Blaze Reviews: My ATVs

hello this attorney blazer for the motocross from all presented by Blinn Zahl if you're in the market for some high-quality racing oil for your two-stroke or for make sure you go to blends all calm and use our discount code vault 20 to save 20% of check out thank you for all the support hello and welcome back to the motocross vault my name is Tony blazer and what this video is gonna cover is another one of my Blazers review series if you're not familiar with those what I've done is I've owned a lot of ATVs and motorcycles over the years I total mall up it's all over 50 at this point and I've had a little bit of everything I've had street bikes dual-purpose bikes motocross bikes off-road bikes and ATVs and what this video is going to cover is the ATVs that mount over the years now I know a lot of you out there probably are you know ATV haters I know within the motocross community there's a snobbery that goes on towards ATV guys they call them couches and what-have-you else I've never been that guy I love ATVs now I've never raced them I never was actually I've only taken them one on a motocross track a couple of times for me they're always like off-road bikes play bikes I've always ridden motocross an offer about 50/50 I live here in Virginia and my parents out you know 30 acres up on a mountain when I was a kid so we had trails to the woods you know my quote/unquote motocross track was really almost like a hare scrambles track with jumps yeah actually you see some of the videos on the channel here when I'm riding around freely through the woods so I grew up riding the woods I love the woods and ATVs are fun that was I to me they're awesome for that I've had all kinds of ATVs over the years I haven't had nearly as many ATVs and motorcycles though obviously my first love is motocross but I just think ATVs are fun like I said taken within their own context I never felt really comfortable jumping them that's where I would draw the line any time you jump them if you come up a little bit short the wheelbase is so short and you know a little cockeyed or something can be pretty sketchy so that part of it I prefer to keep it on the ground or at least low to the ground for the most part but I love ride them they think they're hoot and they're good time so what this video is gonna cover is all the ATVs I've owned as I said it's not nearly as many as the motocross bikes but I've had a pretty good variety of them everything from little play bikes to more serious like race tight quads to even I even had one utility quad and the one ironically the one I've owned the longest is a 4x4 that's mainly because the 4x4 was great for actually building the trails I would we would blaze the trails with it with the big heavy four-wheel drive four-wheelers and then beat them down and then cut them you know they we use them to cut in the trails over my parents place so they were great for that and if you ever wonder arrived in winter time in this now whatever there fun so they all have their usage and like I said if you haven't if you haven't tried them you know don't knock them they're actually a lot of fun as long as you keep in mind what they're designed for and use them for that purpose so if you want to check out the other reviews I've done I did a separate review of all the 125s I've owned the 250s and the open bikes and again this is gonna be a little different than the classic reviews I normally do where I go through what the magazine's thought of the individual machines look at all the tests the shootouts and compiled that information kind of you know tell you a little bit about what the editors of these magazines thought this is just my opinion this is just my personal experience with these quads when I what I thought about them and the other blades reviews I've done were the same thing I took you know my Sierra 125s and whatever else it was and just told you what I thought of my personal opinion everybody has maybe their own individual opinion about certain motorcycles and ATVs and what-have-you and this is just gonna be mine I know yours might vary so don't take it personal if I hated one or actually I don't think I really hey hey I would really have many ATVs I really hated but if you know I'm sure some of your personal experiences might be different than mine so just eek just keep that in mind this is just my use you know like so now even the sport ones I wasn't using them for track you so I was really riding them in the woods which is around my little motocross track but again it's not like I don't have to clean helmet on or something so if you're using your quad for high-level motocross you have a different opinion to me so this is just my little rundown of the individual ones I've owned over the years and what I thought of them if you want to support what I do I have motocross volt merch available this is one of the t-shirts just with the logo I have several different versions this available they also have some great ones well I think they're pretty cool anyway with some really neat bikes on them and you can find them in the description below and I have my teespring store and then if you want to support the channel very much appreciate it if you can subscribe like and share on social media I would very much appreciate that as well so here's the story of my personal ATVs all right the first a TV and our a TV rundown that I own was the 1988 Yamaha blaster now I grew up around ATVs like I said I didn't have a motorcycle when I was little but my next-door neighbor who's my brother-in-law now he had three wheelers when we were kids and I certainly rode them and crashed them a lot like I said three wheelers never really did it