3800 kms and three belts. My third belt is on it's last legs. But I also have a bunch of mods, run oversize tires, pull a trailer and do a lot of serious technical trail riding which is going to decrease the life of a belt. Is it a pain to adjust the clutch? The first time it was when I was playing it by ear. Now it's a piece of cake that I've done about 7 times. A lot of the times I've checked my belt, I was only at about 1" of deflection and the bike wasn't making any squawks, but I figured while I had the cover off, I might as well shim it to the proper deflection and keep it running like mint. The Kawie CVT does require more maintenance than other brands, but once you figure out how to do it, it's no biggee and I wouldn't trade that V-twin power for anything.

 

Man, thats only an 800 mile average per belt, 7 belt ajustments in 2400 miles. thats once every 350 miles. What are you pulling with that machine??? I had 1500 miles on the old oem P650 belt, the only reason I changed it was it was slipping a little in high after I overheateded the belt pulling a 1100 pound load over two mnt passes in colorado. We had stop about half way up the pass to let it cool down, by the time we made it back over 30 miles back to camp my belt was sqaulling on take off. the next day we road most of the time in low to keep from it from sqaulling. Whithout the load it didn't squall in low and we raod at least 100 more miles that next day. I had it out one more time before i took it in for its anual service. I told my dealer I thought I glazed the belt pulling that load over thoses passes. He pulled the cover and showed me and thats exactly what happened. He said deflection was not that bad and would not gain much by adjusting it. I agreed we put the new 700 type belt on and he serviced the rest of the quad inc. valve adjustment. and front and rear gear lube changes and coolant flushed. everything was 230.00 bucks. The belt and labor was 100.00 of that bill. This experince is one of the main reason why everytime someone asked for a recomendation of a true utility quad for work, I always try and direct them away from belt drives all together. I have about 800 miles on my Stock 700 motor Twin Peaks and never had the cover off it and its never made even a cherp. So I am going to keep doing what I am doing. If I can get 1500 -2000 miles with just putting gas in it befor changing a belt , that works fine for me. Like I say thats about one belt every 2 or 3 years for me.

 

I do a lot of maintenance on my machine. It is very therapeutic to have it working perfectly all the time. Like I said in my post, I changed deflection a couple times just because I had the cover off to do regular maintenance (blow out the clutch) and figured while I had the cover off, I might as well shim it so it's right at 7/8" deflection. I also pull a walking beam style trailer that I use when I go camping and it weighs about 500 pounds loaded up. I camp way in the boonies so I'm dragging that trailer up some pretty nasty trails. Bound to wear the belt more than your average joe rider. If you saw where I take my machine pulling my trailer, you'd know why my belt doesn't last long! Also, there are nothing but huge mountains around here so all the quad trails are steep hills. Kicks the hell outta a belt.

 

I'm not trying to restart an arguement. I'm trying to find information from people other than yourself. What's more, I'd kind of appreciate you getting off my back cc1999 considering every reply I've received on this thread thus far has played into the concept I had.

 

Remember the post from South America where the guy had 3400 miles on his P700 and had never touched the belt? Then it started flashing 2wd-4wd and he was wondering if he ran it real easy would it be ok for awhile. Finally the belt broke he said. He also said the Prairie was his only transportation where he lived and worked.

That doesn't sound like constant belt maintenance required to me. I think most guys adjust belts just to find out what all the jive talk about belt maintenance on Kawasakis is all about.

 

mudblaster

mudblaster replied to the thread we were originalily talking about this. I think he brings up a good point. I have herd seveal fokes gripe about the belt minder feature in particular since I think the 2003's were sent into a limp mode because of it. Mudblaster has been getting similar results as I am, except my 2002 does not have a belt light that has to be reset, and both of the 2004's I have are equiped with Dyna CDI boxes that disable that belt minder feature. As I recal that belt minder goes off every 100 hours or somthing, its not fuction related more of a timer to remind you to check it. I can see now why some fokes are checking them and others like myself are not. I feel if it is setup right from the factory and you don't pull heavy loads 2000+ miles is pretty common, without any adjustments needed. I spoke with my mechanic and the newer style belts are even better than the old and he felt that the shimms are only worth messing with if somthing was out of adjustment from the factory and if they are set up correctly and are not cousing any problems then he does not like to mess with them since, the added belt life is minimal and when you do get a new belt you have to remember where they were shimmed to before. His thoughts were that his costomers who are paying him to maintain there quads are money ahead if they just change the belt every couple thousand miles rather than paying him to keep ajusting it to get a few extra miles out of it. He said belts are not that much and most of his customers get around 2000-2500 miles out of them as compared to the labor to adjust one that is about the same price as the belt. He felt if the factory setting was right from the start and you are getting a normal wear life then he recomends changing them rather than adjusting them.

Does that make since to any of you guy's???