vt_bluyamaha54

bonjour chris !!!
 
thank you ...very appreciated !!!
snowing lightly this morning !!!
 
jean-guy

I’ve built a few performance sleds and many custom heat exchangers, get the hoses off both sides of the sled up front and put a hose on one side and see if the tunnel flows, fast easy and simple to eliminate.hopefully by now somebody has taken the radiator cap off and verified no exhaust or compression leaking into the cooling system superheating the coolant. Has someone put a pressure tester on the cold engine to see if a crack is opening up under temperature and overpressurizing the cooling system and filling it with air causing a system to overcome the limit of the pressure cap and pumping it out on the ground… I’m with Alain on this one… I would really question how the water pump was tested… if they plastic drone gear in the block is damaged or an impellers is loose… something crazy here… I had a friend put coolant in and he dropped the aluminum seal from the container into the reservoir causing a restriction… that’s outside the box… I don’t want to say anything negative about any repairer…. But this is nuts and bolts… I’ve done this for nearly 50 years… and I never give up on a customer… hasn’t been looked at by the right guy

A big thanks for sharing this Alain. Wonderfully written and great pics/video as always

Chris - an overheat situation with a known good thermostat, water pump, sensor, and good coolant levels kinda leaves only the piping and the heat exchanger. Kinda surprised the dealer wasn’t able to cure this for you. 
I would suggest a thermal imaging gun to check temps at different points in the system with it running. Just my opinion - 

Chris - an overheat situation with a known good thermostat, water pump, sensor, and good coolant levels kinda leaves only the piping and the heat exchanger. Kinda surprised the dealer wasn’t able to cure this for you. 
I would suggest a thermal imaging gun to check temps at different points in the system with it running. Just my opinion - 

A big thanks for sharing this Alain. Wonderfully written and great pics/video as always

I am a Mainer who normally rides Quebec, (almost exclusively quebec last 15 years but have decades of riding Maine);  but past two years have ridden Maine due to the Covid situation.
Go to page 7 of the  QuebecRider general discussion section for last season's rides and pictures,  ***titled  "maine ridn"***mine of the Millinocket area of trails and lunch stops, as well as others who posted their rides of Aroostook County.
My favorite places over the years of riding all the various Maine snowmobile hot spots:
Rangeley:  very busy trails Thurs. -Sun.   Lots and lots of fantastic restaurants. Big entertainment center (Moose Alley) with games, bowling, bar food etc., small downtown but has great shops, big ski area (Saddleback Mountain) and another ski resort Sugarloaf Ski Resort that also has outdoor center and is about a 40 minute drive, and some nice places in Rangeley to stay as well as large amount of camp rentals. Lots more to do for kids and family type trip. Beautiful area!
Millinocket: love the big wide logging roads they use for trails,  lots of trails,  not enough restaurants at night, not much to do at night, lunch stops  on trail can be small and crowded at lunchtime.  Popular starting point for saddle bagging to Aroostook County, and saves few hours in truck driving to Aroostook.
Aroostook County:  considered best area in Maine to ride, good combo of fields, RR beds, trails etc.  I like to stay in Presque Isle or Caribou as they are centrally located for riding in all directions.  Only downside is it is a long drive to get there.
mike
 

Here our last Sunday trail path for a Joliette St-Côme loop

The festival St-Côme en glace(Ice sculpture festival) began this last weekend so it was a good opportunity to ride on this side
The last week thaw that hit us up to Saturday had been rough for the south west of Quebec province were the snow levels were already limit but after the deep cold Saturday night and the good groomers work the trails from home and up north survived well and we got good trails conditions.
Here near home at start. As expected, trails were very hard: scratchers on duty!.


A bit of brownish snow on some spot but no breakthrough. Here north from Joliette

As expected side of the roads are not at their best...here crossing Baril bridge

But the fields are nice. Here north of St-Ambroise de Kildare

From here south of St-Alphonse de Rodriguez we began to saw some new snow. Grooming of Coureur des Bois snowmobile club was perfect

North of St-Alphonse when going up in the mountains we got some vey nice scenery


Once in St-Côme we walked a bit in the village to admire the sculptures. Again this year we are not deceived!


We are still early in the festival that was just begin and will continue up to the end of February. Many Sculptures were still "work in progress" and we had the chance to watch many artists at work


To give you an idea what to expect of this festival, they pulled from the river more than 700 ice blocks of more than 3000lbs each that have been placed along the principal road  in the village for the sculptors


The Festival that just started will last 2 weeks/3 weekends to end on the 27 February. It's a nice destination ride by sleds if you are in the area, the #343 trail pass trough the village, impossible to miss!
We then continued our ride in north direction on #343

There was the short last section of the #343 that was rough but back on the #63 it was nice

We pass by the Bazinet outfitter

And continued down to Ste-Émilie/St-Damien. Here just down the big hill in St-Gabriel direction

