Yes, I think this will be interesting year also for the ATV's. Someone posted that the new Griz will a locking 4wd system similiar to the Kawasaki. Not sure where this info came from. I read the paragraph in dirt wheels, it didn't mention any about that.

The Griz will be faster with the 660 motor, more CC's & valves, this is assuming the 660 motor is from the Raptor which has 5 valves. The IRS on the Griz will add a few pounds there is no doubt hopefully Yamaha can keep it under 700 pounds.

Again this is all conjecture at this point, everyone is guessing.

 

Thee information on the new 2002 Grizzly came from my local Yamaha dealers product rep. According to John the owner of Pocono Mountain Motorsports a couple of Yamaha,s people were in the U.S., here from Japan. They took back a couple of sets of mud tires and informed him that the 2002 Grizzly was going to be second to nobody. I was told by him that the boys from Japan are going to build a speicial edition mud machine so to speek. Kind of like the traxter.

 

Snowshark, I was told by WayneB that the older ATV manufacturers have to keep the weight of new machines under 605 lbs.. (check out "650 accessories" in the Kawasaki forum). I don't know where he heard this, but he told me that Kawasaki has to keep the 650 Prairie under this weight. I don't understand this because Polaris is an old manufacturer and the Sportsman 500 H.O. has a dry weight of 697 lbs.. Have you heard of this?

 

jscyoung,

I have seen reference to that weight limit before. I can't find any "real" info on the weight subject.

You are right about it not making cents because the Arctic Cat & Polaris have machines weighing over the 605 pounds. Something isn't right if the American manufacturers don't have a weight limit while the imports do? Intersting.

These are good time for our sport.

 

"A Sportsman is better than a Grizzly, in anything
but a straight line drag". seems to me there was
a person in here going by the name of Gimp, who
owned both and would disagree with that statement.

A guy I met on the trail who owns a 500 H.O.,
told me the Grizzly is still quicker to 40 but the H.O. dose have a better top speed, sounds
reasonable.

700#'? If they go with the King Quad style locking
front diff it will be close, 680-690#'s I predict, You could select between the Superior Traction of the Lock'd mode or the Easier Steering of the Unlock'd mode, when
in 4wd, a brief glance at a King Quad test will
show how much the steering effort and turning radius increase with it locked.

From what I have read and observed the only Sport/Utility, Utility Quads 400cc and up with
lighter steering effort and tighter turning
are the Kodiak and the Big Bear.

Not to take away from the comfort of the IRS and
the exceptional rear ground clearence it provides.

Yamaha must be kicking themselves in the teeth
right now, the 660 5-valve has been around in the
MZ and the XTZ motorcycles, and in Raptor tuning it makes the perfect 4x4 engine, they should have used it in the Grizzly in the first place, yes the DS650 has a greater peak H.P. but you take
the readings from 2000 to 7850 R.P.M. the Raptor
makes more H.P. and Torque 60+ % of the time, sidenote; the Raptor will only run about 8250 R.P.M. stock, when I was doing top speed runs after break in with a 175# test rider, he told me the Electric tach was only registering 8200-8250, and that came out to 73-75 M.P.H., using two cell
phones and a stopwatch over a 100 yd run with a approx 3 mile run to.

So on top of not using IRS in the first place, Yamaha also messed up by not using the 660, instead of that old 600 engine, which did alright
but did not make the splash the 660 would have.


Great Time
Hope Everyone
is O.K.

Y2K, 01 Raptor, 00 Kodiak, 98 Grizz(still going strong!)
need new nick!