for me to my god on one I killed myself so I wasn't super psyched about the three wheelers but then another buddy of mine when we were in high school ended up getting a Yamaha blaster I except me it was just out after high school also just after I graduated he had a blaster and I wrote it and I was like you know this thing is a lot of fun I really enjoyed it and again at the time if I was living in Point of Rocks Maryland and this is all developed now but back then there were this huge network of trails and the horse field behind us and just all these places to ride we'd ride all over God's green earth and you need that but you need to have something that's quiet you couldn't I at the time I had my 78 cr250 and that thing was loud I mean really loud I mean my neighbor told me I was making his life a living hell riding that thing the backyard so that wasn't too awesome but my buddy Brian Ross had an 88 blaster got a brand-new he was also the guy that had that famously had the young hot BW 200 that caused me to get a fat cat but that's a disastrous story for another day so anyway my road is blaster I was like this thing is a lot of fun so this is when the blaster first came out and I think it was maybe 2 grand brand-new it was really they're really inexpensive and I picked up a lightly used one for about 50 hundred bucks and I mean his was red and mine was blue and this thing was super fun I really really enjoyed this quad a couple things that were awesome about it the motor it had I think maybe uh there's probably used some kind of a dual sport mode it wasn't the same engine that was on the i.t 200 I don't believe but it was very peppy for what it was if you've ever written a blaster they actually have a lot of power for a little 200 surprised how peppy it was even compared like a 125 at the time or something it was strong much stronger torque really responsive engine then pull roll four on top of course the stock exhaust is super choked off and quiet but super snappy great for pulling wheelies and just a fun little motor they would sit there and happily idle all day ran like a top really a phenomenal engine great little of that part of it started real easy I love that little part of it what didn't work so well at least for me the suspension on that thing was very very stiff and not very good you know we were actually taking those things around like motocross tracks and stuff we homemade motocross tracks nothing like a major one but we we are actually trying to motocross from around we a little track out there plan rocks and then you got the thing in a set of whoops in that little short wheelbase hard suspension it would just swap and bounce and never one time Brian got him to set of whoops and each Whoopie hit the rear would come higher it went like three times and it finally just went end over end so the short wheelbase and the mediocre suspension you had to be careful with those under the hot setup at the time was they sold little extenders to make the wheelbase a little longer and of course if you could afford it you get some shots but work you know I'm just out of high school I mean you know going to Community College at the time so I didn't have any money for anything like that so we pretty much wrote of stock I think the only mod I did that bypass I replaced the stock Sancerre with like an FM F which opened up the power a little bit but not a huge amount thing was great had oil injection you just put we ride up to the gas station and putting rocks put straight gas in it launch kept all the tank full was great it was awesome for that probably the weakest link in the whole Blaster was this first generation early on had drum brakes in the front in a mechanical disc in the back and this was in 88 when the bike was brand new I remember I wore out the brakes on it the front shoes and the pad in the back and yeah I had the the replacements on backorder I would try to get him from Farrakhan Yamaha they couldn't get him so I literally rode this bike this quad around for like a month with basically no brakes I almost killed myself on it at one time you know I'm a kid I'm an idiot you know I would never ever ever do that now but back then we didn't care we rode whatever no matter the thing was falling apart we would ride it so the brakes were sketchy even when they were new the drums you know you hit them and they they would lock it different it wasn't like a hydraulic system where an equalized pressure you know one wheel would pull though more than another and they didn't work real well and that mechanical disc was kind of light switch but overall super fun quad it was it would it was little submarine I enjoyed the hell out of in spite of the fact that the suspension was terrible and the brakes were pretty terrible for what it was at the price point it was it was a screaming value years later I'd have like the Honda competition the 250 acts and in every way the 250 was superior to the blaster except for price and the blaster was great great affordable great starter a TV and one of my favorite machines I owned at that time for sure and I would highly recommend if you can pick one up cheap they're fun little quads as long as you keep in mind what they're designed for now I had that blaster for maybe about a year so like I said we had a lot of fun with them they were super fun quads but at some point I decided I really wanted to focus more on motorcycles as I said when I first got the blaster I think I had my 78 cr250 but then somewhere in the year when I had the blaster I picked up in 1987 kx125 at that point and that was the bike that really got me started at racing that was the first machine I went to Antietam in Elvan Hagerstown Maryland I