I know parts are available right now, but what about in a year or longer and will they get too expensive, since there won't be backed at all by a factory?

 

i agree with above. for about the same price you can get a new YZF450 if your buying new and yamaha isnt going anywhere down the bankrupt route.

 

The only thing is that cannondale legally has to make parts for 5 years no matter what, so no worries should be of them not making anymore parts. and for the whole cannondale being fast thing, Lets line em up ANYONE, Cannondlae will blow any other stock machine AWAY!

 

Sorry but Cannondale DON'T have to make parts for 5 years.Cannondale motor sports is out.No legal bond or nothing.

There are people getting parts from the orignal venders and have bought alot of parts from the liquidation sale.They are the only thing keeping Cdale alive.

There is alot of talk latley about some new owners and the start up of production again but only time will tell.

I for one love my dale and I am going to stick it out awhile and see what happens.
I saw a yfz in action and was impressed with the power but it will need the same suspention and chase mods as every other quad out there.

To answer the ?Cannondale..bad idea?
If you are buying a quad to keep for a long time I would hold off right now on any purchase untill honda makes there move.

If you just want a quad to race for one season and then move on to what ever else is hot at the time get a dale or a yfz.You could get a dale for half the price of a yfz now.
Its a gamble for both the above right now as the yfz is not proven yet.

 

I wouldn't suggest buying a cannondale unless you can personally justify finacially. In my opinion I wouldn't buy a cannondale new unless it was around or under $3,000.00 The problem is not only is the engine more complex than a 2 stroke, but I believe in the future your going to see far less support for Cannondales to fix them than any other manufactuer based on the fact that there haven't been around that long and there are vary few repair shops that will touch them. Furthermore it would be like trying to find parts for an LT500 which was only made for a few years but even worse because far fewer cannondales were produced and sold IMO than LT 500's plus Yamaha never went under Cannondale did. The mere uniqueness and complexity of the engine, alloy frame, componets, fuel injection will make it vary vary difficult to deal with as time goes on. the more I think about it the more I think even 3k would be to much for one.

I would much rather buy something and spend twice as much if I knew the manufacture was not going under and the design was simple enough to work on as is the YZF450.

 

I think the biggest support problem will be with the electronic control boards. Maybe a good busines for someone to be in. The engineering and support for these boards will not be available like aftermarket A-arms, shocks, etc. etc. And given this was a "proprietary" board - meaning exclusive to Cannondale, not too many will have the info to diagnose - other than dealers who may no longer want to waste their time keeping your older C'Dale running when they really would rather sell you a new machine from somebody else.

 

There are no electronic control boards on the Cannondale, there is a sealed ECU. The ECU is made by Sagem (now Johnson Control) and is not proprietary, it is also used by Triumph and a few others I'm sure. The only thing about the ECU that was proprietary is the programing, and that was done by Optimum Power which is still in business and supporting the Cannondales.

 

Grab the latest dirt wheels they have all the info you ned for the dales if you have one are considering one , there are a few forums that you can get unlimited help from several of us and are more than willing to help out to the point that some guys will even travel some distances to give you a hand . I personally have one and recommend a ride to change anyones mind about the quad . Though some people are die hard fans of other manufactures and have nothing but ugly things to say to you that think like that when you need help and a daler was flamed by you look else where for help , we are all in the sport togther , and you win some you l.ose some but at the end of the day you can all sit around and have a good time talking about the trails or track and be equal .

 

airtime- has good points. I would not buy a dale with the yammy 450 out or the rumoured honda coming. If those 2 were not availible then the dale would be a good choice. The dale had its time but i would move on. It is a shame that cannondale went under. They would have been good by now. They should have forgot the motorcycle and bought a built motor from another company. They would still be around. Oh well coulda, shoulda ...

 

i guess will find out tonight what honda will do. anyway, talk to my local cdale dealer today and he is placing a large order from atk for cdale parts. so factory parts are still here, just not from cdale. one more point, fuel injection has been around for 20 years, why is every body so scared of it. if fuel injection was not the absolute best and reliable form of induction then the large automobile manufactures would not use it. in a few more years fuel injected atvs and motorcycle will be the norm. cdale was just ahead of it's time. the fastest production corvette ever is a 350 cubic inch fuel injected z0-6. it makes 385 hp and doesn't kill our environment doing it. besides i don't see carburated engines being able to pass the strict emission requirements coming in the near future. for goodness sakes, they have fuel injected freakin lawn mowers!