, they got to take their broken bits back and try again. There were lots of sad back board vendors.

My favorite one that was done very well did fail and I wished it hadn't. Rigid structural foam inner core, high quality thermoformed shells that overlapped on the sides with the lower shell going up into the upper shell and then full perimeter bonding that was sealed. Very nice piece but it couldn't handle the impact which exploded the corner it landed on.

eh, gotta do what you gotta do, with what you have. If you want to see if a backboard will survive being dropped on a corner, you drop it on a corner. If you want to know if a chiller will start in -20F, you start it in -20F. The root difference is that I can't walk outside and find a place that can be -20F at my whim. The other one is that in your role as the consumer, your only response was to keep testing until one passed, while as the manufacturer, I had to revise my design until it passed (or back off on my acceptance criteria, which doesn't play well with marketing when it's a key differentiator against our competition).

 

[Apparition]

Cleetus explains it

 

[CMBD]

The people I see making negative comments about this new design are people in general that just don't get it. And Polaris racers that finish behind Can Am X3s every race already

Im a Polaris guy, but if I wanted to race and be competitive it would be in a Can Am.

Time and race miles will be the judge of the new design. Big power, big travel, and the no belt thing is is the game changer.

My N/A RZR rock crawler will do 80 in the desert, but not like that thing

 

[Apparition]

The people I see making negative comments about this new design are people in general that just don't get it. And Polaris racers that finish behind Can Am X3s every race already

Im a Polaris guy, but if I wanted to race and be competitive it would be in a Can Am.

Time and race miles will be the judge of the new design. Big power, big travel, and the no belt thing is is the game changer.

My N/A RZR rock crawler will do 80 in the desert, but not like that thing

They did 102 mph in that video

 

[CMBD]

Peeps have 100+ in the new one.

And

 

[CMBD]

Someone posts up a pic of it with 35s, and the dingdongs pile on and say it still looks stupid with those dumb "city tires"