raced that bike and that was another buddy mine had a CR 185 cr125 trend thomas and we decided you know we were gonna focus more on motocross at that point so this was the bike where I really kind of cut my teeth started to learn a little bit more the blaster was fun to kind of teach me a little more of the basics of riding like so I had my 78 I really just wrote it up and down my my driveway of my parents place I really didn't I never took it to a motocross track I had two access to any of those things at the time so it was during that year transition around 88 or so that I kind of started to become more interested in motocross and I eventually sold the blaster and really for the next I don't know almost a decade I was exclusively on dirt bikes I was you know racing a lot I had many many dirt bikes over those years and I really kind of got out of the quad thing it was I lost interest in it more or less I think part of it was I started hanging out with other guys that were into motocross more and like I stopped I moved away from porn rocks my buddy Brian who was more of an ATV guy you know as always always kind of like you know you're around bunch of buddies riding a certain kind of thing and you're like oh that would be fun I'll do that then you get it with another group of friends and they're doing something different so I was kind of like that I I got away from the ATVs there for a while now somewhere in the mid 90s I'm thinking maybe 96 97 I got the bug to try and get one just to the right at my parents place again they sell these trails up there so I ended up picking up a used 1993 Yamaha warrior the warrior was a real popular quad I know a lot of people love them I've met her the thing that attracted me to his electric start if I remember I thought that was really nice you have to worry about pull starting it or anything which you know kick starting the blaster you can kick start that thing with your you know with your hand pretty much it was easy for strokes though especially gonna pull start him there a I remember might like I said my brother-in-law always had those ATC's that had the pull start at four strokes and it was a nightmare so I like the electric start I end up getting this thing I just hated this quad now again to be fair I know a lot people love them it felt like a tank maybe it was because I had spent so many years on dirt bikes going back to the quad it just felt heavy and cumbersome and I didn't think it handled very well it's certainly a much bigger than a blaster it's gotta be I don't know 20 percent bigger or more the blaster be centering it now it's kind of hard I can't believe I'm hopeful thing is it feels so tiny like if there's got a mini super short wheelbase not much room there and I've actually taken the front fenders off mine to give me a little more room to climb all around it and I just didn't gel with this quad I only kept it maybe a month or two I wrote it a few times just didn't like it like I said it felt it felt like it weighed 500 pounds and I you know I guess I assumed it if me know 350 would be pretty quick it wasn't no I'm really disappointed just didn't didn't gel with this quad so I got rid of that one pretty quickly and it's actually by far the quad I had the least amount of time it was only like I said a couple months and it was a Dios amigo after the warrior experiment I knew that I really liked riding the quad for trail riding it was super fun I really enjoyed the experience of riding the trails but I wanted something a little bit different and I ended up picking up a well-used 1987 t-rex 250 X 4 tracks I'm gonna want one of these so badly when they came out in 1987 I guess it was I ended up getting the blaster as I said earlier just because the Honda's were much more expensive it had to be at least I don't know a third more something was I don't know the exact price I remember the Honda was much more expensive but it was a larger machine where the blaster was very cramped that 250x is much more you know it's like a science I think it's basically the size of a 250r maybe a little bit smaller but I found to be much more comfortable the main difference is everything else other than the power was way better I mean the blaster might have had a little more pep because it was a two-stroke but the suspension the 250x really good way better I mean it's not great for a motocross track but for the kind of stuff I was doing just hopping over little jumps maybe catching a foot or two a tear in the woods over logs and what-have-you it worked awesome it's super plush it really is an xr2 54 the quad world very liable they're still reliable that thing was a claw hammer you brought it all day no radiator to break we'd be puttering around the trails and it never heat if there's a really really great machine the distance you know all were all around disc brakes the brakes are like quantum leap better than the blasters drums which are just garbage really a much higher performance machine in every way except the motor which was very torquey very mellow I thought it's great great for trail use not fast by any means I mean you can imagine a 400 pound 250 four-stroke would not be a rocket ship and there's a very low tech motor again it's very much like an XR it's a really fun quad I enjoy the hell out of this thing I had it like maybe a year I got it thinking that I would get it and I'd let my wife ride it and she end up riding it a couple times and you know rolling it and that was the end of that she's I don't think she's ever been on a dirt bike a quad since she'd watch the crash that I have no interest in this that's what you know if you're really into it you know if you're into it you crash it like break