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New member from Newfoundland, Canada!

5K views 9 replies 5 participants last post by  CanadianKodiak700 
#1 ·
Hey folks.... new member here from the most easterly province in Canada and most easterly place in North America. ATV culture is wide spread in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador and well ingrained. Many many places to ride and lots of groups of ATV riders.

I was a long time Honda owner.... my latest Honda was a 2011 Honda Foreman 500. I use my ATV's for work (hunting, firewood hauling, etc) and the Honda Foreman was always up to the challenge, but it never had power steering and it never had "true" 4WD, it had the Honda "TraxLok" 4WD which is basically useless to get you out of a jam, 2 rear wheels locked and pulling but limited slip up front...how many times did I see myself stuck with a front wheel on solid ground and the other in the muck...was annoying to say the least. Last winter I put a set of Camso T4S tracks on the Foreman, it was a game changer for the winter...we had a LOT of snow in Newfoundland last winter and the tracks allowed me to use my quad right through the winter. But with 25 HP, foot shift, and no power steering the tracks slowed the Foreman down a LOT. It pulled like a train while in 1st and 2nd gear though and I appreciated that when hauling firewood at times, but I could never get any amount of speed out of it on the straight going and the lack of power steering sucked.

What swayed me to abandon Honda and go to Yamaha was driving my buddies 2017 Grizzly 700 EPS while hunting one day last fall. Man there was so much more power and the ride was awesome compared to the old solid rear axle Foreman. This set the gears in motion for me.... I knew it was a matter of time before I would be selling the '11 Foreman and getting a Yamaha. I did give Honda a look at what they offered, but a 520cc Rubicon DCT was the best they had to offer, which if you ask me is kind of sad when Yamaha offers a 700cc, Kawasaki a 750cc, Suzuki a 750cc, Polaris a 570,850, and 1000cc, and CanAm a 570,650,850, and 1000cc! Honda has seriously lost it's way in the ATV market... there was a time when a Honda ATV was the gold standard, they were the best on the market. Sadly that hasn't been the case in 20 years or more.

Couple of weeks ago I pulled the trigger on this beautiful 2020 Yamaha Kodiak 700 EPS SE. The tactical black sold it for me, I could have gotten a green 700 EPS with diff-lock for a couple of $100 cheaper but I love the matte black and the black aluminum wheels..... I have a set of overfenders installed which will help when I run my tracks on it this winter, and I put on the Quadrax Elite cargo box I had on my Foreman and a set of shock socks (which was also on my Foreman). I will be adding a Rival rear bumper and a Rival full skid plate before the fall's hunting/firewood cutting season. Had it out for a run the other day and it was such a different experience than riding my old Foreman!!

9720
 
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#2 ·
Welcome to GC. Nice looking Kodiak. You will love it. I too have the same Kodiak but mine is a 2017. You will like it more when you up grade the tires. I also have a Honda Rubicon but it more for my wife to ride or friends that might stop by and want to ride, or I’m going to be beating on it hauling wood where I don’t care if it gets scratched or banged up so as to keep the Kodiak looking nice. Also the Honda transmission and ride leave a lot to be desired like you mentioned.
 
#3 ·
thanks for the welcome. When I took the Kodiak for a run I went through all of the options, 2WD, 4WD, 4WD-Diff lock, low range, high range etc. I was very impressed with the 4WD-LO, man it had a lot of bite and power.

This Kodiak will be my every day work quad... she won’t be pampered but at the same time won’t be abused. Here’s a pic of my ‘11 Foreman, she was mainly used to haul firewood out of the bush and hunting, 4400 kms and 385 hours on the odometer when I sold it, I would say 4000 of those kms was hard hauling firewood. But I kept good care of it, never pushed it past what it could handle, kept the rust check to the frame and tried to hose her off when possible. It never gave one bit of trouble in the 9 years I owned it.
I just hope the Kodiak works and looks this good after 9 years 😀

9724
 
#8 ·
The 500 (now 520) rubicon is actually almost a perfect match to the 700 kodiak as a competitor. Very similar in almost every aspect with the kodiak winning out by a slim margin. My buddy bought the 19 500 rubicon manual shift, and we were pretty well matched, mind you I did have a flipped weight in my clutch so I was basically starting out in a higher "gear" all the time. Now with that corrected, totally different beast.

I have an 18 700 se, I'll give you a heads up on that rival rear bumper, it's going to need very minor modification to fit. I'm thinking when they designed it, it was tested fitted on a grizzly ac base model kodiak... No prob, keith come with factory 2" receiver hitch. But our SE have the hitch, and the tabs on the bumper need to spread out just a bit to go over the mounting tabs on the hitch (use the same bolt holes). But once they spread out that tiny extra bit, the holes don't line up perfectly, making it impossible to thread the bolt in. You either need to enlarge the hole a bit on the bumper tabs, or possibly grind or dent the gussets on the hitch to allow the tabs to slide in straighter and closer together.
Personally, I opt for enlarging the holes because I don't want to effect the structure of the gusset on the hitch.


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#9 ·
The 500 (now 520) rubicon is actually almost a perfect match to the 700 kodiak as a competitor. Very similar in almost every aspect with the kodiak winning out by a slim margin. My buddy bought the 19 500 rubicon manual shift, and we were pretty well matched, mind you I did have a flipped weight in my clutch so I was basically starting out in a higher "gear" all the time. Now with that corrected, totally different beast.

I have an 18 700 se, I'll give you a heads up on that rival rear bumper, it's going to need very minor modification to fit. I'm thinking when they designed it, it was tested fitted on a grizzly ac base model kodiak... No prob, keith come with factory 2" receiver hitch. But our SE have the hitch, and the tabs on the bumper need to spread out just a bit to go over the mounting tabs on the hitch (use the same bolt holes). But once they spread out that tiny extra bit, the holes don't line up perfectly, making it impossible to thread the bolt in. You either need to enlarge the hole a bit on the bumper tabs, or possibly grind or dent the gussets on the hitch to allow the tabs to slide in straighter and closer together.
Personally, I opt for enlarging the holes because I don't want to effect the structure of the gusset on the hitch.


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I saw a comparison between the Rubicon and the Kodiak and the Kodiak got the nod in all but one category in real world riding. Can’t recall the category and it was done on one of those online ATV sites review sites. The Rubicon 520 puts down 30 HP, the Kodiak 700 48 HP. That’s 60% more power, I would hope that would be noticeable in real world driving. All I know is that there was a difference of less than $500 between a 2020 520 Rubicon DCT Deluxe and my 2020 Kodiak 700 EPS SE.

Thanks for the heads up on the bumper. Would you have a pic of it installed on your Kodiak? And I’d agree, I would rather enlarge the hole slightly than muck with the receiver.
 
#10 ·
I'll get you a pic when I get it installed. I was trying to install before a planned ride, but ended up just leaving it off. Then work and weather got in the way. Last few days e have had a heat warning and been 34+ with a humidex of 37 to 40. Now today, it's pouring rain. Man I miss having a garage.

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