This does not apply to the 500, and the 4X4 does not help, but the 400 Scrambler is almost in a class of its own.
After a few affordable motor parts it becomes a "Muscle Quad".
It cost less than a Raptor or DS and can blow them away in a drag race.

Kind of like a rich collage chump in his daddys Vett on saturday night.
You pull up next to him in a older Muscle Car that costs less than his paint job.
Giv him the nod, light turns green, and you blow past him throwing burnt rubber all over his hood. FUN FUN FUN
Some of us cant run out and buy the Rags "Best of" every year.
Instead we build "MUSCLE QUADS" or MODIFIED POLARIS 400 SCRAMBLERS.

Thank you for not calling it a Rag certified Sport Quad.

 

For $6499 I think you should throw Cannondale's Cannibal into the ring as a "High Performance machine"....

 

Hey magacrash~
The engine in the 400 Scrambler is very capable of blowing away a Raptor or DS in a straight line, but at the end of every straight is a corner. The suspension and handling on the Scrambler can not even compare to a DS or Raptor. It would take a couple thousand dollars in suspension parts to bring the Scrambler up to par with the DS. Then you still have to deal with the extra weight. How many mods could you add to a 400 Scrambler and have only $5,500 invested? That's what I paid for my brand new DS650. That might get you even in a straight line, but once the going gets rough, or the trail gets twisty, the Scrambler will fall way behind. If your main kind of riding is drag racing, the Scrambler can be one of the best! Of course, on most trails there are corners and I enjoy keeping my speed up through those corners. So is the DS a better machine? In many categories, yes it is. But if I were to encounter more than 6" of mud or a dead end trail, my mighty DS would be in trouble! Whatever works best for you, so be it. At least you are supporting the ATV industry as a whole and all of us benefit from each machine that is bought.

 

Seems to me there is a Bombadier forum somewhere on this site for you to go. In reguards to the DS650 and Raptors, nice machines. I took care of them all, and I mean all day long at Silver Lake....That included a DS650 on nitrous...he wasn't happy. I ran a harescramble circuit last summer. The Ds's couldn't fit through the trails. These guys were luberjacking more than Paul Bunyan!!! All these machines have limitations. Strengths and weaknesses. Ride what you want. Don't be sooooo narrow minded, because it would be a boring planet if we all rode the same machine. Save your breath to fight the people who are trying to keep us from riding, not your partner in ATVing. Until we finally begin to realize what's important, we will all be fighting a loosing battle.

Ken

 

I guess it's all a matter of perspective. I've read on here that many think that the DS 650 is the ultimate in High Performance quads. I'm pretty much inclined to agree. If I had to do it over again, rather than adding about $5000 worth of mods to my Polaris Sport, I would probably just have bought the DS650. But when I bought my quad, the DS 650 didn't exist. The only two quads that were in consideration when I bought mine were either a Banshee, or a used (and abused) TRX 250R. I decided I wanted "creature comforts" like reverse and electric starting, not to mention the auto tranny.

Mega Crash,

You hit the nail on the head with that post. Unless you spend about $1000 to $1500 on suspension mods, you basically have a 429 Mustang of quads. Sure it goes like hell in a straight line, but unless mods are made to suspension, it doesn't turn very well. Most people out there today aren't interested in modifying the suspension on these machines. I'll be the first to say it isn't easy. They prefer to go the "muscle quad" route. To each his own.

3TV,

I don't think you'll ever see the kind of performance from a quad the way you see from MX bikes. DS 650s, Cannondales and Raptors are the top of the performance ladder in the quad market. You'll never see a stock quad with the power to weight ratio of a MX bike. Simply put, you're compairing apples and oranges. Let's face it the CR 500 is a dying breed. I've heard that Honda won't even make them next year. In fact if it weren't for quad sales, you wouldn't see those wild MX machines get updated every year. The money just isn't in bikes any more to keep making these mods year in and year out. They take the money from quad sales and use it to pump up the MX bikes, while giving us the same crap year after year.

As far as a Scrambler being sport utility, I'd say that you have to have utility to make it a sport utility. The lack of racks and the lack of a dual range transmission pretty much keep it from being a sport utility in my book. Sure, you could add racks and a trailer htich to a Scrambler. But I could do the same for a DS 650, Banshee or Raptor it doesn't make it a utility machine.

 

Exactly,
I raced MX when I was a kid and know a 10 year old YZ80 would make a 400EX look like a garden tractor on the track.
When you watch a MX race and compare how fast the bikes are, and how fast the quads are, the quads look like they are glued to the ground and in slow motion.
If you want High Performance then buy a bike.
Otherwise buy the quad that best fits your rideing style, location, and the quads you'll be rideing with.
Sold my YZ250 three years ago, and I like the training wheels (Quad) I have now just fine.

 

I got my first opportunity to ride a Raptor last weekend, and I have to admit I was pleasantly surprised by the power to weight ratio. I didn't feel that it had any more off the start than my Scrambler, but the weight difference made the power it has throughout the power band much more aggressive feeling. And jumping the Raptor was like wearing 50lb lead weights around your ankles all day and then taking them off and sprinting 50 yards compared to the Scrambler. I scared myself on a big table top I'm used to just grazing over the top and flying down the slope on the other side. At the same speed of approach I use on my Scrambler and about as much acceleration going up I easily cleared the top of the table top and landed damn near flat (missing the down slope) on the other side. We're talking about 7 or 8 feet of free fall! And what really amazed me is that the Raptor's suspension soaked it up like it was just a little hop for it. I was really impressed, because I made the same mistake on my Scrambler on the same table top a year or so ago and came down like a ton of bricks, smashing my face on the handlebars and almost losing it all together. Yet, I still love the old Scrambler for what it is. I can still keep up with everyone I know, if not outrun most of them, and go ANYWHERE a 4wheeler can be made to go. As a matter of fact the guy on the Raptor had a buddy with him who was riding a Banshee and in a drag I pulled both of them for the first 50 yards and didn't start losing ground until they hit 5th. In my book that's pretty damn good for a "utility" quad. Also, the Raptor smoked both us in the end.