an arm or whatever you're like well I'll get back on later if you crash you're like I'm done well you just not cut out for it so she was cut out for that so what I had to say I said a quad maybe a year and what it turned out to suck is I had bought it from Shenandoah Honda in Winchester turns out that quad had been stolen the person who had stolen it and had then traded an Indiana into a Honda and I it's a subsequently bought it for like a thousand twelve hundred bucks they were around 1997 or so and the cops called me said hey do you have this quad and that's like yeah they show up my house check the VIN I had stolen they took it I was like oh crap so I contacted Shannon doe Honda and you know to their credit they refunded my money so I got to use this thing for like a year or so and got my money back so that was pretty good sucked because I like the thing a lot the only thing that sucked about it was the motor was hard to start when it got hot this one this version did not have the electric start the later ones would get and unfortunately if it got hot it was a bear to start it but other than that little thing it was a phenomenal quad and if you're looking for a cheap fun trail bike that's you know super reliable I would definitely recommend one of these all right so after the 250x was unfortunately parted from my company I decided I wanted to get something similar to play with and again I'm just using these for like trail bikes you know essentially like an XR or something somebody's and I were like driving the quads up at my parents place so I wanted something similar now it wasn't as easy just finding other 250x at this point the 250x that was like 10 years old I guess is pretty 97-98 and although there were newer versions I was you know looking for something inexpensive and of course it wasn't as easy as getting on Facebook marketplace or even eBay maybe EBA was maybe just coming out around this time and it was just much harder to find stuff you'd go to the one at weekly your local cycle trader or something to find something so eventually what happened was I found a well-worn 1987 Kawasaki Mojave now I never really carefully looks in the Mojave or as my buddy Brian Ross used to call it the moji I thought look really goofy the giant fenders on the front were not very attractive you know it was much less sleek than the than the 250x and in my opinion least weigh less attractive than a blast stream and I just for my money the by far the least attractive know it's funny because the the Ducati 4 was always in my opinion the most attractive of the spor quads and this Mojave was just a strange machine now it was very different than the 250 X even though they really were direct competitors the Honda used a very simple air-cooled four valve four-cylinder engine this Kawasaki used a liquid cooled engine that I believe was based off the the dual Sportage of the in the k lr 250 which was now obviously no rocket ship certainly nothing like a kx250 F would be but compared to the very mellow Honda motor it was much more Revie I guess I don't know that necessarily means more power but the power band was way higher up the Honda is really all low to mid if you try to read it it just makes noise it doesn't pull on top at all but just burn for the woods it's fine for what I wanted it for but the Kawasaki is the exact opposite me because it was derived from a street engine it was made to rev it didn't have a lot of torque I remember it was really hard to get it to pull a wheelie like the Honda you just blip the throttle and pop the collection and the Mojave you really had to rev it up and like just gunned the crap out of it and it just didn't have that torque it was a rev monster and I just never really gelled with it I didn't like the handling it felt the I'm not sure on paper exactly how close they are but it felt significantly heavier than the Honda I'm sure the liquid cooling adds a little bit of weight but I think it was more the chassis the way the motor run all those intangible things that make it feel different and to me at least it felt like a big heavy not particularly fast a quad I didn't really care for it um I had it for a little while you know we played around the woods it was alright but again this was definitely not one of my favorites I never liked the styling of it and I don't think I even kept it a year basically you get it you flip it in a couple months and you call it a day after I got rid of the Mojave I realized that the quad I had enjoyed the most was that 250x it was great all around quad had reverse gear great suspension handled very well and like I said a really nice mix of stability and turning awesome little woods machine I love that thing and Honda had an updated version of it which at that point it had transitioned to the 300 e.x around I don't know maybe 92 or 93 s when they made that transition I was kind of when I was more into bikes I wasn't really into quads at that point so the newer version had electric start which again was one of the things I hated about this really the only thing I didn't like was that 250 X was as a bear to start when it got hot so I went down to my local dealer which at the time was loud motor sport here in Leesburg Virginia and picked up a brand new 2000 Honda 300 X I love this quad the only thing I didn't like about it was they made some weird styling choices here they added this little funky cowl to the handlebars which I hated it looks stupid I thought like they're trying to be aware dynamic it was may look like a Ford Taurus or something the bike was already had kind of that interesting look to the bodywork anyway and I didn't like that so I had the hot idea I went and bought the headlight