Performance Damper for ski lift

[YammyRX1]

They had a demo for this at the Yamaha booth in the Toronto Show. It was basically a square tube frame, another square tube frame with a diagonal brace, and a third with the damper across. The idea was to hit one side of each with a rubber mallet and feel the energy transferred through the steel. The damper dramatically reduced the transfer (vibration) but I'm just not sure if you could save weight or optimize the frame in other areas to make this a valuable add on or design element.

Edit: just watched the second video which shows this already...duohhh!

 

[darv]

Well I would like to get my hands on these an put it on my apex Chris R are you listening,

 

[Ak Yammy]

Problem is that when all is said and done, in the case of the Nytro chassis its about the same as putting lipstick on a pig .... the main issues of weight, balance and vertical centre of gravity is still buggered up.
Yamaha needs to go back to the drawing boards and use its talent - or recruit / plunder talent as in the automotive sector - to come up with a decent light chassis for cross over and off trail riders. No one doubts their ability with respect to engines. I don't ride trails so more weight to fix a problem that really doesn't exist is of no interest or benefit.
Maybe for the trail riders who like to put on 500 km a day on groomed trails it may reduce unpleasant motions / vibration band therefore offer some benefit, but for lots of yamaha riders who prefer 50 km of off trail to 500 km of trail it's a different story.

As for the engineering, proper use of FEA would likely achieve a similar or better result with the benefit of increased stiffness and reduced weight. As for the real world use of the dampers, mounting locations seem to be centred around the mounting points for shock / strut assemblies ..... not as an afterthought tagged on to the rear bumper ......

They did plunder some chassis building talent. Ever hear of a Viper???

 

[AKrider]

"Tuned Mass Dampers" Crap now my head hurts

I have a great issue with this the sway of a bridge is a long way from the lift in a ski. I spent yrs re-engineering these things from the 03 rx's to 08 Apexes. The ski lift phenomenon is a result of the distance between the roll center vs the center of gravity. I had a series of sway bars made to fill the gap between the 10, 11 and 13 mm bars and went even to cold rolled stock that had 1/2 the flex the material the Yamaha bars have in them.

The results were wicked, I could keep a ski planted under extreme cornering using the heavier bars and tunable Ohlin resevior clickers but when the limit was reached the sled would go crazy and what was once a manageable 6 to 8 lift went balistic and darn near caused the sled to roll right under me.

The front tub on the entire line (RX- Apex) is so rigid there is no flex under the conditions we put them in.
as far as bolting it to the rear bumper, Boy I dont get that at all it is right next to a pair of 90deg bends and if there is that much flex back there where it attaches on either side of the tunnel would shear or at least cause damage to the holes in the aluminum tunnel where they go through. Not to mention wrinkles that would form in the tunnel itself

That's what I don't understand about this whole marketing push for the performance damper? None of the other OEM's chassis needs it. The biggest problem is like you said, roll center versus the center of gravity. I don't doubt the damper improves things a little bit. So what? Very few people in the general snowmachining community care that they found a way to improve the handling of an 11 year old chassis. Drop Yamaha's other motors into the Pro-cross chassis and a lot more people would be excited. The reality is the majority of the people buying used Deltabox chassis sleds do not have performance at the top of their list. Why would they run out and buy the dampers? You are left with a small market of existing owners and maybe 10% of them will buy dampers and that percentage is likely being generous. Offer dampers on the '15 models and..... meh... it's not exactly a performance enhancement that gets people's blood pumping.

If I worked for another OEM I'd quickly criticize the performance damper as a band aid for a flexy, over weight, poor handling chassis. My brand X chassis is already so stiff, so well designed and good handling that it does not need the extra weight of a multiple chassis shock dampers. I'd also say that my brand X sled doesn't share anything in common with a performance damper equipped, front wheel drive, grocery getting, Toyota Camry family passenger car.

Now, if Ken Block's Ford Focus uses one, well, that helps to market the product. I'm guessing it doesn't because the chassis looks hell for stout. I can say I've never lusted after anything that came stock on a Toyota Camry.

[video width=400 height=350]http://www.youtube.com/v/WUO-lPubXeI&feature=youtube_gdata_player[/video]

 

[Bigfish]

I think the idea has merit, however I think the name "Performance Damper" is a bit misleading. Perhaps "Vibration Damper" would be more appropriate.

