Has anyone heard of or experienced problems such as front wheel bearings going bad or drive train problems with their LTF500 after installing 27" Titan 589 tires. If you go way back with this web site there was a guy named Gordon Banks who put 27" Blackwaters on his Quadrunner 500 and had lots of handling problems. My main concern is if they cause mechanical problems, I have heard things from wearing out front wheel bearings because of too much weight to being too hard on clutch and engine. Would like too get some input from anyone who has them. Would be real good to hear from those people who have used them in deep snow.
Thanks Bob G.

 

i have installed 27"mud bugs on my2000 500 quadrunner and have no problems as of yet

 

I have the 27" Titan 589's on my 98 Quadrunner 500 and have yet to have any problems! I can tell you these tires work GREAT in deep snow! I went to a friends this winter a few times and we ran our quads on his property and these Titan 589's really go thru the snow! His Honda Foreman 400 with a older set of mud tires had a REAL hard time on some of the hills. But the 500 with the Titans just kept churning right up the hills! I hope the long term wear issue from using the bigger tires dosent become a problem, but so far, so good! Also, the Titans handle just fine as far as trail riding goes also!

 

yo Bob,,
From experience I'd have to say tha mud and water are probably gonna cause more damage than the tires.I do a lot of mud running with mine and I constantly have to work on it.The main thing s are the wheel bearings and seals and the rear final drive bearings and seals. On the 98 thats the weak link, I don't know if they fixed the problem on the newer machines or not.You may want to pull the rear driveshaft out once in a while to check everything out in the rear end

 

Kingmort isnt kidding about checking on the rear end, it is a $500 dollar bill when your quad becomes a front wheel drive. Ours went to front wheel drive on the Sand Dunes... that was fun - had to tow the big bad 4x4 home with the Big Red (Honda ATC 250es). That got some looks.

 

I blew the rear end twice.Finally I had the bearing housing bored, a steel sleeve pressed in and replaced the stock ball bearing with 2 sealed bearings,,,,no trouble since

 

If you want to see what Bloodtrails 589's look like, just go here

 

Dont know about the tires but for everyone who has a 98 500 quadruuner4x4. To keep water and or mud dirt etc out of the rear bearing housing all you need to do is drill a hole in the housing and tap it out to fit a standard grease fitting.Make sure to use a small o-ring or some rtv to seal it and install the fitting then pump it full of grease and that will keep the water out.Shoot a shot of grease in it once a while and you will be good to go.PS.The stock bearing is sealed so remove the metal seal so the grease can get to the bearing.My suzuki dealer gave me this idea.

 

Bulldaddy, do you happen to know if the Arctic Cat 500 uses the same rear end? If it does, could you be more specific on what and how you did your fix on keeping the rear bearings greased. I for one, even though we have limited mud and water here would like that fix because we have snow (sometimes ) in the winter.

 

Hey bulldaddy, I have a 98, where did you put your grease zerk at? I'm very interested in your fix, because that is definately the weak link in this machine. If you would rather use e-mail, mine is jenksbr@mailbox.orst.edu

Thank you