cowling that was originally on my 1987 to 250 X and it would bolt right on then you would ditch all that crap and it ended up going with like some DG bars or something I replaced the bars with some aftermarket ones with a straighter been the other thing was the bend yeah this cowling you couldn't change the handlebars a cowling wrapped around the handlebars the handlebars had a really far back sweep to them like it was a handlebar from like 1987 or something back in the old days when the handlebars have we're not straight I really like that so that allowed me to replace the antibody better other than that the only mod I did to this quad was I replaced all the tires with ITB hole shots they became kind of my go-to tire for ATVs love the hole shots they wore well they slid real well they're much lower profile the standard tires on these things if you went with the standard tire there are really balloony and they roll the Oxus they would roll in the terms and the the quad would you know be pretty easy to flip it so but when you went with a harder lower profile tougher tire and it really improved the handling and so I always went with hole shots other than that I left this quad completely stock and I had this thing for four or five years of maybe more it was a lot I had a long time I love this three little quad super-quiet which was really important to me I didn't want to piss off the neighbors and reliable as a stone axe the only thing I ever replaced on it was I made the mistake of letting this idiot kid ride at one time and he hit a tree and he just destroyed it for about $50 broke off on the front wheels busted the axle carrier in the back been through her axle he hit it really fast broke his arm and jacked his shoulder up and flipped it pretty bad to almost total I think other than that other than crash abuse this thing was completely bulletproof great quad loved it I wish I still had it I never show sold the damn thing really really really great quad and like again that's another one again my favorite all-time quad in terms of actually the most I've rode and the most fun I had on it was probably that 300 X yes I have many more higher performance ones but general use I let my little sister would ride it that's another thing too is that yeah friends of mine if that was if we were gonna go riding together that was the one I let my buddies ride ones had not much experience like some little sister can handle it my wife can handle it if she was so inclined it had enough power to be fun not so much that somebody's gonna kill themself unless they were complete I mean you still hurt yourself clearly that one guy but great all along great all-around quad in maybe my number one all-time seed $4 per fun value now as I said I absolutely loved that 300x but I decided I thought I wanted a little something more higher performance my little sister was doing a lot of riding with with this at the time we're doing some trail run at my parents place and I thought it'd be fun to get in a second quad and let her ride the the 300x so Honda at the time had come out with a new high-performance quad the 480 X and it was based I think on a modified version of the XR 400 which you know an extra 400 is not a rocket ship but the 300 X is really not a rocket ship that's or you know it's a fun little quad but slow let's be honest low I thought it'd be fun to have something a little more high-performance and I thought that that for her next looked badass I love the looks of it it's great-looking quad it had those cool little headlights in the front and stuff and I thought it was really handsome machine and I thought it'd be cool to have something you know like I said to ride so I went and bought another brand new quad I bought a brand new 400 X 2000 model and I had that for I'm the only had that for about six months so what's funny is I think for a lot of people the foreign DX was probably a better quad certainly way more powerful but again what I was riding it in it was just tight trails at my parents place really wasn't taking to a track or anything really why out wide open and I actually always went back to the 300 X and liked it better the 40 X had way more torque I thought the power was a little bit too abrupt off idle had a really not a ton of top in but really strong tip and when you give it the throttle and it was kind of herky-jerky and I just never really was as comfortable with it I think I remember I don't think it ever reversed you're either chairs are a little after having that reverse gear and the 300 not having reverse sucked in the tight woods again you're riding out in the dunes something you don't notice that but if you're blazing trails and these single tracks everywhere and stuff not having a reverse gear sucks so I I just didn't really like the 40 X as much I ended up selling it I I think I sold it to my buddy Jamie Connard my best friend if I remember I yeah I think he bought her off of me about six months after I bought it myself I don't think he had long after that anyway you know we go through bikes quite a bit and yeah if I remember I think I sold to him and so that was one of the ones I had not very I regret that now I wish to god I'd kept it I'd love to pick up one now they're really cool quads at the time it just didn't gel with me in a diet I regret that does may be the one I wish I hadn't sold the most after I got rid of the foreign TX I want a couple years where I just had the 300 X it was just kind of like a spare bike if somebody wanted a ride if we were gonna go trail riding or something I kept it at my parents place in the shed I didn't keep it at my house here I didn't truck it back and forth it was just one of those things where