Bronco engineered to beat Wrangler's VCI (traversing soft terrain) according to member on Wranglerforums

[BossMann]

Saw this thread at work today and had to wait till I got home to post this pic. I think this is what they are trying to convey. I zoomed the pic in to make it easier to see, if you look at the rear tire (passenger's side) it is not contacting the ground flat, it is more on the edge of the tire. This is more evident on the driver's side rear. If you now look at the front tire (passenger's side) you will notice that the tire is flat on the ground. IFS will give a better "contact patch" of the tire to the ground through it's range of motion, up and down. Not ride on the edge of the tire when it is articulating.

...but it’s contacting. IFS likely not.

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[Norm A.]

Lol! I’m still getting a Bronco, it’s just going to be probably a late ‘22 or ‘23 MY I’ve come to the conclusion. Should give me plenty of time to get my finances prepared! Step one for that actually just happened, finally got the refinance done on the condo so now I’ve got $170 more disposable income monthly. Not too shabby!

I just added 13 grand to my build today, had to buy the wife artificial turf for the house to replace the old stuff lol, now we're both Happy

 

[BossMann]

Yeah, his 85% number didn’t make sense. The Badlands with 35s is going some places easier than the same truck without Sasquatch. An inch of extra ground clearance means more than 10mm of up travel more often than not. Both in the same ballpark of capability though.

I can work my way around poor articulation, but if my underbelly gets caught up on a rock and I get high centered I’m helpless. Ground clearance for the win. I want the articulation for sure, but I’ll take ground clearance as a consolation.

 

[MoabRox]

so I have never had a failure on my disco, but lots of reports of issues especially for guys who live in areas where they ford water and the disco get pretty wet, I am in California so a water crossing is a really Exciting big deal...

And I do agree the extra loose travel in bumps can be nice, I had a chip in my last rubicon that would increase the recon sales if I wanted from 18 to 35 miles per hour... I actually did like leaving it loose under 35 for that exact reason... but I did have a Sahara befor with the quick disconnects and it was fine as I said and I would leave it loose and do it during air down and air up... but once I had the rubicon with the auto I wouldn’t have gone back. My business partner is like you he won’t even get power windows, he like thinking if it as his apocalypse vehicle, and wants everything as simple as possible to avoid breakage and increase ease of repair. But for me it being my daily driver, I want the bells and whistles and maybe spring for extended warranty

That's good info and food for thought. My Bronco will be a daily driver too.
This is my apocalypse vehicle. A 1977 Dodge M880, upgraded with a Mopar 440, lift and 35s. It's EMD proof too!

 

[BigMike949]

That's good info and food for thought. My Bronco will be a daily driver too.
This is my apocalypse vehicle. A 1977 Dodge M880, upgraded with a Mopar 440, lift and 35s. It's EMD proof too!

that’s an awesome truck

 

[BigMike949]

I can work my way around poor articulation, but if my underbelly gets caught up on a rock and I get high centered I’m helpless. Ground clearance for the win. I want the articulation for sure, but I’ll take ground clearance as a consolation.

nothing mire fun than getting high pointed solo

 

[TeocaliMG]

@TeocaliMG thank you for the great write up in the thread this came from. This seems to be the better thread to ask the question. Please walk us through some more of the details to better understand: "but having more downtravel than uptravel will let the IFS flex better" when you put on the "35's with no lift" ?

To keep it very brief, there is no single ideal ride height for a given suspension travel. A good benchmark would be to sit at the middle of your travel, even at high speed because you need both jounce and rebound budget for undulating terrain. Most "lifts" just jack the ride height up within the same wheel travel. This lets you run bigger tires and have more ground clearance but it also effectively limits your wheel travel unless you have very linear springs because it will be much harder to compress through all the rebound and take advantage of your maximum flex possible. The Bronco is cool because its coming from the factory with very good tire package with the suspension at mid sag, or around the middle of the travel. If you want an IFS rig to flex more, aside from disconnecting the sway bar it is good to trade jounce travel with rebound. As others have pointed out that's one of the benefits to SFA in most set ups. I was pointing out that the overland rig with true 35's sitting right at the middle of its travel will flex better than a more jacked up rig with a bit more clearance. Of course there is no perfect set up, it will always depend on the obstacles.

 

[TeocaliMG]

"Those who cling to the solid axle vs independent suspension argument miss some important details. A solid axle setup can offer more articulation unless the independent suspension has long travel arms. If both offered the same amount of articulation, the independent suspension would yield a higher VCI than the solid axle because the independent suspension could keep more tires in contact with the ground and with more even pressure to the ground so they would actually work better. "

You mean if there is zero body roll and no camber changes? Not much ground contact here.

There are ways to change IFS flex without "smart suspension" Including the fulcrum effect. But its not something I would consider practical when you could just build and SFA rig if that's what you want. But for the most part I agree.

One thing I would point out regarding VCI, and this is admittedly an assumption, is that "more even pressure" would be better represented as "more equally distributed tire force", not specifically flat placed tire patch. That's not to say tire patch profile/camber is not important. I just think that having an equal force put down by each tire regardless of contact patch is more important and likely what VCI is trying to measure.

 

[tshaw2009]

Did I just read that correctly that Ford is claiming that even the Bronco Sport outperforms the Wrangler. That is some serious talk there, Ford!?!?!?!?

 

[TeocaliMG]

Did I just read that correctly that Ford is claiming that even the Bronco Sport outperforms the Wrangler. That is some serious talk there, Ford!?!?!?!?

Highly doubtful, I think they are talking about direct competitors. So the Renegade/Compass/Cherokee

 

[Gamecock]

Did I just read that correctly that Ford is claiming that even the Bronco Sport outperforms the Wrangler. That is some serious talk there, Ford!?!?!?!?

No, you did not read that correctly. It says the Sport outperforms the Compass/Renegade...it's competitors.

 

[Flourman]

BuT iT DoEsN’t HaVe A v8.

 

[tshaw2009]

No, you did not read that correctly. It says the Sport outperforms the Compass/Renegade...it's competitors.

The result is that both the Bronco and Bronco Sport were set to exceed competitive Jeep models (Renegade/Compass & Wrangler). They accomplished that with the Bronco Sport and claim to have done it with the Wrangler.

The way they worded the second sentence seems to imply that the Sport not only met its goal of exceeding its direct competitors, but even went as far as beating the Wrangler. We all know that the Big Bronco beats out the Wrangler already. Their wording is just a little open-ended here.

 

[BigMike949]

BuT iT DoEsN’t HaVe A v8.

The wrangler v8 is going to cost 70k plus

 

[tshaw2009]

BuT iT DoEsN’t HaVe A v8.

And that sir, is a travesty. They could have just made a hybrid 5.0 Coyote to put in the Bronco, lol.

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