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Mahindra & Mahindra’s dimensional engineering team needed to understand how tolerances on suspension linkages influence the kinematic behavior of a double wishbone suspension. A conventional tolerance stack-up could not capture how the parts move relative to one another through the suspension’s range of motion.
The team had to predict camber, caster and toe variation, find the worst-case bump steer gradient, and isolate the components driving that variation — using a mechanical digital twin of the assembly instead of a static model.
3DCS Variation Analyst simulates how part and assembly tolerances propagate into functional variation. At Mahindra it modeled the full double wishbone suspension and quantified each contributor to camber, caster and toe.
The Mechanical Modeler add-on defines the kinematic joints of the linkage so the model moves like the real assembly. This made it possible to run multi-position analyses across the full range of suspension travel.
The Advanced Analyzer & Optimizer identified worst-case conditions and supported iterative tolerance optimization, helping the team bring the bump steer gradient into an acceptable range.
3DCS runs natively inside major CAD platforms, and its outputs fed downstream tools such as Siemens LMS and MATLAB Simulink — extending the digital twin into full vehicle dynamics analysis.
Every kinematic joint of the double wishbone assembly — UCA, LCA, knuckle, hub and wheel — was defined to simulate the actual build.
Position tolerance on the LCA mounting holes was isolated as the dominant contributor; the camber bolt is rotated to bring the value into the specified range.
Simulation confirmed the strut length contributes little to variation because it is kinematically adjusted during assembly.
Multi-position analysis of camber, caster and toe across the range of motion enabled iterative tolerance optimization for acceptable behavior.
All simulation results were compared against actual vehicle wheel alignment values, confirming the accuracy of the model.
Stack-up studies feed other departments and simulation tools across Mahindra's chassis suspension programs, from design to plant.
At Mahindra & Mahindra, dimensional engineering feeds the wider development process rather than sitting downstream of it. The stack-up studies produced with 3DCS are used as inputs by other departments and simulation tools, and the same approach is applied across chassis suspension programs — wishbone, mechanical and multilink systems alike.
The team’s GD&T expertise (ASME Y14.5) underpins this work, ensuring that the tolerances driving the simulation match the definition on the drawings and, ultimately, the parts on the vehicle.
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