Piped/ jetted Z vs. cannondale canable or speed.

 

MX track? GNCC track? Drag? XC track?

EDIT: Just wanted to add that I have no idea, but you might get more responses if you narrow it down a bit [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

 

It , as usual, depends on the rider.

I run both MX and XC and have ran across many Z400s in various stages of mods.

What happened?? Well..The guys who smoked me the year before on 440EXs and 250Rs still smoked me this year on the Z400

The guys that I smoked the year before that were riding those bikes and are now on Z400s......well........they are still getting smoked...LOL

 

I meant MX track

Knowsalot- Glad to see you back. You running all the races this year on the'dale or do you have a new ride? Where did you finish up last year and what was the division. My short term memory escapes me. LOL I would like to run one or 2 but they are not close to home.


I would think in harescambles and woods races the dales HP advantage would be to much to over come for equal riders on z-400 vs speed

 

Go to a track and you be the judge. Always trying to start another fight on things that really don't matter to you. Ride the Raptor in a straight line and smile - leave the turning to the riders [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

BTW: I have a friend with a Z, with said mods. He can outrun me on a track big time because he rides a lot faster. He can turn much better times on my 'Dale though and loves the power and suspension. Mostly rider IMO, but I'd vote Cdale on lap times with same riders. Just from what I've seen.

 

My opinion(I don't race, just trails) is that any sport quad out there can be made to go fast on an MX track if the owner wants it to and can handle it.

There are a lot of great bikes out now, more than anytime before. We should be thankful that we have so many choices now.

The bikes are so close in moded performance that it pretty much boils down to rider preferance. I've never seen a stock machine on an MX track [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

Cannondale, Gas Gas, Yamaha, Honda, Suzuki/Kawasaki, Polaris...they all make great machines, what more can we as riders ask for?

They are all great quads with potential to mod to rider taste.

Ride what you feel comfortable on [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

 

14mins,

Well, I believe the last time we spoke, I was into the 2002 season!! LOL

I finished 2nd for the season in the MMCC series in the C class

In the 2003 season, I moved up a class,..... I got a 3rd,4th, and a 2nd in the first 3 races in the B Class.....and then had an engine failure[a bad one] that caused me to miss 3 of the next races. It took me about 6 weeks to get everything back in order again, and then with only 4 races left....I got a 3rd and then contracted a sinus infection that took a month to get over...........Soooooooo without saying, if it weren't for the bad luck, I may have actually gotten a Top 3 spot for the season in the B lass, but we will never know....LOL

This year, I'm spreading my wings a bit. I'm running all of the MMCC races, all of the AHSS races, some MSHSWS races, and a couple of GNCCs to boot. At least with this much racing going on, I can look forward to an engine failure! I'm ready this time though. Got me another engine[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

 

Knowalot- That is really cool. You said once that you thought you were going to be in Dallas on business. (years back now lol) If you are ever this way shot me a email

Themez- Why you feel the urge to follow me around is beyond me. There are leaders and followers and you are in the latter catagory. You seem real defensive about your choice of quad. Be happy with what you have and it should last you a long time at the rate you actually ride it.I have spent more time on a mx track that you ever will. ( i built one on my property 2 years ago) For a while in 2001 and early 2002 we were going to 2 or 3 mx tracks a week. Last trip to mossier valley a cannon dealer was letting people demo a speed. I rode it one pratice session but i was to hard on it. It failed to finish the night. At that time the Z-400 was not out. Now there are no cannons around here (well there is one) and the Z-400 is on the scene. Actually there were never more than 3 or 4 in the 75 mile circle i run around in. Yodaddy had a cannon and showed up to play at my place once but the rains came and it was beer drinking times instead of ride time. Seen a broke cannon in the kermit dunes and saw a few broke cannons in Glamis on the end of a tow rope. So to me the question was a legimate one and you show up with your short man snydrome crying foul. LMAO I hope you are a freshman in college so you will still have plenty of time to learn. I have no doubt that MY raptor would turn in faster lap times that YOUR cannon on any track. You preach you cannon race ready quad but the fact remains many, many cannon buyers dumped the shocks the factory shipped them with for others as well as axles and so forth. I would be pissed if i had paid 12.5 k for a quad only to see it worth 3500 the next year. The whole cannondale fiasco is a topic in its self. I am lucky that i get to ride alot of different quads from 12 hp 250ex's to 100 plus hp banshees and all in between.

To the others, sorry i got sidetracks for a moment.

I see Z's all over the place and no cannons around here. I would still like to know how they compare. I would imagine a semi serious Z racer would bump displacement to 440cc. On second thought i just realised that cannons have nothing to do with this anymore with the release of the yamaha and honda.

So the new question is how will the modded Z's going to do against the 2 new 450's. Can the HP be raised enough on the z's to compete? Rodsquad built a nice Z-400 with 440, axis shocks front and rear lonestar a-arms, sterring stem and ?? for the rear axle. He sold it before the yamaha 450 was interdouced, but that quad felt great riding it. I spent some time on a custom pro quaility CRF 450 quad that Rod had built. He probably had well overf 20k in it, he sold it shortly after he took delivery as it did not meet the expectaions that he had hoped for. It was a great quad but he decided it was not what he was after. ( in a way more than he needed) He sold it and now a pro rider now owns it.

 

The Z400 is a model from what all other designers should try to base a quad on. It's not the fastest quad in the world, but it is the most user friendly. You can mod the hell out of a Z, just like the old TRX 250R, the Z400 has a lot of support in the aftermarket.

Just read the new Atvconnection article about the Z against the YFZ. I posted it here for you all to read. The 400Z makes less power but it has an uncanny ability to get the hell modded out of it for cheap [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] As far as a trail quad, the Z really has no competition.

Cannondale quads are pretty much race ready out of the box, so there is no comparo with a stock Z.

The beauty of a Z is that you can turn it into any kind of quad you want. All the while it's going to be the best trail machine on the market.

I'm not biased, but the suzuki sure tickled my prospective *** [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] If I buy a new quad soon, it's going to be the Suzuki 400.

 

I'll just say that since C-dale is out of business and their quads had major definencies and reliability poblems, that any stock Z/KXF on the track has a far better chance of winning simply because the odds are there are far more running Z/KXF quads than their are C-dales anymore. A lot of the 2003 C-dales that were produced and sold are being parted out. It is going to be difficult to keep a quad running that only saw a 7000 machine production run and then it's company went out of business.