153 on trail

[Snowbound98]

Replaced the upper steering post support with a billet one that has a brass bushing. Issue was it’s shorter than the original and when I tightened it down it pulled the u-joint and upper shaft down and wouldn’t allow bars to turn. It needed to be 1/2” taller. Nothing seemed to be going right for me.

I got up to the house on Friday night around 9pm but I was up since Thursday at 3pm so I passed out after getting everything turned on and making sure everything was ok. All this was my Saturday and by Saturday night I was done so I packed up stuff to take home and crashed. Left Sunday morning early because I had to be at work Sunday night.

When I got home I messaged BDX about their kit and asked what I was missing. They said looks like I have 38” lower arms.
No #*$&@! It’s a 15 MTX. Exactly what your kit is for.
That kit is for 40” arms.
The only 40” arm Viper MTX was a 16 MTX 141 SE.
Oh, we must have the years wrong then.


WTF!! So now I’m going back to stock because my ball joints weren’t bad and I’m not buying lower arms and shocks because they “got their years wrong”. So now my brother is gonna need 6mm bolts and bushings because I’m taking mine back or he can drill out his arms. Already ordered new bolts and bushings. Country Cat was the only one that had a listing for the 6mm. Everyone else shows it as 8mmx1.25x45mm.

Switching gears here a little, since my air box is out I’m gonna finally put in the steering upgrade.

I also have DynoJet PCV, Autotune, Wideband2 and Pod 300 that I need to install when I get back up there.

 

[Snowbound98]

I had to get rid of this factory O2 sensor and bung. It’s too small for the Bosch sensors that I’m going to be running.

Cut it off, cleaned it up, marked position of second sensor and drilled pilot hole before drilling 7/8” with a step bit.

I got them tacked on but not fully welded so I’ll update when I get that done.

 

[Snowbound98]

I pulled the shocks off my sled and brought them home too.

I’m seriously contemplating grabbing some Float 3 shocks for the skid. I’ll do the front once I decide what I’m doing about this 40” spindle kit.

Question, should I get both the float 3’s for the skid or should I get just the rear in a QS3 and keep the front skid shock and Bill’s spring?

Steve the Shock Doc has my shocks right now but I’d like to hear what you think about the floats or QS3 over these spring shocks. Thanks in advance.

 

[Snowbound98]

Picked up a 41 tooth gear and chain to replace the 49 I have in there now. Also got the cover thrown in on the deal but it has a broken tab near the top I’m gonna see if I can have it repaired and have it for a backup.

I also replaced the plastic bushings on the shift fork for the brass or bronze ones from BOP.

I also finally replaced the lower steering shaft support brackets for the updated ones. Mine wasn’t horrible, but it’s just an insurance policy.

 

[Snowbound98]

I can’t believe how worn my carbides were after 2 seasons but I guess last year was pretty bad so I put on a new set.

I got my shocks back so I was able to get them back on and put the front end back together along with the skid and set the track tension and alignment.

Also greased my clutch side bearings. They needed it.

 

[Snowbound98]

I cut a piece of aluminum and bent it to use as a mount for the PCV. I had enough room on the fuse panel relocation bracket that I made to rivet the mount to it.

I tucked the Wideband2 module behind the bracket.

The PCV and Autotune got stacked on the bracket. Plenty of room for the side panel and I shouldn’t have to worry about them getting damaged in that location and easily accessible to plug in the laptop.

 

[Snowbound98]

As far as the gauges go, I cut another piece of aluminum to mount the POD300 to and made it so it uses the bolts for the handlebar clamp. This should be ok for data logging and making quick changes.

The AFR gauge I didn’t want another connector on the hood so I just mounted it to my handguard support bracket. It’s out of the way and in clear view so this may be it’s temporary spot or I may just leave it. We’ll see how it goes.

I never really found a good home for my GPS due to having the windshield bag. It’s low and I have to look down to see it but so far it hasn’t been an issue because I only look at it to make sure I’m headed the right direction and usually that’s at a stop or coming up to an intersection. Not real happy with its location but I’m getting crowded.

 

[Snowbound98]

Looks like I’m gonna have to take the hood back off and tear back into this thing one more time before the season starts. I came across a Push turbo kit that is slightly used and I talked myself I to it today. It was gonna happen sooner or later so I figure now is the time. It has Ulmer 430cc injectors and is already tuned and comes with the PCV, Autotune and POD300 so I’ll give that stuff to my brother and just load the tune into mine and download the tune I got from Terry at TP into the one for him. This should be an easy install but I hope I can get it all done in a day because when I get back up there I’m gonna wanna be riding not wrenching.

