I am looking at buying a 500 manual. I currently have a 400 auto. I love this bike but i want more power and i dont like the cvt tranny when it comes to deep mud witch is what i ride most. I would like some feed back on how much gear shifting you have to do on the 500 when trail ridding and how easy is it to get it in reverse. ( these are are 2 things i do like about an auto just hit the gas to go, then stop, and just pull one lever to go backward) any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

 

I don't have a lot of experience on mine (less than 200 miles), but it has plenty of power (I tow a 2000 lb trailer up over the curb into the back yard w/o difficulty) so shifting is required more to optimize speed than to keep it in the meat of the power band in order to make it pull.

I will say it is a PITA to get it into reverse sometimes. It has to be in neutral before it will shift into reverse and even then sometimes it takes a little fiddling to get it to go. This might be because mine is so new. That said, so far I am very happy with mine.

 

thanks for the reply. 1 more question, you talked about only shifting alot to keep it in full power. Can you trail ride only using 2nd and 3rd gear, I understand you would not have alot of power doing this but will it pull 3rd at slow speed.

 

Of course it depends on the terrain, but yes mine will take off from a standing start in 3rd gear in high range. In low range, I think any gear will make it go, but I haven't tried that yet.

 

the 500 is awsome. i own a 2002 500i and i will never go any bigger. my friend just got rid of his kawasaki 750 to buy the ac500, he couldnt believe what all i did with just a 500. we do alot of trail riding around here(missouri). we have pretty much all combinations of trails, mud,hills,rock,smooth,ect...im running 27' 589's on mine and trail riding in 2nd or 3rd is not a problem. which that puts you at about 15mph. yes you can stop, put it in 2nd and start off all day long. low range you can put it in 5th and its like 2nd gear high. this bike is a tank,mine has 2800 miles and not one problem. the only thing is that i dont think the 500 manual comes with low reverse like mine does. 2005 or 04 was the last year.

 

Thanks I think I will buy the 500m

 

The 400 lost the low range reverse, the 500 still has it.

I am dying to get a 500M myself.

 

Yeah, talk about a stupid move that can't be explained by anything except stupidity. But there is a guy building a conversion kit that gives the 400 a low range reverse, only $150 plus your old gears.

 

Does the 500 have the same High/Low range sub-transmition as the Suzuki Vinson since it uses the same engine? There are definately alot of machines out there that have way to high of a reverse gear including our Eiger and Rhino. Our Prowler has a single reverse gear but at least is is geared low.

 

Kind of an old post but -
One thing I do like about an auto transmission is that you can 'rock' it back and forth between forward and reverse relatively easy (even though the forward is high range - with a little extra time you can hit low range forward).