What was the year the scrambler started having the central hillard instead of one per side?
I'm looking at buying a 2004 quad.

What else has been updated since 2004?

The redesign in 2009 was plastics and headlights only right, or were otherthings updated in 2009?

Thanks.

 

I believe it was 2010 that things were revised on the Scrambler, including the switch to the central hilliard. My 2008 has hubs, and I think everything stayed the same for 2009.

 

Scrambler's went very late with the single centralized Hillary,and Plastic rollor cage. Are you looking to go that way? The Hub style have twin Metal cages.

 

Which one is better, central or at both wheels? If having it at both wheels is troublesome then I don't want it at both wheels?

 

They both have their good and bad points: As long as you change fluid around 50 hrs on the hub activated system,they have always been a good system, just expect after a few years on most of em to have the armature plates magnetize(about 10 bucks per plate) and maybe a little nuisance on one wheel kicking in even when not in awd(good habit to leave the awd switch in 2 wheel drive on BOTH hub and centralized systems until awd is needed(constant power to plates will cause this to sometimes happen a little quicker)plus possible hub and strut seal leakage,AGAIN after a few years. This system has been the 'bread and butter" and best selling point versus other awd machines through the years.
On the centralized (which I think eventually all will go to) the plastic roll cage cracking has been the problem.They offer on replacement parts an "optional aluminum cage" and on the 2011 Scrambler have it worded as a "high performance option" roll cage. Polaris knows about the problem and hopefully all the future models will be aluminum. If they finally solve this,my old opinion is the cenralized because of smoother engagement when awd kicks in (what I first noticed when they came out) no hub or strut seals or 8 bearings to worry about or jerking to one side if plates stick. I KNOW,I didn't ride em that much in the "real world", I had my hands full just repairing them over the years! OPT

 

Thanks for the great info.

 

Do a "search" and tell me which system has the most posts about troubles.

 

Granted there are a lot of posts on the centralized gear case problems,but if you go into most shops like mine and others there will be more hub awd machines in for repair for the simple fact there were thousands more made in the 23 years since the first 1987 4x4 first came out versus the 7 or so years on the centralized.I've done everything from just changing fluid and plates all the way to replacing whole strut assemblies that were ground down from running dry. Again granted 7 years is long enough on the problems on the current system on the atvs and also the Razr also. Never realized how old the hub system was until about 1993 when an old man came in and bought a Sportsman after he found out how the awd worked. He said he knew more about em than I did.Truth is he was right! He later brought in an old 1942 WW2 repair manual on a half track and showed me the front drive system which was almost identical to the Polaris,only about 3 times larger! He was a field mechanic during the war. So this system is at least 70 years old or older? Plus over the years Polaris changed the seals,bearings, and hubs to accommodate the larger drive shafts and is still a good system. I think eventually the same thing will evolve on the centralized awd system.Its kinda like me in the early 60's with my little transistor am radio versus the i pods and flash drives today that hold a million songs! Can't stop progress. But when you get burnt out(I finally did from the ecms and efi system problems more than ANY AWD problem),you can sorta stop the world and jump off like I did and retire and let the next smarter generation take over. Best of luck to all you guys no matter what you own! OPT

 

On a side note, you'd be surprised at how large of a gear ratio difference there is between the front and rear diffs, you can drop the tranny output sproket by two teeth and just become the same ratio as the front (even with the difference tire size), however this basically leaves the front always driving, and turning becomes very dificult. I learned this when building the jackshaft setup on my snowmoquad project and wanting to keep 4wd.

 

i think you'll find that 95% of the central hillard roller cage breakage is the riders fault as maybe putting it into awd while the back wheels are spinning causing the stress to break the plastic cheap cage. granted not all of them are owners do improper things as part of it is a weak link into the design/ imo.