I regards to the EPS of the 700 FI Grizz, I have noticed a situation that has not been dicussed. When you are turning to the left and you strick a rock with the the left tire, the bars can be snapped out of your hand. Vice versa is also true. The reason, I believe is that the electric assist is going in the same direction as the force of the impact. The force of the electric assist is just added to the impact. If the opposite wheel is struck by the boulder, then you enjoy the electric force working against the force of the impact. Don't mean this to be a downer on the EPS, just an observation that I have made. If you want to dampen the shock of impact, there are after market adators. Another idea that I have not seen marketed is to insert a spider coupling on the steering stem. I think that would be an improvement in the 2008 model as a compliment to the EPS :cheers: .

I would still like to hear the rational behind no pull starter. What does Yamaha recomend to do when the battery is low and you need to get it started. They have not been able to answer that for me. Jumper cables do not solve this either. After starting and disconnecting cables, the engine dies???

Best Regards :cheers:

 

Now I haven't purposely tried hitting things with either wheel while turning to see if it does this with my Grizzly or not. What I can say though is after 2 different trips to a local riding area (which has plenty of very rocky trails) that the 700 Grizzly is the easiest to handle of any ATV I've ever ridden in those conditions. It's the easiest to steer when you are in a rock garden and bump steer is minimized (not eliminated) better on this machine than any other I've experienced so far. Also, when sudden steering inputs (i.e. corrections) become necessary, especially in rough terrain, it's easy thanks to the EPS.

I can understand your concern over the pull starter, but I guess that is less of an issue with me. In the 8 years I've been riding ATVs so far I have not yet needed to pull start one. I started my Brute Force 750 a couple of times with the pull starter just to see if I could do it (a multi-cylinder engine should be easier to start in this manner). So I guess that demands that we keep on top of our battery maintenance to lessen the possibility of getting into this situation. Also, it seems to me that if you can jump start the quad with jumper cables, but the engine dies when you remove the cables, than having a pull starter would be of no use in that situation either (if you can manage to get the quad started, it shouldn't stay running because it would be like you never had jumper cables on it)...

 

I agree 100% on both