I can't see how this would make the sled faster, but for the person who regularly runs over 400 km a day on groomed trails, I can see this going a long way to remove the fatigue brought on by vibration in the chassis.
For the ditch banging or short tight and twisty rider they should increase the life of the chassis by eliminating most of the flexing.

I would like to try them out just to see if there is a noticeable difference.

 

[smokingcrater]

Now, if Ken Block's Ford Focus uses one, well, that helps to market the product. I'm guessing it doesn't because the chassis looks hell for stout. I can say I've never lusted after anything that came stock on a Toyota Camry.

Ken Block's FORMER car (Subaru) did use performance dampers! Three of them, one in front, two in the rear. It is available in the aftermarket community in Japan only, is spendy ($800+), but it apparently makes a fairly significant change in ride quality. (Subaru apparently also co-developed the damper with Yamaha)

Ohh, and this car has dampers on it!

 

[Yamadog]

Hey smokingcrater I did not say that

2nd of all I cannot believe this is getting this much air time but..... There is a HUGE diff between a car and a snowmobile!

I have built a lot of formula cars and faught weight distribution issues with a 4 cornered machine, the lateral loads placed on frame flex and shock towers is immense. In my old days of racing SCCA VW rabbits were running through courses with the inside rear tire a foot off the ground for more than 1/2 the race. It is a coefficient of roll center vs center of gravity! That is why the new CAT's and Viper have such a large spread between the upper and lower A Arms and corner so flat (stolen from formula 1).

Especially on todays uni-bodied production cars there is a lot of stress on the shock towers through the struts, even my mitsubishi 3000 GT VR4 was noticeably better when I installed strutt tower stiffner, but a rear of a sled is basically a box with the suspension bolted in in a rigid tunnel in at least 4 locations. You dont have the outrigger effect flexing the rear like you do with 2 wheels seperated by 4 or more feet acting as a fulcrum or lever twisting the sled longitudinally. The rear of the sled pivots or rotates on a mono surface (the track).

I do not see how a damper with 1 mm of travel mounted to the rigid bumper is going to offset what relates into sometimes 12" or more of lift out at the ski.

Look at the geometry of the front A arms of a modern Formula car vs. Ones from 20 years ago.

What I wish for next is inboard shocks. They could be the size of a water bottle, out of the weather, lighter by 5 lbs each. Moving the weight to the center of the sled and cross linked to to offset lateral G loading.

OK I'm done now

 

[Ak Yammy]

What I wish for next is inboard shocks. They could be the size of a water bottle, out of the weather, lighter by 5 lbs each. Moving the weight to the center of the sled and cross linked to to offset lateral G loading.

Doo tried it in the 80's bad idea. Buddy had this sled constantly breaking front suspension parts.

 

[Yamadog]

well that was the 80's today we have stronger stuff than duct tape and bailing wire

horizontally opposed takes a very short stroke and less stress than a 90 deg mount. Shorter stroke less heat and fade spring rates become trickier to get anything progressive.

 

[couch]

Problem is that when all is said and done, in the case of the Nytro chassis its about the same as putting lipstick on a pig .... the main issues of weight, balance and vertical centre of gravity is still buggered up.
Yamaha needs to go back to the drawing boards and use its talent - or recruit / plunder talent as in the automotive sector - to come up with a decent light chassis for cross over and off trail riders. No one doubts their ability with respect to engines. I don't ride trails so more weight to fix a problem that really doesn't exist is of no interest or benefit.
Maybe for the trail riders who like to put on 500 km a day on groomed trails it may reduce unpleasant motions / vibration band therefore offer some benefit, but for lots of yamaha riders who prefer 50 km of off trail to 500 km of trail it's a different story.

As for the engineering, proper use of FEA would likely achieve a similar or better result with the benefit of increased stiffness and reduced weight. As for the real world use of the dampers, mounting locations seem to be centred around the mounting points for shock / strut assemblies ..... not as an afterthought tagged on to the rear bumper ......

They did plunder some chassis building talent. Ever hear of a Viper???

Can't consider that to be plundering talent .... even the production sleds on the sales floor have the cat profile in the ski loops! If they had hired cat / poo / foo chassis developers or some of the great talent from the aftermarket builders and produced a product that was Yamaha DNA ......

Anyway, the integration of a mass damper in their line up won't cause me to run out and buy a new Yamaha .... seems to be a gimmick for which the result is less than quantifiable! Didn't explain how it works, how well it works, why it works, etc. I watched the video clip and to be honest, Chris sounded a bit like Rob Ford, Mike Duffy, or Harper trying to make a case for something they've done!

