The pro chasis with a 440 lc or 550 fan with belt drive in a 136 track not much expense in tooling to bring this public.
I had my usual conversation with Polaris reps at Hay Days last fall to ask again when they will be building a mountain sled for kids. I spoke at length with a marketing guy and then an engineering guy. To my surprise the answers I was getting were very different than they have been in the past. When I mentioned they have all the parts to build a shorter version of a fan cooled axys RMK in the 375 pound range, there was a response that it would most likely be around 365. I spoke about cutting a big block in half to make a 300, 350 or a 400 single cylinder, with ease because the oil and water pump are mounted outboard on the mag side and that lead to discussion on how the new electronic oil pump could solve half of that problem and allow the use a current injected engine to make a 300cc engine. They did not bring up the small market this would need to serve and how this would not provide enough volume for profit as they always have in the past so I did. My vision to market this considers that they have 98 % of all needed parts already on the shelf to build a 550 fan, 90% if they tool a new engine. A snow check only build (no in season models) with a budget priced heavier base model and upgrades to include the light weight goodies, better shocks, electric start, and instrumentation would let the buyer decide how much they are willing to pay for an entry level sled. No in season models would create demand and keep resale values higher. Snow check only build would also prevent the issues ski doo experienced with unsold sleds when they tried this market. Ski Doo also tooled most of their sled without using current off the shelf parts which did not make the tooling a good investment for them,using as many off the shelf parts as posible would eliminate this issue. Marketing asked me questions on how much I thought this sled should cost. My answer was for them to look back at their marketing plan used when they introduced the Indy lite. What was list price % compared to the flagship model, or the next model up or bellow? It would need to fit in that range. A bare bones sled price pointed there would be the starting point. Add snow check options or let the dealers make some money on the upgrades thru the accessories catalog. I did not get an answer about when or if they would build the sled I was asking for but definitely came away with the perception that they were working on something and have actually built prototypes. Just seeing this post with the invite looks promising that Polaris may actually be listening to the folks that buy their products or the new 200 sled from Yam a Cat has got their attention. Just a few more days to wait and see what will be reveled.
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