My cousin, Cletus, told me about his neighbor's nephew, Billy Bob, who once overhead some guy at the farmer's market talking about a Yamaha that broke down.

Cletus never mentioned any Hondas breaking down so that must mean that all Hondas are very reliable and all Yamahas are no good. It's a fact!!!

 

I owned a Warrior for years, and I have to say I prefer the Hondas. The quality is better, and the Warriors suspension is far inferior to even the 300. The Warrior handles like a big klunker. Every time I changed oil on the Warrior there was a PILE OF METAL SHAVINGS IN THE OIL FILTER. Ok, I would expect this from a new bike during break-in, but not after hundreds of hours!! I couldn't imagine where all those shavings kept coming from??

 

YZGUY,
I will be changing the oil in my Raptor soon again and I sure hope I don't have big piles of metal shavings in my oil filter because if I do that yellow 400EX could be in my future a lot sooner. Chet

 

The Raptor has a spin on filter, so shavings will be inside where you can't see them! When I bought the Warrior, the mechanic warned me about this. He said Yamaha just doesn't clean off the parts before they assemble the engine. He said to ride it no more than 2 hrs, then change the oil and filter. I did that, and there was a HUGE pile of shavings. Thing is, the shavings NEVER STOPPED COMING!! At every oil change there would be a nice little pile. I was happy to get rid of the thing!

 

Your right it does have a spin on oil filter. Suppose to be easier but not the first time. The first time I tried to take the oil filter off someone at the factory vised it on for me. I had to take a screwdriver and punch through the filter to get it off. I will have to go and inspect the filter more closely for metal shavings. My former 300EX did handle much better than my nephews Warrior. So far he has had hiswarrior over a year and had good luck with it, but I still prefer a 300EX over the warrior because of the handling issue. Chet

 

As far as your original question they are both of good quality.I have had 3 yamahas.The first was a 1988 big bear that would not die,the second was a 1995 wolverine that was no problems and now I have a new kodiak.I have to admit that I would have SERIOUSLY considered the Rubicon if part time 4x4 was an option.On our last big ride the only person to have a problem was a guy with a rubicon,it started overheating for some reason.it was weird,just 5 mins before that happened he was bragging on how good it was.Hate to see anyone have problems but that was kinda humerous.I see time and time again how great hondas are and they are good,but based on my experience one is not better than the other.Another guy that goes with us has had a rear diff leak on his 450 foreman from almost day one so it can happen to any of them.Sometimes I think the blind faith thing carries over to the quads..............kinda like the ford/chevy thing you know..LOL