JACKAL
Ancient Honda fanboi
Moderator
Lifetime Member
Supporting Member
Club Contributor
Dammit Trigger! Now I gotta get my 2cents in. The Honda propaganda brags about IRS- Independent Rear Suspension. If you ever watch a P5 going over rough terrain from the back, the rear suspension (stock) barely moves, (or the front for that matter) and when going through ruts, or over big obstacles you will often see the corner to corner teetering act with one wheel on two corners in the air- some of you have seen my videos in the suspension thread demonstrating that one- because the machine is ridiculously over-sprung to begin with- unless loaded very heavy, like stupid heavy- I had 700+ lbs on mine, and still couldn't compress the suspension to get all four wheels on the ground during one of those 'teetering' events- with the rsb removed!. So, what the h** is the point of IRS if it never IRS's to begin with, and then adding an additional, ridiculously over sized torsion spring (rsb) that ties the two sides of the rear suspension together virtually guaranteeing that it will never move independently like it is supposed to? Phew! glad i got that off my chest!
Pretty simple to answer really. Attorneys, liability over stability (or lack thereof at speed) Honda learned from their ATC experience on 3 wheelers you just can't expect people to drive responsibly according to the terrain, and when they get hurt it sure wasn't their fault they were drinking and putting their foot down when it tipped. Same issue Kawasaki went through with Mule lawsuits, nothing terribly wrong with the machine the design flaw was sitting between the seat and steering wheel.
So yes in low speed situations having greater articulation is awesome, but speed it up and body roll can be unnerving to the novice. The problem the engineers have to deal with is age requirements instead of IQ and experience requirements, then the attorneys really throw in the tarantulas for a good design.