Well I'd Like to hear from people who've ridden both.

I'm 6'1" and 290.

Which is the better all around?

 

honestly you can't go wrong with either one the 650 arctic has a lil more power. the ground clearance is really close to the same the 650 has just a tad bit more. the arctic cat has true independent rear suspension which is nice for really rough terrain but you can disconnect the sway bar off the grizz. i contemplated on buying the grizz but my buddy bought one so i went with the cat and to be honest i am glad i did it sits up a lil higher and in low range it seems the 650 has alot more low end grunt i can sit on mine and crack the throttle and it will flip me backwards and my buddy has to throw alot of his body weight onto the back rack. in the end you can't make a bad choice.

 

Rode with both an AC650 and a pair of Grizz's this week end. One of the Grizz's had the anti sway bars removed. He says it make it work better over rough terrain. After watching all 3 and following each; I have to agree. We never went over 25 mph this whole weekend, but for very rough technical trails the AC setup and the Grizz without anti-sway bars worked far better than the suspension of the sway barred Grizz and he was by far a much better rider.

 

Well the ac is allot more stable, the grizz is norrower and doesn't handle as well. The ac is built heavy duty while the frame and racks on the grizz are light duty. I'd say the grizz has more power than a stock v2 though, or maybe it feals that way because the grizz is allot lighter. The grizz has better engine braking. Both are great machines, buy the one with the features/ looks you like. You won't be dissapointed in either one.

 

hey wook for some reason you are right it feels the grizz has more power but we lined them up and the v2 had more i think you are right about it being lighter and probably because it is smaller it just feels that way.

 

Ok, I've read this and I see where you guys said that the Grizz with the sway bar removed and the AC did much better over rough terrain than the one that still had the sway bar on.

Ok. Yes, that makes perfect sense to me. I took mine off long ago because of this.

My question.. Everyone here realizes it, everyone realized it with the Sportsman 500 for like 6 years. The thing that gets me is how come in 02 when the Prairie 650 came out, everyone and their dog decided that a straight rigid axle (Prairie) which had been around since the creation of time was better than an IRS machine?

The AC V2 is just basically what Kawasaki should have made in the first place.

To answer the question, I would keep my Grizzly. I like its lightweight feel and steering response. If I didn't have the Grizzly, I'd have a V2 though. AC's are built solid. Some CV problems a year or two ago on 500's, but the frames and everything else are tough. My 99 was a freakin tank.

 

me personally i never been on the straight axle bandwagon. i got a 1987 suzuki 250 4x4 and that thing has fully independent suspension front and rear (true independent) and it has high low and super low range and the darn thing has 2wd 4wd and diff lock. i got this rig willed to me when my great uncle passed away in about 97. there was no looking back for me, and what happened suzuki you were ahead of your time in 87 you should be miles ahead of everyone now maybe i should go to the suzuki sight and ask that.

 

Andy I'm glad you bought that question up. I thought it was rediculous how the Kawi 650 won damn near everything in every rag when first introduced. Only thing they raved about was the speed. Everyone got REAL emotional about the speed. Kinda pisses me off really. I am compelled to remind you that in a earlier post (a month or so ago maybe) you did point a guy toward a used kawi 650 with the straight axle over the '05 500i Auto. I think your quote was some thing like "back when the 650 was a new it won every shootout".

I personally would be happy to sacrifice 8hp for a better all around machine which I think the '05 Cat 500i is over the old style Kawi 650.

Andy I'm just waiting for the day that you come back to Cat though. You've had the grizz long enough! :-) Seriously though. I'm glad you've stuck around to help answer questions. We've lost a lot of good resources on here. Guys like Boner and Cowboy. .. Kinda miss 'em.

 

8 HP difference between an AC 500 and a Prairie 650??? Try 15HP. the Prairie has 32HP at the rw and the AC has 17HP, and the AC weighs 160Lbs more HUGE difference.

I have ridden both the AC 500 and 650 and they are great machines for rock climbing and mudding but they are really heavy. For any kind of fast trail ridding, fire roads, or anything that requires decent HP to weight ratio the 500 is a little bloated

 

sammydogs64 If you check the Dyno runs for the 500i Auto on Highlifter's site you'll find that it puts out 21hp at the rear wheels. The 500i standard puts out about 2 hp less. The dyno chart shows the Prairie 650 to produce 31.5 hp. Looks like I was wrong. It's a 9.5 hp difference. But still not a 15 hp difference. What gives the Prairie the HP-at-the-wheels advantage is the straight axle. The Cat 650 with the same engine shows to put out around 26 hp which was more where I was getting my figures from but I was still off. Why does the Cat have so much less? Two answers, AC detuned it a little and the extra CV joints for the IRS. The IRS has quite a bit of loss, a classic example of that is the dyno run between the 500i auto and the Suzuki Vinson. Same engine, same tranny, Vinson has straight axle and cat has IRS, which equals several hp difference.

Personally, a quad is supposed to get you places. The 500i is powerful enough to get you ANYWHERE ya wanna go. Extra hp is nice for a thrill but isn't gonna help ya much on a steep slope, might even hurt ya if you blipped the throttle too far. One might say the extra HP would help in the mud, but there's myriads of examples of guys on Cat 500i's running Outlaws and keeping up with the best of em.

I'd rather have the much better ground clearance, 6.5 gallon tank, limited slip 4wd + locker, longer suspension travel on all 4 wheels, bulletproof Duramatic transmission, and 2 year warranty than 9.5 hp. Put a Dyno jet kit in, add a new filter and drill your muffler baffles and you'll find 4 more horse easy. That'll put you in the ball park and you'll have a much better bike to boot.

.. all my opinion of course .. and comes without warranty expressed or implied. :-)