quebec bob

Simmons male a wing to bolt on the inside edge of the ski, just behind the spindle, it does not touch the ground. Basically if sprays the snow from the ski onto the windows at the front of the track, saves the hy-fax and cools the sled. they cost 15 dollars, I do not think you will find any thing easier, or with less maintence, and nothing works as good as these. 10 minutes to put them on and forget about them. You will not believe how ingenious and simple this idea is and it really works!!

Yes, you do not want to miss a corner on these hills, pay attention, keep right, and enjoy it. Maybe some folks who are afraid of heights and high bridges could get a little nervous but I think it is doable if you be careful, you will build your confidence, and you want to see this place, close to Gaspe beauty!!

I finally got out of the shop @ 3 am Sat. morning, went home and packed, on the road @ 730 am, off to Universal in Riviera Du Loop to meet Sno Horse and his 17 year old son , for 8 days of adventure. Minor details, we lost the alternator in the truck 40 miles south of the border in Vermont, half hour detour @ Napa, fixed it pit-stop fast in the parking lot, then got thru customs fast. Arrived RDL at 430 pm, put sleds in locked down area and went to dinner, we were spoiled by the restaurant there at dinner and breakfast. We were on the trail by 8 am, trails are hard and fast all the way to Matane, many places faster than I will admit to!! We were very fortunate, police were checking sleds at a road crossing 30 miles from Matane, and were writing tickets as we approached, they were so busy with the dozen sleds they had, that they waved the 4 of us thru. We took the ferry over to Baie- Comeau and arrived just at dusk. It is colder here and a LOT more snow. As we were riding in the dark a blinding storm dropped a quick 2 inches in less than an hour. Trails here are as good as it gets, no other way to describe it. Sno horses' son is missing a week of school, and he really misses it!! Great rider for 17, very impressive. I have a former employee along with me on this trip, another young guy, 24, he is in heaven, never ridden Quebec before, and he is starting at the top!! We checked in to the Comfort and took a taxi to dinner@ Greco's, nice place, middle of the road prices, when I saw Jared and Phil's steak, I new I had ordered the wrong entrée. Other than a couple of wrong turns, that we quickly righted, the days ride was great. We are not expecting much traffic going North to Sep-tile and if the trail is reasonably passable we will continue East of there, we would like to be back to the truck in RDL by dark on Saturday. Tomorrow I will try to post some pics. Ice, sorry you could not make this trip. I changed the skis on the 850 Back Country for this trip and went with Simmons gen 3, 8 " wide, what a good choice, flotation in deep snow is amazing, 0 darting, much more planted and all the tippy stuff from being high and narrow is gone, only a tad more steering resistance, you would have to be unreasonable to even mention it, it may have lowered the mpg by .5, I will know better after another day. We are all looking forward to the trial in the morning...to be continued!!

that arctic cat looks as long as a ladder fire truck!

PUMPER TRUCK CONVENTION!!

ICE, did you get me any of those RUSH OVER AND STICKERS??

Really good thought Phil, never thought of that but saw it once in the shop, a tech heating shock bolts with a torch, very high pressure spraying hydraulic oil under pressure, really dangerous!!

bvs1 is selling for 250 ish here in Mass., the dealer has a ton of them and no snow here for 2 years, he took a deep discount for me at the register with out me even asking!!

sometimes when freezing rain becomes an accumulation, rather than a melt down, it can make for some very good trails when it gets cold enough to groom it really fills in the holes and packs well, just a little new snow on top really makes for Indy car smooth riding!!

What does that helmet do for 600 dollars, stereo system, night vision???

High pressure fuel injection, spraying fuel onto exhaust and pants, no game, you really have to understand when this happens to GET AWAY FROM THE SLED, HAVE A PLAN, GET THAT FUEL CADDY IF YOU CAN, and maybe unhook your heated shield. Seriously, when this shit happens you have to realize everything is plastic, and you cannot save it, be smart and get the hell away from it in case it explodes. Really terrible day when this happens but really great to see the post so if it happens to your group you will remember what to do when it is hard to think quick and smart, hope he has insurance and nobody got hurt.

Many thanks, I think a ski with a little less rocker and a little longer contact behind the saddle/spindle will really help stabilize this sled, and push it a little more toward trail than off trail.

There is the report and pics we were all waiting for, including Bill with a big smile. Leaving Saturday for Sep-tiles, cannot come soon enough, many thanks!!

Mike, you are right, only reason I am doing Simmons is they really worked great on my supercharged Yamaha vector, they were only hard to turn at stand still, worked great while moving. My friend put some aggressive C & A skis on his 2017 renegade without trying them and it was so hard to turn that he bought pilot skis at the dealer in la tuque and left the c&a skis there.Maybe I should try pilot skis, hope I did not waste my money, but the sled is a new model and not many people have a real answer yet. All I know for sure is there must be a better trail ski than the deep snow series 2 it comes with. It is a cross over so Johnny stand-up probably loves them.

went thru St zenon, St Michelle area a week ago on a Saturday, they do an incredible job grooming there, but it was brown in and out of town, down to nothing, much better 5 miles out of each town, but this melt down, only thing that will fix this is more snow, no grooming until it freezes hard, go north!!

Time flies, waits for no one!!

Me too, lots of guys loved that motor, and out west a ton of people turboed that motor and it was very reliable, lots will be disappointed.Replacing it with a 900 turbo, it will be a lot more potent than the 1200 for sure, but more $ too.

