I am trying to decide between a Vforce and a Raptor. I have plenty of sport quad experience but I want reverse and power. My concerns are that a Vforce, due to its auto tranny, will not powerslide on the open trails (something I love to do). Is this the case? Also, I am concerned that it will jump even worse than my old 400ex (that had stock shocks) - I don't jump more than 10-15 feet in distance but the Vforce's weight (really heavy imo) would seem to make jumping, even my small jumps, not much fun at all. I have seen the pictures of people airing out the Vforce but I am not a pro and I do not like being afraid on jumping because the stock suspension is not good enough for such a heavy quad.

I will only be riding trails (both wide and tight), nothing radical. If the Raptors didn't have so many one-way bearing problems I would almost certainly buy it, but I don't want to take that chance. Thanks for the input [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

 

Ben try asking on Exriders watch out what you say or you'll get banned!

 

Well I've hit 35-50 foot jumps with mine many times, and the 700 lands just fine. It's a little ruff on the flat landings due to stock shocks, but I don't think many stock bikes can land good on a flat landing. My brother broke his thumb landing flat on his Z. Now with my Elka's on, I have no problem at all. As far as power slidding, the 700 does quite well. I'm not going to say it will do as good as the Raptor, but it will hold it's own.

 

IMO, the VForce is the best quad for woods riding. The automatic allows you to focus on riding instead of shifting. The shocks on the Raptor will be slightly better in the rough stuff as well as larger jumps. Small jumps are no problem on the VForce but it will bottom large jumps with flat landings. The VForce with aftermarket suspension is the perfect woods machine.

 

i had owned a 400ex it was a good jumper and i now own a 700 and my friend has a raptor. Both great machines and the 700 can power slide with the best of them. But when it comes to jumping the raptor is what you want.

 

Get the Raptor. I bought the V-Force and its now for sale. They suck on the tight trails, and need steering stabilizers for the whoops. Also, the gas tank was way to small, bought the IMS 4 1/2 gallon tank for the long rides.

 

raptor is better for jumping, I like how it lands personally.

 

lilred, I am sorry to here you are looking to sell your VForce. I just did 8 hours of trail riding at Big Rock, KY (Maysville) this past Saturday and had an absolute ball! The VForce is a great trail rider, and an absolute hill climbing/dirtgrabbing monster!

Today I rode quite a bit on the trails with a friend and my son on my 40 acre farm. The neat thing about the VForce is if there is no trail there, you can simply plow thru weeds, over saplings, creek beds, and such and make your own trail as you go! It was a blast, and the neat thing is...I can't get the VForce stuck. It will go almost anywhere. We also were doing jumps tonight and I was launching out about 15 feet or so with no problem. If you jump with good techinque, and land slightly on the back wheels or square on all four the VForce does well. However on some natural jumps on trails and such it will not do as well.

I like the V so much that I have added the larger fuel cell, and do have dual exhaust and Elkas on the way. I think with the proper tweaking it is a wonderful machine.

However, there is a butt for every seat, so it all boils down to personal preference. I also have a Z400 and hate it as it does not fit my butt well, plus is extremely torqey and after riding I feel like I have been beat with a ball bat, but my good friend loves it and rides well on it.

My avise to Maoz is to ride and drive both machines. If the dealership won't let you, then find another dealer.....I did.[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

 

brewster, that is funny. The quad that I want to buy to replace my V-Force is the KFX-400, am I making a mistake? We ride in Michigan, there are many tight, twisty, rooty trails that had my arms aching like someone was trying to rip them off! And how do you like it on the Whoops? I found that the rear end likes to bounce out, making me loose control if I don't hang on. I thought of getting steering stabilizers for it, but is it really worth the extra money? Or should I just sell it???? Oh, and I did get the IMF fuel cell and had the nerfs ordered.

 

MaoZ, those are both good trail machines and both have a lot of torque and power, but in my opinion the V-Force makes a nicer “play” machine. The V has a wider stance (about 4” more) than the Raptor, has more ground clearance and a lower center of gravity so it would be more stable on the trails (both machines in stock form). However the V is no wider than your average Utility machine. With the Raptor being lighter it would be a better jumper when pushed to extremes, but the question is do you go there? I certainly don’t. For the kind of riding I do the V is perfect and you live down there so close to the wonderful Hatfield McCoy trail system, the environment the V-Force excels in.

As good as the HM trails are, every time I go down there I hear from the friendly locals that those trails are only a small sample of what’s really out there in wild, wonderful WV and some have offered to show us around. One of these days I’ll take them up on that.

Anyway power sliding is a breeze, just apply power with a little body English and off you go. The only jumps I’ve done so far are over those perpendicular erosion ditches found on some of the fast trails and it handled those really well.

IMHO for hill climbing you can’t beat a good automatic transmission. You never have to worry about the revs dropping too low and having to deal with downshifting (and possibly losing too much momentum if you do it wrong), or if you want to go faster, you don’t have to worry about upshifting and ending up with not quite enough motor forcing you to drop back down a gear. All you have to do is manipulate that throttle to suit your needs and hang on because the tranny keeps the engine where the power is.

Lifting the front end over trail obstacles is no problem for either machine, especially the Raptor, but the V has ample power to lift the front end at general log approach speeds with ease so you wont miss the clutch.

I’m sure you wouldn’t be disappointed with either quad, I have contemplated getting a Raptor for several years. But when I was finally ready to get a big bore sports machine the V-Force was there and it ended up being perfect for what I was looking for.

Good look and have fun.