How reliable are thye Can-ams compared to Hondas?

 

I try to do good maintenance on my off road vehicles, and I think both of these are very reliable brands. Just going from my own personal experience with ATVs and motorcycles that I have actually owned from these brands, it has gone like this:

I owned at least a dozen Honda dirt bikes (-- CR250s and CR500s --) in the past. I used them for desert racing and motocross racing, and won a lot of races, and two championships. The bikes were ridden hard, as hard as I was physically capable of pushing them. The only problem I ever had in two decades of racing was one ignition failure that caused a single DNF. That doesn't include self inflicted problems that were not the bikes fault, like one broken hub from coming up short on a hundred foot triple, and smaller items like bent handlebars, bent wheels, etc.

Our family has also owned two TRX90s, a 250EX, a 300EX, a 400EX, and a Rincon 650. No problems what so ever from the TRX90s, the 300EX and 400EX. The 250EX lost lubrication to one of the crankshaft bearings somehow. The Honda dealer could never tell us why this happened, but the engine's bottom end froze up, and the ATV was a total right off because it cost more to fix than it did to replace with a 400EX. The Rincon had a few issues as well; a broken CV joint, and the torque converter needed to be replaced. The Rincon spent a LONG time in the service department waiting for a backordered torque converter (9 weeks).

I have owned three DS 650s, and I used them for desert racing as well. They were also ridden as hard as I could possibly ride them. They were ridden too hard at times, and they threw me off more than a few times. One of them accumulated 7000 miles use, and the other two each had over 5000 miles use. I also have a Renegade 800 now, that only has 500 miles on it at the present. I have had a grand total of ZERO problems from any of my Bombardier (Can Am) ATVs. I did have a few "self inflicted" parts failures just like on the Honda dirt bikes, including a set of handlebars on one of the DS 650s that got bent from a high speed end over end tumble, and a few bent wheels. I never had a DNF on the DS 650s.

I personally would not let reliability be the deciding factor for either of these brands, at least not based on my own experiences. Other factors are a bigger issue in my mind, such as customer service from each particular dealer in your area, performance, price, etc.

DV