if I got a while here I would have to visit my mom or something and I wanted to go for a quick spin I pull the 300x out you know if there was a snowy day or somebody go up there and blast on the snow Brydon ATVs in the snow ignorant and that is like the awesomest fun you can have on four wheels super fun so I really wasn't looking for anything high-performance anywhere like I said again just trail ride and so I was happy with that somewhere around two thousand two or three I got a wild hair that I wanted to try and get a something again more high-performance I don't know what got over me I'm always looking for something interesting to pick up and I saw this really clean I mean immaculate 250r four tracks on eBay and I snatched that thing up and when I got it it was even more amazing than I thought in the pictures you never can tell for sure with pictures you're like well maybe it's nice and maybe it's you know somebody just kind of painted it up and made it look really nice but this thing was like all original had the original tires on it it was amazing to stock exhaust and the thing it felt brand-new I remember like said when we were young my the guys down my brother-in-law he had he was into three wheelers he had had a 250r ATC not ridden a couple times again did not like it it was very terrified of this thing and the the four tracks version just handled so much better wasn't quite as fast was on with the added weight but that it was a really nice engine for it was he got out in the open we took it out in some fields and it was fast the brakes worked great it was just a it really rode like it was brand new off showroom floor this thing was amazing but the problem was I had it and again we're riding in the woods you know I take it up in the woods a tight like single track and blazing trails with it and it just didn't have the torque of that 300 yaks it was really wanted to go if you got out on a fire road or something super fun I'm sure on a motocross track it's great I never got a chance to take it on to any kind of a track I wish I had but you know for that kind of thing it was pretty I mean gosh they raced him for almost 15 years it was like me the racing quad for over a decade after they discontinued it after 89 and these were great great quads I had it for about a year and a half I think if I'm right and again I wrote it sparingly it was in such it was all these quads that was it so beautiful I didn't want to ride it cuz I was afraid I'd heard it and you can't remember even at the time just trying to find some replacement stuff I couldn't get the decals they weren't people making replicas in the plastic you couldn't I get the plastic it wasn't around everybody pretty much had snatched up all the OEM stuff cuz again Honda people were racing these things for for 20 years you get some Myer stuff that was like cheeseball looking but there wasn't the OEM and my bike was all over it I didn't want to hurt it so I just kind of let it sit most the time eventually I decided that you know somebody offered me like 4 grand for it and I was like wow this is that's a pretty good deal at the time I probably sell for a lot more than that now this is 2004 I think and I say I sold I end up selling it was it was a I really wasn't riding it much so I thought maybe I get something else to be a little more practical to actually ride and not worry about hurting it it was more like a garage Queen and it was a beautiful quad gorgeous machine but you know for what the kind of riding I was doing it wasn't really ideal after I got rid of the 250r I took that money and I bought a brand new zukie LTZ 400 quad Sport now this was I think the Quattroporte came out the year before no three I think mine was the second year I wanted the yellow one I end up getting a white one but this was a great great machine and it was really more suited for what I wanted to do which was really wide in the woods I basically I think I basically bought it for what I sold that Honda for maybe a hundred dollars or two hundred hours more it was you know mid four grand forty five hundred million range this was a similar machine to the foreigner DX and spirit but way more performance in terms of technology what have you I liked it a lot better than the flora DX in terms of actual performance this is the my favorite quad I've owned that engine was derived from I think the one that was in the DRC 400 which I had actually had a dual sport off great motor the power was then come on as strong off idle as the 40 X did but it it was a longer pull and it was a more linear pull it was just like this long electric pull it you know it was decently fast I remember a buddy mine had picked up the 450 Honda when it first came out and it's a stock not modified and I remember riding and it wasn't well now it's slower I mean that one like these you know the 450 high-performance quads are so choked off stock so they're really a mile stated tune but stock for stock it was decently fast but it was really tractable suspension was super plush I like the suspension probably the best has mentioned me quad I've ever owned in terms of for talking for what I'm doing I'm trying to motocross track meet me the Honda was better but the trails and just like going around my little woodsy motocross track it worked great this was a fantastic little quad electric start reverse gear everything you wanted in a quad I love that thing super fun I think what what I the reason I eventually sold you know one thing that what about Suzuki's the quality is not quite there and you know compared to a Honda and little stuff like I remember the the skid plate on this thing underneath the the quad was plastic and I ended up taking it was