I was doing some chain harrowing in my paddock today when I had a strange problem.

First let me say that although my Polaris is a diesel the gearbox and everything else is identical to the 1999 Sportsman so any problems with it should be the same.

I was pulling the 10 foot chain harrow over some rough lumps that the builders left when they built my new workshop, when the harrow hit a large lump I lost traction at the rear wheels and yet the front wheels weren't turning despit having the 4X4 turned on. It took me a few minutes to realise that although I was still in low gear the neutral light had come on, I pushed the gear lever forwards the light went out and I had 4 wheel drive again until I hit the next lump the light came on again and I lost drive to the front wheels. I finished the job by resting my boot against the gear lever every time I came to the rough bits, very awkward as my paddock is fairly steep.

It's obvious to me that the front drive system doesn't work when the neutral light is on but as it is lighting up when I am firmly in low gear it must need some sort of adjustment.

I was wondering if it's something that other people have experienced and if there's simple to adjust the neutral indicator light switch.

 

There are 2 places the neutral switch can be. It can either be in the shifter box (look for wires coming out of the box at the bottom of the gear selector lever) or in the tranny housing itself (look for wires going into the side of the tranny housing). I don't know where they will be on the Diesel. On my 99 Xplorer, they are on the tranny housing, if that helps any.

Chances are that the neutral switch/sensor is either dirty, sticking, or going bad. Sometimes taking the switch out, and cleaning it up good with WD-40 or electrical contact cleaner will help. For the ones in the tranny housing, they are activated by a little spring loaded plunger which can occasionally stick.

Either way, the machine is working as designed. For safety reasons, you are only supposed to have 4wd when in a forward gear, unless you are pressing the override button.

 

Thanks for the suggestions Farmr123. The wires go into the shifter box so that was quite easy to get to, after a little fiddling with the lever I realised that it wasn't actually locking into low position so it just needed a half a turn of adjustment on the remote connecting rod between the shifter box and the gear box.

Problem solved.

 

Glad it is working!