I bent mine as well. I HAVE NO IDEA how.... polaris ended up replacing it under warranty... they got back to me after the fact and said polaris rejected the claim.. I'm close with my local dealership so they still covered it.

 

Polaris said it was from jumping it.... which is BS.. I would have fought it if they didn't cover it initially.

 

Did you recall a big impact? Something must have occurred. Someone should come out with a bolt on c channel gusset to increase the strength.
Utv.inc??

 

I had the left side stuck in a mud hole for awhile. Could have happened there but I don't recall any rocks under it or anything. I figured I would have bent an a-arm before that beefy trailer arm.

Either way Polaris would take one look at my rig and deny the warranty claim. Ended up getting a take off trailing arm from eBay for $200. Even found a blue one. Had 2 day ship it for my weekend ride coming up. Going to remove the old one tonight, doesn't look to bad to take off. Hopefully the shock is alright.

 

I fabbed up some gussets for my stock arms.

 

Nice job Steve!

 

Steve excellent job, nice fab work!

A word to those fabbing their own up at home, it's easy to build these braces too big for stock wheel clearance. If you plan to use your stock wheels and tires for warranty work like I do, make sure to fab the braces to fit with stock wheels, not just your after market wheels.

 

Looks great Steve! It appears you moved around as you welded, to minimize heat warping too. I'm going to guess you welded your slits you cut in for bending, from the inside, before you placed it on the arm? You did a quality looking job.

If you experience cracking next to the welds in the front or rear of your brace, I'd recommend making a brace that tapers on the ends. That way you're not welding 90° to the strength of the arm. A <> shaped gusset will alleviate that, as compared to a straight across weld. You could skip weld the ends to try and prevent carbon cracking, but if you don't weld it solid, it will always drip rust when it gets wet.

Keep up the good work.

 

Thanks guys! I welded the slits from the outside. Zoom in on them and you'll see that's the only way you could do it. My neighbor has a cnc plasma table, which makes little projects like this so easy.

Good call on tapering the ends. I actually do that at work a lot. Didn't think about it for this. If that front weld was directly under the shock mount, I would be worried. But where it's at it should be fine.

And I did use the stock wheel to check fitment. Never know what you may have on it in the future on when you sell it.

Thanks for the input!

 

I was thinking you could weld the slits on the inside, before you welded it to the arm. Regardless, it looks like you did a really nice job, and I'm sure it will perform much better than stock did! The paint looks good too!