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New 2023 Polaris

6K views 56 replies 14 participants last post by  too slow 
Hard to complain about anything with new sleds the way they ride. Reminds of my moto, and enduro bikes i raced. Their long suspension travel is so forgiving. Strange how it took so long for the sled manufactures to finally get where the dirt bike manufactures were over 30 years ago.
 
Much simpler frame construction would be my guess. And bikes had already been around for a century at least.
Funny thing though the shock technology on the bikes were starting to get good when i raced a 1975 yz125. Even ohlins made shocks for my indy 440's back in the early 90's i used. All polaris had were fox at the time on my 91 440 xc which was nothing special.
 
Their MOTORS were a force, but their suspension was still mid 70's in 1980 when a Kawi KDX 175 or Yamaha IT 175 would smoke a Can-An 250 or 350 over rough terrain. I personally lived this.
Boy i tend to disagree on that one. With the suspension properly set up those AA, and A class riders on 250 Husky, KTM's, and Can-Am's were taking home the trophies. I ran a KDX 175 back in 80 and 81. They were a decent C class bike, but fell apart when you had B and A class riders using them. We had one A class rider on a yamaha IT 250 back in 1980 that was able to stay in the points hunt. Those were not kind years for me...more dnf's than i ever had riding those jap bikes.
 
To be honest, I was a C+ rider in '80, competing with others of my kind. The Can-Am's got a lot of views of my KDX tailight. Not so much the KTM's and Husky's. Very few in our snack bracket back then were riding Euro bikes.:(
I wish i started with the euro bikes earlier, they were more durable for enduros. Back in 78 i started out as a c rider on a new 78 IT250. Boy that was a ugly choice to have for those tight new england woods. The bike was more suited for western riding. At any rate after 2 enduro's i got my B carb. I rode the same bike the next year with a bunch of changes. It took me the entire 79 season before i had enough points to make A. Figured i 'd switch to a kawi KDX 175 in 1980. It was just a lot of dnf's on the 3 KDX's i had till i went back with the yamaha IT200's in 85, and 86. Things totally turned around real quick. I went with cagiva, huskys and ktm's after that, and liked them all.
 
What kept failing on your KDX's?
Broken frames, the wheels flat spotted real easy and broke spokes. I sheared of the rear brake lever more than once plus shattered 2 rear drums on my kdx 175's. Blew the mono shock more that once making those bikes unable to ride. Imo, they were junk. My 83 kdx 200 wasn't a lot better with a seized engine right from the dealer. Not much later broke the internal shift fork in the transmission, and was stuck in 1st gear. The kawi dealer that was helping out claimed they never saw so many part failures, but i was their only guy that was doing enduro's with them at the time. Their other customers that bought those bikes only used them for pleasure riding, or a turkey run or two. Once i got rid of them everything became good again. Yeah, i had some minor gripes with other bikes, but those green things were by far the worse.
 
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