15 posts later and we still haven't heard from Baja Ron himself. He'd have all the answers
Guilty!
I try not to jump in on these threads. Always feels like a cheap sales pitch. I'd rather have those who are using my products tell their story. But this is a bit different since so few have had occasion to ride the new bar.
Since the very beginning. I've had customers tell me that they like what the bar does for them. Increased control, handling, confidence and outright enjoyment are good things. But quite a few say they don't think the bar is doing all it could. And they are right. Because a sway bar is what I call a 'Goldilocks' product. A sway bar can be too weak and it can also be too strong. Too strong is worse than too weak. So, to make this item as a one size fits all, from very light weight people riding 1-Up with no luggage, to the other extreme, two-up, heavily loaded pulling a trailer, means leaving meaningful potential on the table for the heavier and more aggressive riders.
I've had this idea for addressing this 'Lack' in the back of my head for quite some time.
We already produce a 3-piece bar for the Ryker. That was pretty much a necessity after every one of my vendors told me not to bother making a bar for the Ryker because it was so miserable to install. "Miserable" being an understatement. Harvey. of Spyderpops. told me he didn't care how much he could charge for that install, it just wasn't worth the aggravation. So, it was either go to the drawing board and figure out a better way to install a bar kit for the Ryker, or go home. I'm not very good at going home. In fact, telling me something can't be done usually assures that I will try. There is a saying that; "No one who ever succeeds was not willing to risk failure". I've found that to be very true. And believe me, I do not always succeed!
I finally pulled the trigger some months back and made prototypes of a 3 piece bar for the Spyder. Not necessarily to ease the install, though we are also looking into that aspect. But maybe to retrieve some of the performance potential for the riders mentioned above, which had eluded me with the original design. And doing so without making the bar too strong for the light rider. I knew that a 3-piece bar would be more impressive visually. I didn't say anything about the project because I frankly didn't expect much improvement in performance. I am so glad that I was wrong.
You might want to quit reading now because things get a bit more technical. But I know there are some of you out there, like me, that eat up this nit-pickity, detail stuff.
The sway bar is nothing more than a spring. It is a highly specific, single purpose system that performs functions which no other suspension component can. But in the end, it's just a spring. The horizontal portion works to move 'weight' or loading from the overloaded outside wheel, to the 'lighter' or unloaded (sometimes lifted off the ground if you get too energetic) inside wheel. This is why you get less lean, etc., with the upgraded bar.
With a 1-piece bar, everything from where the bar starts to bend, to the attachment point at the A-Arm has potential to absorb, or bleed off the torsion energy generated by the center portion of the bar. If anything from the bend to this attachment point can flex, stretch or compress, you are losing energy. This is why simply replacing the OEM plastic composite end links with rigid end links will give you improvement. But with the 1-piece bar, we are still left with flex from the bend to the ridged end link. Which I had always assumed was negligible. And that is where I was wrong.
The spring steel arm flex is not liner. A little pressure creates virtually no flex. More pressure gives more flex, but the flex increases much faster as the pressure increases. This is the beauty of the 3-piece bar. Because just going to a stiffer spring steel would risk a too stiff bar for lightly loaded Spyders. Replacing this portion of the spring steel with rigid billet aluminum arms increases efficiency where it is needed most without increasing stiffness at lighter loads. Sounds like circular reasoning, I admit. But it's the best way I know how to explain the advantage. With the 3-piece bar, virtually all of the energy transfer is applied to the suspension without any increase in strength to the torsion portion of the bar.
As far as availability. I was only able to get 20 of the F3 and 20 of the RT bars produced with this 1st run. The F3 only in Silver and the RT only in Red (Arms & End Links). I have more coming. But things are taking ever longer these days. I did not want to open things up completely until I had enough to supply demand. But I wanted to let people know what is coming. I am selling what I currently have in stock to customers who have an immediate use, like an upcoming trip, etc.
I will still be selling the original bar kit as it is still a viable product. The 3-Piece bar will be $315.00 ($27.00 over the original 1-piece bar kit) delivered to the 48 US States. There will be some shipping cost to other locations. As soon as possible, these new bar kits will be available to all of my vendors.
On a side note. I had a customer call me last week about installing a bar kit. He purchased a 2022 RT, which is sitting at our local Can-Am Dealership awaiting parts. He wanted to know if we could install a bar kit for him while he waits. We arranged it with the dealer but I wanted them to transport it both ways. I could ride it, of course, or use our trailer. But I just didn't feel good about us moving a factory fresh 2022 that the customer hasn't even taken delivery of yet. The salesman (who I purchased our 2019 Ryker from) not only rides, but knows the product better than any salesman I've dealt with before. He texted me after riding the Spyder back to the dealership the next day and said it was the 1st time he'd had a chance to ride the same Spyder from stock to having a sway bar installed back to back. He said he was very impressed.
We put the new 3-piece bar on this one.
See My Update Below... (Post #21)
And just BTW, if you want a link to his faceache page &/or the announcement of his newly released Custom Performance 3-piece Sway Bar for Spyder RT and F3 Models - it's about the 4th line down in the text of the page you get by clicking on his logo on the Home page; and atm, this bar appears as the very first item in the right hand column that's discussed on that faceache page - eeeaaasy as to find it & get there, all it takes is a few clicks of your mouse... 
hyea:
