From an engineering point of view, what is the most advanced suspension design?
As far as I can tell, a lot of bike manufactures(especially up-and-coming ones) main decision list when it comes to rear suspension is:

a) Do we own any patents? (and if it’s a bit compromised, can we make it work), if not, go to b:

b) Can we afford to licence a system of someone else? DW link etc..

then:

c) “Oh well, looks like it’s single pivot again boys!”, or perhaps with a linkage, I guess such a simple lever is unpatenable and free to use?

Now I know there’s advantages to single pivot, such as the simplicity, presumably why even advanced sports cars don’t seem to go any further than a linkage driven single pivot, but I’m wondering about what is the optimum engineering solution for keeping a wheel in contact with the ground and absorbing bumps?

what is the optimum engineering solution for keeping a wheel in contact with the ground and absorbing bumps?

You don’t think that the variety of solutions shows that maybe there isn’t one?

Or perhaps different ones are best for different situations?

Trek or Giants Designs, although the new super star frame is also a very capable design by the looks of it, based on my uneducated opinion of what is what!

Orange’s single pivot – it’s so advanced….

Rocky Mountain’s (sadly discontinued) ETS was pretty revolutionary when it came out, first mass-market Virtual Pivot system, as far as I remember – Outland/SC’s VPP wasn’t launched/developed at that point.

Thing is, in my own humble opinion, more people choose to use simpler systems and manipulate the shock stroke/characteristics. ProPedal/platform damping had just about eliminated the bob issues with single pivot bikrs (i remember my old non-PP’d Marin bobbing like a really bobby thing on climbs), so why not use the simplest/cheapest solution and tweak the shock tip eliminate the undesirable?

Horst Link.

VPP, Maestro, DW, APP (Trek)/Split etc have all been designed to try and obtain the same traits of the Horst Link (active & brake independence) whilst not breaching the patent.

what is the optimum engineering solution for keeping a wheel in contact with the ground and absorbing bumps?

A hardtail and a really big pneumatic tyre run at low pressures.

from a users perspective it has drawbacks of weight and mass to accelerate, though.

Unified Rear Triangle.

The whole damper advancement thing did cross my mind. I suppose it’s at least partially motivated towards giving simpler, more reliable designs advanced characteristics.
Does that mean that a close-to-optimum solution is as simple a pivot system as you can, attached to a super-trick damper?

edit: whats the pivot arrangement on a Horst link? don’t know if I’ve ever seen one (knowingly!)

FSR, look how long its been around and people are still getting excited about the patent running out. Newer doesn’t necessarily mean better.

Every design has good and bad points and different design objectives, this is before we go into the suspension damping units themselves and how they’re set up to work in conjunction with the system and geometrical factors of the rest of the frame and the rider and their component setup.

It’s worth noting that so called ‘suspension Guru bike designers’ come out with new designs on such a regular basis

Do you mean best or most complicated?

so why not use the simplest/cheapest solution and tweak the shock tip eliminate the undesirable

i.e. choose a non-simple solution? Surely the most expensive single part of the suspension is the shock?

Do you mean best or most complicated?

Best. It’s a machine designed to do a job. In this discussion, complication is allowable in the name of improved performance.

people are still getting excited about the patent running out

When does the patent run out, out of curiosity?

Andy

Mogrim – possibly, but maybe not if you’re having to put huge amounts of R&D work into delivering entire new systems. The changes in actual bike/linkage design have been minor (tweak a linkage, move a pivot, etc) compared to the leaps in damper design and setup. Since that development is being done by a third party (Fox, RS, etc) the R&D cost they put in is spread over a much larger number of units than a change to a bike design will be.

horst = FSR = all specialized frames & a bunch of others generally not american (canyon, norco to name a couple). the horst link turner 5 spots were the best 5 spot design.

I personally think Maestro is the most effective along with DW and good Horst setups, but a good single pivot feels the most fun to ride.

Does Horst just refer to the FSR system, or does it include the likes of the old Giant NRS?

If you ride a FSR type 4 bar and then swap to an NRS you will see that exact pivot placement can make a huge difference.

your legs

The most advanced rear suspension system has surely got to be the one that allows the most b@llocks to be talked about it in marketing literature and magazines?

In which case you would think every manufacturer would produce the best system ever.

If you actually intend to use the bike, the most advanced system is that which doesn’t have your rear end slopping sideways after regular use in mud. 🙂

mt beats me to it…too slow tonight 😥

I think Horst Link is the system patented in the USA by Specialized and as used slightly differently by Ellsworth, but probably with some sort of agreement with Specialized. In Europe I don’t think there is patent protection, so it is used by Cube, Lapierre, Nicolai and probably a few others.

Horst is FSR iirc the Horst bit refers to the patent and the area as to where the chain stay pivot can be located not that it is specifically a 4 bar setup. That’s why ellsworth can get away with a chainstay pivot that is slightly outside the Horst area. If you think about maistro and DW systems they are both 4 bar it’s just that the chainstay pivot is much closer to the bb.

Matt, any more detail pics of that bike? Looks brilliant.

Dave Smart(?) ‘Muddy fox Interactive’ – great until you hit wash board stutter bumps.

There are only a couple of different rear suspension designs fundamentally with some variations on how the shock is driven. Its either a swinging fork design ( single pivot) with either a direct or linkage driven shock or its a parallelogram design. The links in the parallelogram can be long or short and again the shock can be driven in different ways.

All designs have advantages and disadvantages so what is best depends on what you want to use it for and where you are prepared to compromise

That one off of the Yeti SB66 looks like it’s fairly complicated, but then I know SFA about suspension.

The one where they use a programmable shock with an electronic feedback and magnetic damping. It’ll be the next best thing ,no need for fancy linkages or suspension gurus

From all the bikes I’ve owned and ridden, my old Reign maestro and current DW 5spot are pretty much identical and bOth very capable- the DW is better as you just don’t notice it working, it just grips and keeps on gripping with virtually zero bob

The one where they use a programmable shock with an electronic feedback and magnetic damping. It’ll be the next best thing ,no need for fancy linkages or suspension gurus

Been done ages ago by Noleen

I now have Dolly Parton’s Jolene in my head.

this thread is silly imho

its like asking ‘whats the best cheese ever?’

A lot of suspension designs were conceived to work around rival companies’ patent constraints.

Such a discussion is futile, remember that a bunch of riders vastly more skilled and you or I are paid a lot of money to demonstrate the superiority of one design over another. The fact that single pivot designs can compete on a level footing with Horst Link, DW, Quad Link and VPP setups pretty much says it all.

Personal preference is another matter entirely. I have a Horst Link bike and a Quad Link 2 bike. Both have different characteristics under pedaling and exhibit different traction properties. But this is largely an engineered in property as axle paths are also subject to patent.

Halloumi…

brie cheddar manchego.