I was just wondering which one you guys prefer. I read the Dirtwheels shotout but I want your opinions. Any info will be appreciated

 

400EX all the way !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

I have ridden both, and I bought the 400ex. The Raptor is a nice bike, but does not feel as stable to me, it feels like it wants to tip over on turns. As for all you will hear about how much faster the Raptor is in the drag race, look at it like this. The Raptor beat the 400ex in a drag race by .5 tenths of a second. When you blink your eye, that is .25 of a second, if you blink your eye twice, you have a half of a second. When the Raptor hits the finish line, blink your eye two times, and you will have an idea of how far behind the 400ex is.

All the bikes are relatively close in the drags, but the 400ex handles the best in my opinion. In the woods, the speed doesn't matter much to me, how often do you ride in 5th gear in the woods? Ride them both, and figure out witch one you like. If you are close, you are more than welcome to come over and ride my 400ex.

What ever you do, don't worry about who has the fastest, just have fun and pick the bike that fits your needs. When I bought my 400ex, I knew the Raptor was faster, but I didn't need all the speed, I needed a bike I would be comfortable on, and I love my 400ex!

 

They are both great all around machines. But if you have a power complex and mental issues with it, such as myself [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img], then you won't be happy with the 400EX.

 

Racer18J, your math is a good way to cloud the issue on how close the races are. Do you realize that at the Raptor's top speed of 71mph that bike is covering 104/second? So in that 5/10ths of a second you are referring to the Raptor has gone 52feet. Go out and measure 52 feet, it's a good stretch. That doesn't even factor in the Raptor's quicker accleration to top speed and the 400EX's slower overall top speed. The mag's 300ft. drags aren't really that indicative of what real world drags are about. You and I both know that when we get out with our buddies on an open road we go wide open for roughly 10 seconds, maybe more. The 400EX's top speed has it covering 95 feet/second and as previously mentioned the Raptor is doing 104 feet. Now, run our bikes together at top speed for 10 seconds (like most of us do) and the Raptor has just put 90 feet on the EX. 90 feet is a good distance, roughly 15 bike lengths, and the gap keeps growing.

People can run around talking about 5/10ths of a second difference but neither bike gets to top speed. The mags really can't say, "We ran these 2 bikes in a drag race and before these bikes could shift into 4th there was only .5 secs difference." You think people would take the drag results seriously if they actually told you how they went down?

 

I will say this.
My friends & I were doing some racing this past Saturday at a local quarry everyone ride at. When he raced Raptors on his 400EX I was surprised at close he was. I think there was still room for the Raptor to maybe accelerate a tad more before getting on the brakes, but like I said the 400 put up a better race than I would have thought.
Drags aren't about top speed. Drags are a race of acceleration. Only 16 year old kids in mom & dads car worry about top speed.
On the note of the Raptor being unstable. When we were at the end of the track & they were coming at us the Raptor looked so thin almost like a motorcycle with training wheels on it. Whether it's as stabble as a 400EX is a matter of opinion. I suppose the harder you ride the more stable the 400 seems.

 

GuyRaptor,

Don't blow a head gasket trying to defend the Raptor. Your math is what is going to cloud things. Your theory of 104ft per second is not even close to reality. How can you say the race would only be 52 feet long? You would have to be going 71mph when the green bulb comes on. The 104 ft per second cannot even be a factor until you have reached 71mph, how long does that take? It will be a lot longer than .5 seconds and 52 feet.

I do agree with you that once you have reached top speed on both bikes the gap will grow. Also, when you race for 10 seconds from a dead stop you don't cover that much ground. The way you worded it, you usually race for 10 secs at 104ft per sec, that is 1,040 ft, plus what ever distance it took you to reach top speed, you are looking at a race that is roughly a 1/4 mile long.

The reason the Mags don't go over top speed for thier test is because the average rider will usually not see a near perfect 1/2 mile strech to race on, these are not made for freeway use. Drag racing is set up for short distance acceleration, thus they set a distance limit. They do not need to race for 1/2 mile to figure out how much farther ahead the Raptor will be, once both bikes have reached top speed, they can use math to figure that out, just like you did. Acceleration is what this is all about, and the bigger cc bike does not always have the advantage right from the start. I have seen a 9sec dragster beat an 8sec dragster to the 1/8 mile, but in a 1/4 mile the 8sec car cathes up on the top end.

 

I will add this, I have ridden both of them. One of the guys that I ride with daily has a raptor and it's a great machine. We have never actually raced them against each other in a drag because we both know that it doesn't mean s... I bought a new 400 last fall and he bought the raptor last fall. I think it really comes down to what you personally like. The performance of these two machines is so close that a race between equal riders on a track might be determined by what mood they were in that day. Other guys are talking about blinks of eyes and 50 ft. That is all relative to where you are riding and how aggressive you are.
I would readily admit that the raptor is a very nice machine and a little faster, but $1500 worth?, not to me. The raptor is tippy because it's 2 inches narrower in the rear than the 400, my buddy is correcting that with a $300 durablue extended axle.
Just a thought, you could put $500-1000 into you 400 with a 440 kit and I guarantee that it would slaughter a raptor while still giving up 220 cc.

 

Racer18j, how much faster is the tecate than your 400EX. I know that the 400EX handles alot better and is better for MX and prbably XC, which are the main conditions I'll be riding but I am going to the dunes and I don't want to get beat by everyone just cause they are on 250's.

 

I will tell you the T4 literally runs circles around the 400ex. There is no comparison between the two when they are drag raced on pavement. With the mods I have, the T4 is a Raptor eater all by itself! Where it is soo good is on the starts, you can nail first gear and the front end is glued to the ground. Most of the 4 strokers have a heck of a time keeping the front end down in first gear, and if you can't use 1st gear to it's full potential, you lose a lot of ground.

It also has the 2nd highest top speed of any quad ever made, the Zilla was 79mph in stock form and the Tecate4 was 75mph stock. For trail riding, I will always choose the ex, in the woods is where the tables are turned and the 400ex thumps the Tecate4. But for pure straight line power, I would have a Tecate4 before I would want a Shee, the only other bike I would want would be a Zilla.