I have been hearing lots of stuff about trailing arms.
they have their place. Polaris chose a-arms on the rzr "S" and the General (and xp) for a reason.
Trailing arms soften the ride a little, and give you a little more control, in a racing situation, or really fast trails. Their downsides. The radius rods are exposed to trails debris (rocks....), the trailing arms themselves are exposed to ruts rocks stumps etc, and I have experienced both situations where the radius rods hang up on rocks (bent one on a brand new rzr xp) and in a really bad situation on the same xp rzr, had the right side trailing arm get hung on a rut which lifted that wheel up just enough to give the other wheel traction and "rear steer" the machine (sorta like a zero turn mower), and this was on a hillside trail where turning was unacceptable and frankly dangerous. That was in fact a dangerous situation when it steered itself to the cliff side which was obviously less than confidence inspiring. Later in the day I drove a General XP up the same trail and it was trouble free, a little more confident in the ruts. It was effortless other than a little bit of a rougher ride.
--but--when we put the xp out in the faster trails, dunes more or less, the general couldn't touch it. But there was a weight difference too.
also on the trailing arm setup, the tires tend to "toe" and they also tend to camber quite a bit during suspension travel which can affect how it handles in the more technical typical trails that we have here. In the dunes and in a more racy situation, that stuff is of little issue. Pro R addressed the toe issue with a toe link that runs inside the trailing arm.
Polaris tested this stuff, and that's why the trail S and rzr S all have a-arm suspension (they are designed for trail riding) where the pro r, pro xp, turbo xp and xp 1000, are all trailing arm style-they're more "racing" thatn trail riding, although it seems people often use them on the trails here.
