Performance and Maintenance

PRE-SEASON PREP IS IMPORTANT.   OUR CHECKLIST OF A FEW BASIC MECHANICAL TIPS THAT WORK FOR EVERY MACHINE WILL HAVE YOU READY FOR THE TRACK OR TRAILS. 

IS YOUR POLARIS PROSTAR ENGINE DOWN WITH ELECTRICAL PROBLEMS?   RMSTATOR HAS A PERMANENT SOLUTION TO YOUR VOLTAGE NEEDS.   WE’LL SHOW YOU HOW TO KEEP THE POWER FLOWING!

Need a utility ATV for pulling a trailer, toting your gear to camp, or exploring remote trails but you still want the power and instant acceleration of a sport quad?  You don’t need to compromise; you just need a Kawasaki Brute Force 750 4x4i.   We spent a year finding out what the Brute Force could do.

I grew up riding dirt bikes, 3 wheelers, quads and 4X4’s in the desert. As I got older, starting a marriage, a family, and two companies took all of my time and then some, but it was hard not to miss the riding and the dirt toys of youth. It was time to get back into the sport but with the current responsibilities to family and employees I would need the protection of a roll cage.

My wife's aunt and uncle, who own a farm in North Dakota, exemplify the typical ATV or SXS owner. Their stable of machines is used to round up cows, herd sheep, inspect miles of fence line, pull a trailer loaded with firewood or other supplies, and, of course, pin the throttle through a muddy slough or across a freshly cut soybean field to blow off steam. And that's just in one day.

Just because the weather turns cold doesn’t mean we have to stop riding. It’s a blast to slide through the snow and there is always work to be done hauling wood or pushing snow out of the drive. We might even get a little late season hunting, but just like your hunting gear has to be ready for winter, so does your ATV or Side x Side. Here are the tricks we use to make the most of any winter riding.

Brakes are quite possibly the most overlooked system on an ATV or SXS. We take them for granted because they usually work when we squeeze the lever or step on the pedal. But over time, our brakes will lose their feel and performance. Since it happens slowly, we often don’t realize how bad they’re getting. Routine maintenance is very important to proper brake function, and unfortunately, throwing on a new set of pads won’t necessarily restore all of the lost performance.

Fuel injected ATVs are becoming the norm on showroom floors these days. We have to admit that it’s awful nice to not have to babysit a choke knob for the first few minutes of your morning warmup, and to know that our EFI equipped engines will always be running in their sweet spot regardless of temperature or elevation. Still, many riders prefer a good old carburetor for a variety of reasons, and some have even removed their EFI components to go back to a carbureted engine.

If you own an Arctic Cat 400 or Suzuki Eiger 400, chances are that you’ve experienced or at least heard of the flywheel failure that plagues these otherwise great ATVs. One minute you’re riding along and everything is running smoothly, and out of nowhere and for no apparent reason your engine coughs and you roll to a stop. You know you’re not out of fuel, but it doesn’t take long to realize you are out of spark, and that points to the dreaded electrical gremlins.

Atten-TION!  Before we can proceed any further, we gotta get somethin’ straight.  The new POL-aris General is NOT your mommas UTV.  It’s a fine, multi-pur