really rocking with my parents place up on top of the mountain there and ended up having the the chain derailed in the middle of No because in Iraq and that stupid plastic covered and protected hit the sprocket Bennett derailed the chain little stuff like that little things that would break on that thing that just you know my 20 year old 250r didn't have these problems so I got a little disillusioned with it I got pissed at it it ended up throwing a chain wanted the chain up broke Bentham wadded up a chain been against the shift shaft broke the cases I had to get that fixed it really soured me on the experience like I love the performance of this quad but I had a couple of problems with it where it's stranded me two or three times and I was over it you know I was like well screw this Suzuki piece of crap in spite of the fact that I love the way it worked it was just the little stuff it just you know again me my bad luck maybe I'm sure plenty you guys have had quad sports out there never had a bit of a problem I had a lot of little issues with it and it just kind of soured me on the machine so I ended up selling it I probably here so so great performance again nothing against mine maybe I just had bad luck I think they're good little quads but in my experience it just wasn't maybe it's well put together and was more at least vulnerable to damage it seemed like than some of the other ones I've had after I got rid of the quad sport I actually went a completely different direction because I'm again I wanted something something more comfortable what I ended up doing is when I had the quad sport and went riding with a bunch of buddies in mind the guy who actually had that four tracks the 450 sport quad I don't know what they call them whatever the 450 are and he actually owned a prairie which was a big v-twin 4x4 and we were riding out of his place which is outside of Leesburg here on America's I mean where it is but a bunch of rocky trails and stuff and he let me ride his Prairie and this thing was like a Cadillac I was like wow this thing is awesome Heather the if you're never in the Prairie it actually is a 700 CC v-twin this is before they came out with the brute force and the damn thing in spite of the fact it's an automatic transmission it is a rocket I mean you could if you whack the throttle this big 7 800 pound machine would loft the front end it was like holy Christ and I'm never riding it and it was so comfortable where where my quad sport would beat the crap out even with rocks and roots and everything you're consciously shifting it and blah blah blah this thing was like the Cadillac it was so great I loved it and I actually went this is I think 2005 I went in rode the new Suzuki version which was they have independent suspension on it and it was a beautiful looking machine actually looked much better than the Prairie was add really great performance but it looked kabhi and the Suzuki all had an independent rear suspension which made them very tippy and what I wanted was a sport feel I wasn't looking for comfort as much as handling big and heavy always maybe a little nervous so I wanted it to handle and feel more like my 300 yaks or something and the thing about the prairie was at a live axle so it was way more stable in a much lower center of gravity if you park a prairie next to one of the modern like a like I said it grizzly sits up 2 inches taller and I ride like a buddy Mons grizzly and the thing feels like it's kind of roll in the corners a tip over they always feel super sketchy to me and the prairie though for a machine as big as it is it feels like a sport quad and I could see how you can take the racks off of and actually rotten gene see I can actually go pretty damn fast on it it was you can do donuts with it and pull wheelies and actually you could jump it I jumped the thing you can jump attack up feet in the air the thing I said like great suspension reel as far as work quads go the prairie was like the bomb I loved it it was really fun and that is the quad I had the longest if anything I've ever owned I had that quad jeez Louise probably 13 years now I didn't put a ton of use on it I sold it to my buddy Jamie a couple years ago cuz I just stopped riding and it was sitting in my dad's house it only it had less than 300 miles on it and I never took any where it stayed at my dad's house again it was my go up there and ride the trails in the wintertime or beat the trails down get a couple of buddies to come over we I'd pull up the quad actually you know I blew out my ACL I've done my ACL twice and that was the thing that I got to ride after while I was letting my knee healed up I didn't want to get back on a dirt bike so my buddies wanted to ride I rode the quad there for you know a couple months after the surgery just cuz you don't worry about dabbing your leg it was a great corner I love this machine again if you're looking for a utility machine that's got a sporty intention there great now they don't make them anymore like I said I think the brute force which came after has an independent rear they've all gone to independent rear and I just don't like the way they handle but my buddy Jamie still has that Prairie still rides it took it out to hatfield-mccoy last year and it's still a great quad and easily one of the best I've owned in terms of performance and I loved it it's a great machine for sure all right so we've come to the last quad I've bought although not the last one on the one that I actually owned the longest and I had up until very recently was that 2005 Prairie but the last quad I actually purchased was a 2004 Kawasaki k xf 400 k xf I believe which is the equivalent to the LTZ 400 during the early 2000s