ATS Spindle Thread Split

[chicane67]

**EDIT** Yeah, what Shane said....... and to add to his comments:

Wally,

Until the release of the product, I dont believe the actual numbers will be disclosed. And you are correct, not everyone can just go manufacture a spindle, but unfortunately, most of the competition is doing just that.

To further this and possibly give you some insight on your other questions concerning strength, the AFX spindle, unlike the tubular, plate construction and other fabricated spindles, have not gone through any FEA analysis or million cycle testing that we are aware of (with the exception of only one company). Our offering surpasses the stringent and even the most critical OEM testing to gain DOT certification as a minimum. To do anything less, would be a gross misjudgement concerning liability.

Trust me, our development chassis is my personal 67...... and I am not very nice to parts. I will abuse any and every part installed onto the chassis so that I may be armed with the knowledge of what parts will and will not take. Not to mention, we will have the emperical data to back our findings as it is instrumented with enough DA to tell me when the sun is shining or not.



I find it kinda funny, that everyone with a suspension program can sit behind a keyboard and bang away at it all day to form their own opinions and theories, but without an actual product and testing it in the real world, these opinions and theories are mearly assumptions. All that can be done with that, is an assertion, without knowing where our 'white paper' starts. The previously stated geometrical numbers for the spindles are just rough numbers. They are not of the final product. But, they are close enough to give some insight to those who understand basic geometry and dynamic kinematics. Thankfully, we do have our fair share of those in our ranks and it is good to see them asking appropriate questions.

It does however, take time to deliver emperical data and until we are comfortable with that information and are confident with this product's public release timeline, I hope that you can be patient with our decision on keeping this information under wraps.

That time is not very far away.....

[dennis68]

I find it kinda funny, that everyone with a suspension program can sit behind a keyboard and bang away at it all day to form their own opinions and theories, but without an actual product and testing it in the real world, these opinions and theories are mearly assumptions.

Quick question Tom, how exactly did Shane come up with the initial design specs for the new spindle? Did he use a crayon and some paper to just throw down some numbers or did he use a very complicated computer program that will quickly compile data and get you really damn close to the end numbers you will eventually unveil?

Just asking as I'm pretty sure all of the big 3 (Chrysler I know for sure) use computer programs to design and evaluate suspension systems and build off those blueprints. I would guess most successful race teams do as well.

I'm sure it wasn't intended as a knock to those who have a pretty good grasp of design theory and know what they are looking at when viewing analysis results, sounded awfully cocky though.

I posted only a few times in this thread to questions that pertain to “A” body geometry as that is what I am most familiar with. It is impossible to design a spindle that will fit multiple applications and optimize each of them equally. It is also pretty egotistical to say that that anyone with an opinion about the specs ATS has released thus far is off base, numbers don’t lie. The ATS spindle is the best thing thus far but is not even close to being the best thing possible.

My congratulations to Tyler and his team for being one of the first to attempt a real fix for 35+ year old geometry problems. I am not knocking what you have done in any way. At the same time I don’t want to see anybody getting slammed for disclosing the results of their own independent analysis. Good luck to you guys.

[wickedmotorhead]

Actually I used chalk and my driveway...all kidding aside. Yes we did use a suspension program as a start. Designing the suspension in a program is a very solid start and from what we found doing the physical testing is it also fairly accurate...but their are factors that are not attributed to the program and that is why we have also done extensive physical testing to back up what the program is spitting out. I understand the Big 3 use programs and design from there, but what Tom is saying is that we also are taking that extra step (as do the OEs) to do real track testing and collecting of data to optimize the setup. Since the AFX spindle is designed for multiple applications it alone is not the "ulitimate" combination for both body styles ALONE, but it still drastically improves both setups to the best of its capabilities and with the help of some components (like in the A body case) it can be obtimized to its full potential.

Obviously we could design a clean sheet spindle that uses custom UCAs and LCAs to reduce scrub and dial in better geometry and make it application specific, but then you get into buying new rims, more components, clearing out your wallet and drastically limiting your market to that one car. Our setup is more than adequate for the ride and handling that most of our customer base is after.

I respect those (like Dennis and Marcus) that do have a good grasp on suspension geometry and how it works and appreciate their input, we just wanted to make it clear that we took every step possible to make sure that real world data matches the computer data and they are not a perfect match. I gave credit to Marcus for his data and I stated that it was close to ours and never implied it was "off base." I also stated that thus far pretty much everything said was legit. We welcome opinions and comments. Thats what this thread is for.