South of St-Gabriel, a bit more brown snow spots visible but overall very good


The long fields between St-Norbert and Ste-Elisabeth were hard and very fast

And finally here near home

We got home early with 135 miles for the whole small loop
So the season is still going strong here, already mid February... let's enjoy it
Alain

Great reporting Tom. Looks like everything aligned for you guys. I’ll have to check in with you when you get back for your thoughts on the Sidewinder. 
Safe travels -

Alain, your ride reports are always great to read and your pics + videos are excellent!
Thank you for posting

Great reporting Tom. Looks like everything aligned for you guys. I’ll have to check in with you when you get back for your thoughts on the Sidewinder. 
Safe travels -

Cool photos from yesterday  2 guys out fishing, the icebreaker was stopped and had coast guard personnel on the ice next to ship. They allowed these guys to approach and take these pictures.
impressive 
 

Do not hold your breath
Legault is a bull shit artist like all politicians

Alain, did I ever tell you that you are my "hero" ?
When I die I want to come back reincarnated as YOU !!
You and Kristine are true Canadian motoneige icons !!!!!

We were due for a crazy day ride...



It's a 300+miles loop ride running on both side of the St-Laurence river via a ferry and bridge that get around the large Montreal city, this doable from the porch of my home. Having done it before we already knew it was an ambitious day ride, way more than doing a 300 miles in norther area. There are many roads and highways and rail road crossings+ the ferry and "the unexpected" that insure a very full day ride.

So we started from home at 8:00 am to catch the 9:00 ferry in St-Ignace de Loyola. Freshly groomed trail to warm up...



Arriving at the first river trail path, it was a bit scary



The St-Laurence river level got a bit higher in the night and cause water to rise on the ice on the sides. It is more scary than dangerous because the trail snow bank already cover the immediate side of the river where it can be dangerous and the small water pool we got is over the full river ice cover. It's been so cold since the beginning of the season that this ice is for sure thick enough to support the weight of a Yamaha so no worries we are on a BRP! 



We got at the ferry at 8:45



This ferry is one of the cheap option to cross the St-Laurence river: $7,60 for a sled and his driver and $11,35 in our case for an old married couple +sled



There is actually 2 ferries that offer crossings every 30 minutes on each sides during most of the day(see the web site for full schedule)



Our ferry had an hard time to accost because of the ice. It had to move back and forth many times to clear/crush all the ice along the dock and the 10 minutes crossing turn to over an half an hour one. We got back on the south shore trail at 9:45.
The first stretch along the river to get out of Sorel city was rough but we cross the groomer that was about to solve that



We quickly got on the #5 trail that we follow most of the path up the west of Montreal city. Not a lot snow but good conditions. We could feel few earth bumps in the skis on some very windy pass but the trails were overall very good  





You need to not be allergic to road crossing, especially highway crossings. I quickly counted and we cross the #30 highway 5 times, the #20 and #10 then the #15 2 times also the #640 and #25 and this on or under viaduct and even with a tunnel for the #640
We stopped there for a small break around 11:30



Here a first video(of three) that summarize this first part. you can always push the reader 4 arrows icon to pass in full screen
Continuing on the #5 trail we could saw St-Hilaire mountain that we usually view riding by car



Here after #20 highway crossing, good conditions



It began to get worse after the #15 highway crossing. Last Friday fluffy snow had been more generous there and with the very strong winds we had there was a lot snow blades/drifts in the trail. The visibility stayed good but the bumpy drifts slowed down us to keep in the safe and comfortable zone.



We even crossed a groomer that flatten our route for a few miles but the drifts were forming again quickly behind





We also had something I don't encounter often, a long train that gave us a 12 minutes break before clearing the way



We left the #5 trail in St-Michel area (west of Montreal) to cut toward St-Louis de Gonzague(bridge). We had few trail changes to make so I pointed my destination on the Gps to make it easy but a change between my map version and the real world trail glitched my gps that route us on the wrong side. I figured something was wrong by seeing directions for villages that we had already pass before. I got my cell phone out and made a check with Imotoneige that locate us and confirmed we were out of our route. We stepped back but it add some miles over an already busy ride.  


Here the 2nd video that summarize that part of the ride
 
We finally reached our ticket to the north shore at St-Louis de Gonzague around 4:00pm. It's a 3/4 miles long car bridge over Beauharnois canal were snowmobiles are allowed to cross for free. The bridge is also almost snow free so I did as usual and throw some dish wash soap on my track slides before starting the crossing to help our mule to move our 2 ass on the other side of the bridge without overheating too much. It went very well.