Kawasaki Suzuki entered into an alliance where you got you know yellow cow sakis and green Suzuki's for a couple years they jointly developed the first generation of the their 250 four-stroke and for a couple years again they cross pollinated their lineup so you could actually get a drz and green and you can get a quad sport in green as well and that's what I bought again I love that zookie performance but I got aggravated with that particular one I had and somebody here local and Leesburg had one for sale and I was like you know what I love that quad I'll get another one again everything you could say about that first uzuki you could say about this it's really the same bike with green plastic I love the ergonomics the suspension is great the motor is perfect for a quad in my opinion for the kind of use you're gonna use it really is the perfect off-road kind of sporty quad motor not too fast not too slow just like Goldilocks love these things they're comfortable they shift well the only thing that's a knock is you know you better upgrade the skid plates the quality some of the components was not great you know Kawasaki and Suzuki again in my opinion typically not maybe not quite as well put together as like a Honda but the machine was performance wise awesome and I had it I had to be a year and a half I had a lot of fun with it if I remember right the reason I sold it was I ended up wanting to get somebody had a KTM for KTM 540 525 SX with a 540 kit for sale yes I wanted to get that so I ended up selling the Kawasaki so I could get this KTM Iannetta at the time I had maybe three or four motorcycles in the garage and quad and my wife's like you got to get rid of something again something else so anyway I know in and I'm getting sacrificed to the Moto gods for me to pick up this KTM open-class four-stroke it was a really cool machine so I don't regret that but this Kawasaki was a cool bike again they're great quads you know long as you don't break something on them or do something stupid with him they're really reliable I think in general I think most people say they're pretty bulletproof my again my stuff was probably abused is probably on me so I'll say I'll take knee be so I probably treated that that quad sport incorrectly I had no failures with the Kawasaki version it was perfectly reliable when she need a little quad so that was the end of that story so there you have it that's a look back at the ATVs I've owned over the years like I said I haven't had nearly as many ATVs as I've had dirt bikes but I love them you know I just recently thought about picking up another one I like riding ATVs as a guy with really bad knees three knee surgeries I like the fact that I don't have to dab my leg in the corners and also my hip is bad - so some of the ATVs is nice that's why I read that prepped that Prairie so long it's cuz I could ride that thing when I couldn't really ride a dirt bike as easily anymore so it was getting a little bit physically getting tough on me in the Prairie because it you could stand up everywhere and if the suspension was very plush and stuff it was a great way to ride when physically maybe you're hindered a little bit and ATVs they allow you to ride year-round they're super fun in the winter time when my dirt bike would sit if it's snowed or whatever the ground was frozen the ATV didn't care I think people who were haters maybe haven't given him a fair chance I mean I'm not saying you know go out and trading your CRF for 50 and get a quad for sure I'm their bikes are my first love but quads can be super fun within their element and I think I pretty much embrace all off-road machines of any kind and I I'm not sure why there's so much in fight it's almost like the two-stroke vs. four-stroke guys there's the the quad versus dirtbike guys which always to be seeking like you know got like Gary Denton who was a phenomenal motocross racer and then transitioned the quads and a phenomenal quad racer great at both our Barry Hawk a guy won the motocross of what won the GNCC and dirt bikes and quads so I think it's a lot of cross-pollination there they are different but they they do require some of the same skills and I love them they're super fun and so like so if you ever tried one give it a whirl they were there a good time I definitely enjoyed the highly endorse them so if you like this sort of thing check out some of the other stuff I've done on my channel again I did my blaze reviews of the 125s my two 50s and my 500s I'm probably I do one with my street bikes next street slash dual sport I've had again not as many street bikes I've always been way more of a dirt bike guy but I have had several dual sports and a few straight on street bikes so I'll take a little time to tell you little bit about what I thought about them some of them some of them great some of them not so great so it's like anything if you'd like to subscribe I would appreciate it share on social media get the word out on the channel that would be great if your list of this and podcast forum if you could rate and review it on iTunes that'd be super helpful as well until we meet again this Tony blazer keep the rubber side down peace

Channel: The Motocross Vault

Views: 3,768

Rating: 4.9727893 out of 5

Keywords: race, crash, supercross, motocross, HONDA, YAMAHA, KAWASAKI, KTM, SUZUKI, 80, 125, 250, 500, 490, YZ80, YZ85, YZ125, YZ250, YZ400, YZ765, YZ490, YZ450, YZ426, CR80, CR80R, CR125, CR250, CR450, CR480, CR500, CR500R, KX80, KX125, KX250, KX450, KX420, KX500, rm80, RM125, RM250, RM465, RM500, RM450, RM-Z250, RM*Z450, ATC, FOURTRAX, Blaster, Warrior

Id: MowjJXKvl-s

Length: 39min 54sec (2394 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 20 2020