was wandering if i need to chang oil in crankcase on my sportsman 400 stroke. i know where drain plug is for crankcase but where do you fill it at. i hope this is not a stupid question, i just dont know this one.

 

That's not a stupid question, because a lot of people don't realize the 2 cycle 350 and 400 liquid cooled Polaris' have an Engine Counterbalancer that runs in oil.
The dipstick for the Counterbalancer is located between the carb and the cylinder, looking on the right side down, with the seat (and maybe the airbox inlet duct) removed. It is recommended to replace the oil every 100 hours or once a year.

There is also a crankcase drain on the bottom of the crankcase (10mm hex) to drain oil and gas residue from the crankcase, or if you flood the engine.

 

thanks for info. i had changed my counterbalancer oil today, and saw the other plug and i did not know that the crankcase was run off of counterbalancer oil.

 

The crankcase gets it's lubrication from the gas/oil mixture (gas in the tank, oil in the reservior, oil pump pumps oil). The crankcase is internally separated from the counterbalancer. You can actually remove the crankcase drain plug and run the engine a little bit to expel any gas/oil residue.

 

What kind of oil does the counterbalancer use??

 

Pick yourself up a quart of Mobil 1 10w30 synthetic. I usually change mine at least twice a year. Doesn't take much, so the quart will last you quite a long time.

Ken

 

A word of caution here. I would advise AGAINST running the motor without the crankcase drain plug in. Doing this could cause several problems. The first of which would be to cause the motor to run WAY too lean because of air entering the crankcase. The second reason is you might ingest dirt through that hole and riun the crank shaft.

DO NOT RUN THE MOTOR WITHOUT THE CRANK SHAFT DRAIN PLUG BEING IN!

 

do you think slick 50 gear oil will be ok for counterbalancer oil. thats what i put in it. also in my trans.

 

The slick 50 is 80w90 or something close like that....WAYYY too thick of viscosity for the counterbalance. The manual calls for 10w30.

 

In extremely cold weather, much colder than we have here in Louisiana, modquad is probably right. However, I have run gear oil in my counterbalance for over a year now with no problems. If anything, it runs quieter.

Waylan