After crossing the Beauharnois canal we were needing next to cross the other half of the St-Laurence river that is done directly on ice. Even not groomed it ride nicely



We then continued to catch the #33 trail, The day was already well advanced



We got on the long Deux-Montages lake a bit past 5:30pm. A bit bumpy but it was ok and was riding good. We missed our target to cross it at daylight... here brief turn to admire the sky behind us 



We stopped for a real supper break at Île Bizard snowmobile relay around 6:00pm. We were near alone there but the people who operate the place told us they were crazy busy from the morning up to the end of afternoon and had depleted most of their food stocks. I took a good club sandwich with a cheese slice in place of the tomatoes and it was delicious! Nice authentic people there, I recommend it! 
We got back in saddle a bit before 7:00pm to do the remaining 90miles to get home
The sony flash was in strike



The trails in this area were pretty worn out and I adjusted the beat to go forward but safe given our day fatigue and the conditions. Our way home went well and we also got the chance to hit some freshly groomed trails on some sectors
Here the 3rd and last video that summarize this last stretch 
 
We finally got home at 10:15PM with 340miles in our butts for the day. The small 900 ace did it flawlessly even if my old venture/expert-x miss missed us in the rough sections. We didn't needed to get rocked to sleep that night!
Another nice good big ride for us !
Alain

 

I have found out that Bill got hurt again this year, it was at home and he is in the Hospital Recovering.
The Rumor I'm starting is JD had him on the Roof with a Shovel, clearing off the Snow..... He slid off and broke his hip, limped uphill to the Hospital by himself, and they have installed a new Bionic one.
So if you can, reach out i'm sure he's pissed at himself for not having tied off to the chimney, and will be stuck at home for the rest of the season.
Later
GutZ

What a LONG 23 months of government legislated abstinence from my happy place of Quebec in the winter! My last day of snowmobiling there was March 15th 2020.  The border shut 6 days later.  That is finally behind me now!!
Well they talked about a big nor’easter coming in last Thursday into Friday. Time to change my plans by 24 hours. Changed my flight to 1 day earlier to Wednesday and took a 7AM flight from Florida to New Jersey to get my truck. My son Jason from NYC met me there & we scrambled for all our gear & hit the black trail at high noon.  I always try to avoid snow and ice on my drives up and back in the truck.  Of course I got my every 2-4 years speeding ticket on I 87 northbound in the high peaks for the Court of Chesterfield New York. Oh well. I have a tight schedule to keep!  Crossed border at 5:15PM.  Very very easy.  ArriveCAN is simple & works great.  Got thru in 10 minutes & no Covid test given to either of us to take post entry.  Drove to Trois Rivières to pick up my fully serviced trailer & sleds.  Then drove another 90 minutes to Lac-a-l’eau-Claire for our lodging.  Arrived at 8:30PM in our condo.  Palm Beach Gardens, Florida to NJ to Saint-Alexis-des-Monts in 13.5 hours!! Long day but mission completed. It’s full on peak season conditions here!  Yippee Ky Yea!!!
 
To be continued………………
 

Like Jack said above the Walgreens Rapid Diagnostic Test (ID NOW) is a NAAT test & is easy to schedule online in advance & is performed thru the drive thru window. I took one this morning at 11:45AM & got my negative test results emailed back at 12:25PM. Can’t beat it. Zero cost & results in 40 minutes!  

Heading to Quebec 4:30AM Thursday morning!  It’s been a long 23 months!!

We left clayton ny this morning about 9 30 a got to the border before 10. Not one car In front of us and none in site. Got to the agent and she was polite and very professional.  There less than 5 minutes on on our way. Got up to Ethans at 3 30 this afternoon.  Lots of snow and best of all the trail we are headed for in the morning was groomed a couple days ago and had no traffic.  Info came from the groomer operator.  We are in  Rapid  des Joachim. We are headed for Timiscaming and onward north.  We are at the outfitter here and 43 is less than a mile away.  The owner is Ethan and what a wonderful person he is. Has a main lodge and a couple cabins.  Groomer operator said north of here there is tons of snow.  
  Tomorrow is going to be a wonderful day.  

Finished 
 

Progress....
 

Got a new toy yesterday. 
Friday October 29, 2021. What a day for the snowmobile club and its directors.  Finally here it is, our brand new resurfacer that we have been waiting for for several years.  A PistenBully model trail 100.
 We can be proud as an Independent Snowmobile club and congratulate ourselves on this great purchase.  Do not forget that it is thanks to the collective effort of all its members, its executive, its sponsors, friends and visitors that the Snowmobile Club can move forward and continue to shine as  the most beautiful Independent Snowmobile Club in Quebec.
 Congratulations to all of us….
 
 

Club de motoneige Harfang du Nord Baie Trinte
 

Nouveau surfaceur pour le club de motoneiges Les Loups du Nord de La Doré...merci DEC canada et la FCMQ ..pour l assistance financière à l achat de ce surfaceur Prinoth Husky au montant de 362,773$..  
(gratte et taxes incluses)
Et que la neige tombe!
 
New surfacer for the snowmobile club Les Loups du Nord de La Doré thank you DEC Canada and the FCMQ ... for financial assistance in purchasing this Prinoth Husky snowmobile in the amount of $ 362,773 ..
 (drag and taxes included)
 And let the snow fall!