Just got rid of my brand new prairie 650 and bought an 03 Grizzly. Prairie had alot of problems and left a bad taste in my mouth. Anyways, I was reading some posts on another forum and saw alot of posts regarding people breaking cv joints and/or drive shafts on their Grizzlys, but it seems only on the 03 Grizzlys. Has anyone here heard of this? I hope that I didn't just buy a machine whose cv joints are going to break the first time I hit some "rough stuff". Is there some kind of a defect in these Yamis? I read that the "boiling gas" problem was taken care of for 03. And while I'm here, does anyone have any advice for me as the new owner of a Grizzly?

 

I just bought my '03 Grizzly about a month ago. So far i've had no trouble with anything, except my gear shifter alignment which i'm working on. I read alot of posts about axle problems before I bought mine and it did bother me a bit, but compared to all the other machines in it's class I think the Griz has a pretty good reliability record.

 

have had my griz about 2 months tried to pull out a stuck polaris and put the shafts to the test no problems the gear shift is a little cumbersome but love it overall

 

i appreciate the responses. I'll keep my fingers crossed and hope that this is just an isolated problem.

 

Yamaguy,

That was one of, if not the most articulate and informative post's I have ever read on any of the atv boards.


Paul....

 

Friends of mine asked to borrow my pulling tires for a weekend, to go to some drag sled pulls in Canada, they owned an 02 and an 03 grizz. Both of them cut the shafts off that goes from the motor to the front, with the tires on, it is hollow.

I have seen several cv joints go out on grizz's in the last two years at my drag sled pulls. These weren't stock bikes, they were all 727's with lots of power. All of them were on the front right hand side, sitting on the bike looking frontwards.

I'm not bashing, grizz's are great bikes, but I think the joints are weak for the power these bikes are capitable of produceing.

 

Frontier,

Thank you for pointing out my error, yes i meant this reply for an earlier post by Yamaguy. I meant in no way for my post to be sarcastic in nature, and yes I can see how it looked that way.

Paul....

 

the 03 grizzly does have cv issues. yamaha said that the first batch to come out of there factory had defective steel in the cv's. they have replaced the broken ones on alot of grizzly's, sometimes with more bad cv's. this has happened to alot of owners, but only for a short period of time. seems the recent buyers have not had this problem. the 02 grizzly does not have this issue.
this is happening to owners when locking the diffs, and turning, even if there not in rough terrain. most have stated that when there's broke, they wern't even into the mud yet. one man( cant remember who) actually took his out from the dealers repair room, and whit a new cv, locked the diff, and turned his quad and it broke right in front of the manager. the manager then ordered more, and he broke them also. now it is fixed due to waiting for the next shipment. all this was covered under warrenty. some have had 4 or 5 break, but with the new batch, all is well. so, i hope your grizzly is a later 03 instead of one of the early ones.
the boiling gas is a vary easy fix, if this occours to ya. the vaporlocking is also a fairly easy fix. do the side panel mods to it!!! this will solve alot of small issues you might incounter.
good luck ,and have a ball, it is a fun quad!!

 

go to.
i own one of the first 2002 grizzly's out there, lmao!!! when i got it, i had a choise of red, red, or if i wanted, red, lmao!!!
i have experianced most, if not all the innitial problems involved with the quad. here are some fixes for most common problems.
sputtering in shallow water, like 6 inchs or so. cause... steam cannot excape from the inclosed engine compartment. fix... i drilled 3 2 1/8 in holes in the side panels( used doorknob hole cutter) cost, nothing, time involved, 4 minutes max. solution, no more problems there.
overheating. fix.. holes in side panel. heat shield under tank( now put on all grizzly's. wrapped exhaust pipe. heat guage from highlifter. problem solved at a cost of 30 for the exhaust wrap, and the guage was 100, but not nesicarry.
sputters on steep inclines. cause is the float in the bowl needs to be adjusted 2 mm. this will fix that. cost is nothing but some time, or let the dealer do it.
floorboards sagging. the 03 will do it too, cause the new and improved supports suck also. i will use 1x1 in tubing to strenthen them. cost is under 5 dollars, and i have a welder. if you dont, get a shop to do it, for around 25 dollars, if you deliver the parts.
light bulbs falling out. get aftermarket ones if your warrenty is up, if under warrenty, let them replace them, and then they wont.
the no 1 thing anyone should do with the grizzly is ADJUST THE VALVES!!! every 25 or 30 hours. they tighten up fast, and will cause damage, as well as a bad running moter.
hope i helped, sorry so long.

 

mich 660grizz, good post......thanks for the tips!!