I have owned a lot of sleds since 66.I rode Yamaha for 70% of that time, started with 318 ski-doo Olympic, 338 sno-jets, 800 Zr arctic cat, vector with supercharger, Yamaha 136 Warrior, RV 250 Ski-Doo blizzard, so I have been around the sport, riding, racing, building, etc. I am not brand loyal, we are all enjoying this great sport thru our own personal taste and I do not care what anyone rides. So now I will critique this sled from my own personal background. First I will say that the 146 inch track , unstudded is an amazing track, really cannot feel any difference from a 125 as far as noise and smoothness, and it really hooks up WELL!! The big windshield and side deflectors work good but could be angled a little more upright rather than tilted back so far.The handle bars looked kind of cheap compared to the covered ones on Yamaha, but I will tell you that they are very comfortable and the seating position and ergos to the bars , they really nailed it, probably could not come up with a better seating position, I am 6 ft and 180lbs. The c-motion suspension, some say it is a Polaris copy, who cares, it really is a great suspension, I like it more than my friends 17 renegade, and it turns just as good, if not better on the trail, hard to believe all that sled is back there, cannot tell it from a 129, but i love all that storage area, that linqs system is great.I am not too impressed by the ds2 skis, they make the sled feel a little tippy, it is tall and an inch or so narrower than the renegade, I will be going to code north for a week starting Saturday with Simmons gen 3 8 inch wide skis with the dual runner, I think they will make a big difference, it took me 500 miles and 3 days to start getting use to the skis, they have to go. I know it is a cross-over but it is a little too narrow.The back country is gear down 4 teeth on the small gear from the renegade, it makes a huge difference in acceleration, it is much quicker out of the hole with the 1.6 track and lower gearing. fuel mileage is 14.5 maybe stretch to 15 if you go 45 to 50mph. Oil consumption is 150 to 165 miles a quart, way more than my 2 stroke Yamahas were.The windshield mounted mirrors, well they functionally suck, poor location and poorly designed mirror, you could get killed trying to use these , all they do is cover the law, not much more.Hand warmers are great, switches on console, I thought it was a joke but I will tell you, I like them and they are easy to use, and if you tip over they will not break off the bar. I saved the part everyone want to know about for last, the 850 engine and clutch. This motor is a lot tamer in the shorter renegade with the smaller track and higher gearing. the back country has lower gearing and more bite with the 1.6 track and it really makes this sled go.....almost too much, the initial pull is quite impressive, remember this is coming from a guy that has built and ridden a lot of 200-230 hp sleds.i was really surprised at how potent this sled was, the clutch is pure racing material, Aaen and microbelmont have used this roller design for years, ski-doo really dialed it in on this application, incredibly responsive, the 3 lbs lighter, Hooper race engines in New Hampshire have built a lot of sleds and engines for world champions for years their big hole shot advantage was a very light primary clutch. 1 lb of rotating mass is equal to about 10 hp. ski-doo now sells this to the public and they really have it dialed in, we will see how durable it is. A lot of guys were saying belts were blowing, mostly on mountain sleds, you should take the insulation out of the cover, even cut the bottom 20% off the cover, let some air in and heat out, ride it normally and it works just fine, beat the death out of a free ride in 3 feet of powder and it will get hot and blow, trial riders are having 0 trouble, I have been watching this close.I am quite surprised how powerful and responsive this sled is, you can pull the skis at 65 mph quite easily, the braking is almost as impressive as the engine, first sled with no studs, and it does not need them. I put front wheels in the skid like the renegade to help the Hy-fax out , should have come this way, the suspension is really great riding and 10 lbs lighter than r-motion, and just as good, maybe better.This sled is probably too much performance from an engine stand point than 50 percent of riders would ever need or even want, it is a real handful if you try to use it, it will go to 100 very quick and effortlessly. If you have some miles on the seat and you like sports cars you will really love this sled, it is that good, there are not a lot of them on the trail yet but this will change, but the 19 is listed for 14,400 which is pretty steep, I bought mine in Troy new Hampshire for 12,900, their first offer to me and I took it without countering.Overall I am happy with the sled, nobody put out anything perfect we all want or add something. They have a glove box extension with a garmin gps, but I passed, 1000$ was a little too much!!Hope I covered it for for anyone thinking about it, happy trails!!

Ski-Doo has released their new models for 19 and it looks like they have once again raised the bar, a 900 ace turbo 4 stroke, and G-4 in a lot of models,now that Yamaha has all but left the game they have really taken the lead. You can really see it out on the trail where they more than outnumber everyone else combined. I bought a 18 back country this year, after decades with Yamaha , it is a good feeling knowing that if needed parts and service are close by. They really surprised me this year, this company is always pushing the envelope.

School vacation week and the warm-up and rain has come at the very worst time. But it does look like the Gaspe from between RDL and Matane going North will fair quite well and Cote North From Tadasac North towards Sep- tile looks fine, next week looks to be in the mid 20's f, a little warm, but that is where the good riding will be, in the North away from the crowd, maybe the last good riding of the year in the next 2 weeks, this season has gone way too fast!!

Always amazed at how reasonable the Fairmont is!!

We will try and post nightly, switching our Verizon US account to Canadian so we can make calls and post.Cannot wait to get there!!

great ride, hoping for the same weather next week, happy trails!!

love that old Yamaha V-Max 800 4 cylinder, those were incredible sleds!!

I wonder if the guy who invented duct tape ever had any idea what it was really worth???