Well it's 6:00am here in beautiful Steamboat CO. I've got the generator running and the heaters on full blast in the trailer warming things up to swap the front ends on the bikes. We had some great testing conditions yesterday. The snow was 3 day old champagne powder that was settled from 30" of fresh to 20". You could not ask for better snowbike conditions. The trail was groomed, but was ridden by snowmobiles a lot.
I want everyone to know that I have been riding TS product for 4 seasons now and have a lot of time on these setups. The bike is a 2015 Yamaha YZ450F with a KMS turbo and a 2016 TS ST. I installed this on the bike last March, so I have a lot of rides on this package.
Just to be fair I set up the front end to Raptors specs which is not the way CMX wants it set up with thier mods. I have a set of stock Raptor skis coming to test also.
The parking lot navigation was beautiful. No washing out, no falling down. Confidence in where you wanted to go.
When we hit the trail we were riding kind of slow breaking in the other new Yamaha YZ450FX. The dual skis were shifty, each one finding its own path. The ski that was high and on top of a snowmobile mound felt very soft on that leg with no true planted feeling at the 20mph area. It would drive the front end side to side trying to find even and level terrain. Not an improvement over the TS front end.
At high speed on the trail 40-60mph. the front end was stable and planted it felt good. I was able to drag pegs in the corners and it felt equal to the TS front end. I have never ridden with anyone that can ride a TS as fast on the trails as I do. I have a lot of time and I am picky about my setups. I carry a lot of ski pressure on my front ski. Some people don't even like to ride my setup because it is heavy on the front end. If you look at the followings pics you will see the lugs on the front is the TS track are heavily loaded compared to the way CMX wants their setup on their unit. The weight on the CMX is evenly dispersed over the entire track.
Off trail in the powder the X2 wanted to be on top of the snow a little better than the TS. This is a real advantage for early season riding, not diving in and hitting trees and rocks. The handling is not as confident as the TS front end in the powder. Nose down bombing into a tree well and a hard sharp turn out the front wants to push hard to go straight into the tree, where the TS would have carved hard and gone the direction it was pointed. The TS front end is the winner in the powder. I ride hard and fast in the trees and can not be confident in this front end on my first day of riding it. If you want to ride open out in the meadow the X2 is better.
I am installing the non mod skis today and will report my next ride. We are trying to justify a $1250 upgrade to a TS unit so I want to be fair and not judge on modified product that was purpose built of another setup.
We were also riding the CMXBK this same day and the way that kit responds to throttle input this front end may work really well with. I will put it on in a few days.
DO NOT take this first ride impression as gospel. There is an entire season of testing that has to be done to say if I like the Raptor X2 front end or not. It works really well, just not $1250 better than the TS front end on my one bike.
I want everyone to know that I have been riding TS product for 4 seasons now and have a lot of time on these setups. The bike is a 2015 Yamaha YZ450F with a KMS turbo and a 2016 TS ST. I installed this on the bike last March, so I have a lot of rides on this package.
Just to be fair I set up the front end to Raptors specs which is not the way CMX wants it set up with thier mods. I have a set of stock Raptor skis coming to test also.
The parking lot navigation was beautiful. No washing out, no falling down. Confidence in where you wanted to go.
When we hit the trail we were riding kind of slow breaking in the other new Yamaha YZ450FX. The dual skis were shifty, each one finding its own path. The ski that was high and on top of a snowmobile mound felt very soft on that leg with no true planted feeling at the 20mph area. It would drive the front end side to side trying to find even and level terrain. Not an improvement over the TS front end.
At high speed on the trail 40-60mph. the front end was stable and planted it felt good. I was able to drag pegs in the corners and it felt equal to the TS front end. I have never ridden with anyone that can ride a TS as fast on the trails as I do. I have a lot of time and I am picky about my setups. I carry a lot of ski pressure on my front ski. Some people don't even like to ride my setup because it is heavy on the front end. If you look at the followings pics you will see the lugs on the front is the TS track are heavily loaded compared to the way CMX wants their setup on their unit. The weight on the CMX is evenly dispersed over the entire track.
Off trail in the powder the X2 wanted to be on top of the snow a little better than the TS. This is a real advantage for early season riding, not diving in and hitting trees and rocks. The handling is not as confident as the TS front end in the powder. Nose down bombing into a tree well and a hard sharp turn out the front wants to push hard to go straight into the tree, where the TS would have carved hard and gone the direction it was pointed. The TS front end is the winner in the powder. I ride hard and fast in the trees and can not be confident in this front end on my first day of riding it. If you want to ride open out in the meadow the X2 is better.
I am installing the non mod skis today and will report my next ride. We are trying to justify a $1250 upgrade to a TS unit so I want to be fair and not judge on modified product that was purpose built of another setup.
We were also riding the CMXBK this same day and the way that kit responds to throttle input this front end may work really well with. I will put it on in a few days.
DO NOT take this first ride impression as gospel. There is an entire season of testing that has to be done to say if I like the Raptor X2 front end or not. It works really well, just not $1250 better than the TS front end on my one bike.
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