Well, I’ve logged about 1 hour of ride time on the Predator so far this weekend up at Pinal Airport Area, about 30 minutes north of Tucson.

The first thing I noticed was cornering/stability. It’s insane. I mean, my old 250R handled awesome, but this thing is one piece. It just holds it’s own. It gives you a lot of confidence in that respect.

Now, I’ve only gone maybe ¾ throttle, so I don’t know what it’s entirely capable of yet. However, it’s not like a typical “XR” fourstroke, where you’re cruising thinking you’re revving it out, but no, low and behold, there is a tremendous amount of explosive power on tap! The throttle seems active and responsive, not delayed. The gearing seemed ok too, not as high as others have explained. But again, this was hard packed dirt, not dunes. I’ve always liked higher gearing anyhow for higher speed wash runs….in the CA desert.

I did about 40 minutes total of ride time with the stock pipe, then I switched it over to the WB slip on. What a difference! Talk about louder and more low end. Snar was right, you heard the engine over the exhaust when riding it….Here in Tucson we’re 2500 or so elevation, so jetting now is not a concern. But when I ride it in CA, I will tamper with it.

I have only set the preload in the front, the rear needs to be reckoned with. I can tell I don’t have it set up right. The ride now is jarring over little bumps, ruts….. so I will give attention to that soon.

It starts with ease. Hold the button for about 1 second and it fires right up.

I really didn’t do anything great on the bike yet. Just breaking it in, varying my speed in and out of the gears…no real performance or jumping testing yet. That will be in a few weeks.

However, I did experience one major problem. The bike is super squirrelly. Just going down a hard packed dirt road, the bike is wandering all over the place, from like 3rd gear on. Just keeping the speed constant or laying into the throttle, it just gets worse. The rear end was all over the place, and then correcting it only made it worse. I have no idea what is causing this?

Maybe tire pressure? Rear shock adjustment? I don’t know, but it’s not acceptable and I need to get it figured out. It’s almost dangerous. Maybe you guys can give me some help on this?

Other than that, I’m pretty impressed. I’ll have more details as I get another chance to ride it, and ride it harder.

Ryan


PS: The tranny performed flawlessly. No issues at all. Not notchy or touchy, worked like it was broken in.

Neutral was not hard to find. It was once, but the brake was on and hard to find it, otherwise both days of riding it, neutral was easy to find.

The chain guard does make more noise than normal, but it seems to do this only when "lugging" it or put putn' around. Otherwise not an issue.

I could hear the front shocks bottom out when fully unsprung when I got the front end up over some whoops..... so, the noise to me is audible sometimes....

Oil was very clean during first oil change too. Filter had the expected metals, but the oil in general looked better than I had thought.

When draining the oil, it does make a mess on the aftermarket center skid plate and front chassis skid plate..... Oh well.

 

Check your front end alignment as well as tire pressure. If it is toed out or in too much it will cause any machine to wander around.

 

BK: Is this something I should have to check, or can the dealer under warranty? I have never played around with these settings, nor do I know what they should be.

Thanks for your input, I would have never guessed that, but that's a great observation....

 

Another thing I've noticed, is how LIGHT the steering is, and at times I'll tend to over-steer or over-correct hence the feeling of darting about.........try lowering your front airpressure to 4-5 psi, as mine was ~6 psi.........

One of the first major performance mods for mine will be a Denton 7 way click adjust dampener.........great product that I run on all my quads.

 

Thx Heaps! I'll take you up on that advice and check it tonight, thank you [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

 

The dealer should be setting toe-in / toe-out at the dealership before it leaves the dealership. This isn't a "warranty" issue, just a set-up issue. Your dealer may try to charge you for this if you take it back but it should have been done at set-up. At our dealership it's the first thin (aside from charging the battery) that we do. Did you sign a set-up sheet when you bought it. That was on there. It takes about an honest hour to properly set a machine up out of the crate. Also, my Troy Lee is a little loose in the rear at speed. Part of it is it's cold here (less than 30?) so that makes the ground harder. Try running less air pressure and/or back the pre-load or compression off a little. These things are a little more nose heavy than the rest. But boy do they handle! Mines got about 4 tanks of gas though it and runs great!

 

My dad did all the paperwork on this bad boy. I will talk to the daeler to see what they can do. I will still check the tire pressure though. I have not looked at that, assuming it was good from the dealer... bad thing is we got it in san diego, but will be asking my tucson dealer to check the alignment, if in fact that's what's causing it...... thx expert....

 

The manual gives you a good idea how to do the toe out on the Predator. It suppose to be even to 1/16" toe out. If it's toed in alittle, it will feel loose in the rear.

 

GE: I wish I knew what that meant. I know a lot about bikes, but about ZERO when it comes to alignment figures. I know the basics, but setting it up properly or knowing where the measuring takes place eludes me completely.

 

Um, 03Pred? Maybe read the manual?

Its covered fully in there, and they have a "unique" way of wrapping string around all 4 tires for a reference system. Toe in and Toe out is adjusted by lengthening or shortening your tie-rods, which go between the steering stem and your wheel spindle assembly.

You can simply check your toe-in, by measuring the distance between the rims, first at the leading and trailing (3 oclock and 9 oclock) edges of the rim. Toe-in is if the front is less distance than the rear, Toe out is the opposite.

As stated before, I believe the spec is almost neutral, so the measurements should be equal.