 

[RTX]

Just for the sake of keeping this thread going, ill bite.
the things i remember hearing when this was introduced to the public was that yamaha was giving people some of their technology to look at. In chris reids posts he clearly states.
It may never make it into a production sled. They want people to talk about it. And maybe the release a few to the public. I mean, they already use it on other product lines and within the auto industry. Its not like 500 million was spent to develop it for sleds. They saw a practical application for use within another market and are giving it a little feeler.
Absolutely nothing i read from anyone inside yamaha said this was coming so get ready.
At least not at this point.

Second. Im not exactly sure how anyone can or cant determine what any sled or manufacturer needs when the product we are discussing has never been applied to a snowmobile until now.
That said im pretty sure most of us have never even had the opportunity to do a side by side trial of this product in any application. So, comments good or bad are simply uneducated opinion. Mine included.

Hummm it looks like ken block uses them.
That just seems silly for such a well known racer to invest in a product that doesn't work. Lol

Im gonna be real curious to see how this whole performance damper thing pans out.
Im betting it will be just like power steering. The people with it love it and everyone that has never even tried it will be standing around screaming it just adds weight and there is no need for it. Lol

 

[Ak Yammy]

well that was the 80's today we have stronger stuff than duct tape and bailing wire

horizontally opposed takes a very short stroke and less stress than a 90 deg mount. Shorter stroke less heat and fade spring rates become trickier to get anything progressive.

Yes they were some fragile sleds back in the day I agree, but the concept was there and tried and obviously didn't receive further development. The thing I wonder also is how much extra heat was put into the shocks due to this location. Want those bodies to run cool to keep the fade down.

 

[Ak Yammy]

Delete

 

[Yamadog]

I agree with a front exit exhaust (expansion chamber) is one thing but these sleds like the rx and the apex had enough room under the resistor in the nose where the tool box was and with rear exit exhaust no extra heat.

I started to work on this several yrs ago had the actuator arms welded to a spare set of the upper A arms. There was multiple locations to hook the shocks to that would increase or decrease the lever length to gain adjustability I ran into trouble finding suitable shocks to test and then I blew the motor and project was over.

 

[Ak Yammy]

Problem is that when all is said and done, in the case of the Nytro chassis its about the same as putting lipstick on a pig .... the main issues of weight, balance and vertical centre of gravity is still buggered up.
Yamaha needs to go back to the drawing boards and use its talent - or recruit / plunder talent as in the automotive sector - to come up with a decent light chassis for cross over and off trail riders. No one doubts their ability with respect to engines. I don't ride trails so more weight to fix a problem that really doesn't exist is of no interest or benefit.
Maybe for the trail riders who like to put on 500 km a day on groomed trails it may reduce unpleasant motions / vibration band therefore offer some benefit, but for lots of yamaha riders who prefer 50 km of off trail to 500 km of trail it's a different story.

As for the engineering, proper use of FEA would likely achieve a similar or better result with the benefit of increased stiffness and reduced weight. As for the real world use of the dampers, mounting locations seem to be centred around the mounting points for shock / strut assemblies ..... not as an afterthought tagged on to the rear bumper ......

They did plunder some chassis building talent. Ever hear of a Viper???

Can't consider that to be plundering talent .... even the production sleds on the sales floor have the cat profile in the ski loops! If they had hired cat / poo / foo chassis developers or some of the great talent from the aftermarket builders and produced a product that was Yamaha DNA ......

Anyway, the integration of a mass damper in their line up won't cause me to run out and buy a new Yamaha .... seems to be a gimmick for which the result is less than quantifiable! Didn't explain how it works, how well it works, why it works, etc. I watched the video clip and to be honest, Chris sounded a bit like Rob Ford, Mike Duffy, or Harper trying to make a case for something they've done!

Well plundered legally anyway.
I understand what you mean but wouldn't it stand to reason with the new partnership the Cat and Yam chassis guys get together and co-design something??










But keeping on track, another point think of how much engine vibration is discussed when it comes to these machines. I know I have turned away from purchasing certain sleds due to a paint mixer under the hood. In talking about the dampeners why wouldn't lower chassis vibration allow you not to go faster as Chris said due to the chassis feeling that much smoother. Proven time and again that excessive vibration can be very tiring during a ride/race.

With this said it does seem a bit of a band-aid fix but who knows did we ever think an R1 motorcycle engine would fit into a snowmachine and make for a really fun sled?????