 

[cannondale27]

Awesome!

 

[Clyder6R]

haha welcome to the turbo 15 mtx gang!! glad to see your still wrenching. we are only getting our first dump of snow today. but i am headed into work for a few days so i will miss the best riding

 

[Snowbound98]

Well, I made it back up there and stared installing the turbo kit. But didn’t get it finished before I had to leave for home.

 

[Snowbound98]

I got back up there last week and finished it up and got some test and tune time. Gear and chain went in and got the oil tank put on.

After hooking up coolant lines, oil lines and cutting into top radiator hose, I installed a T4 turbo blanket. I didn’t want to make a heat shield so I figured this would be just as good if not better.

Installed the PCV that came with the kit but I only had one wideband bung on the exhaust. So I hooked it up to the wideband2 and not the autotune. This way I can still data log the afr and still see it on the gauge.
The gauge pod I put on the hand guard mount came back off and I installed the AFR and boost gauge above the gauge cluster. I hated getting rid of my windshield bag but I just ran my phone cable into the bottom of my goggle bag.
My first start after the turbo install.

 

[Snowbound98]

First day after install my brother and I dropped at Alpine Resort and ran the lake a few times just making sure that things were staying where they should and no leaks.

I had a small coolant leak but was just the outside banjo bolt on turbo. A quick turn of the wrench and that was done.

Now that I posted that picture I realize I forgot to mention that I put a new wrap on hood. I better show that too.

 

[Clyder6R]

looks good! I bet it rips now!

 

[Snowbound98]

looks good! I bet it rips now!

She does pretty good. Still dialing it in but yeah, I’m happy with it

Before we went up, I stopped over at my brother’s to see if he was gonna have his sled ready to go because we dragged his back home to Illinois so he could do his control arms He put on a 38” front end and didn’t have his shocks back when we were up north.

He also swapped out his jackshaft for a ‘17 shaft and was having issues getting the collar out of his wobble bearing. I walk into his garage and look at his sled and said, “WTF!!!” And he just laughed.

This SOB couldn’t stand it that I bought a turbo so he picked up a Hurricane 190 kit. He made it sound like he bought his kit before I got mine, I don’t think so dude. I had my kit half installed before you even started working on your sled! This rivalry is gonna get expensive! I had to look over his sled real good to make sure he didn’t have a sneaky Pete nitrous bottle on there.
And then he sends me this.

He knew I was originally gonna do my sled in snow camo but then did it in just black until I had the sled home for some time to do the wrap I wanted. I told him he’s such an a$$. It does look good though.

So back to the past weekend, we did our first shake down run on the lake and after my coolant leak was tightened, we hit the trail. We rode about 25 miles and stopped at what was Moran’s Landing on Swamp Lake. The owner Fuzzy was the president of the AWS snowmobile club but he sold the resort and now it’s called Karch’s Up North Resort. But they still had my swamp water! And they remodeled the place.

So now Fuzzy was gone, probably in Florida or something so we found out the new president is some Amy chick and she owns Boomba’s bar and grill. So we jump back on our sleds and head to Boomba’s. Amy wasn’t there, I guess she broke her leg from what we were told but the bartender was able to give us the renewal form so we could stay in the club.
From there we decided to loop west and then come back around and end up in Tomahawk to fuel up. The last 3-4 miles going into Tomahawk he’s going 30-35 mph and I’m thinking he’s data logging low rpm range or something. We get to the gas station and he tells me his oil light would flicker when he would get on it a little, that’s why he was taking it easy. After pulling his side cover we see oil down in the belly pan and it looks like his oil tank is leaking. I had to pee so bad my back teeth were floating but on my way back out of gas station I noticed they had Amsoil 0w40 so I grabbed 2 qts. He said no way he was going back by sled. It was about 1-1/2 ride back to the truck from where we were and he didn’t want to chance it. So away I went solo, it’s 3° and dark and it’s the first ride on my setup too but if I break down or crash I’m by myself in the woods not hanging out at Motel 8 in the warm with a 6 pack of Rolling Rock! But he would go get the truck and trailer for me.
I made it back to him in 1 hr 18 minutes!! I was flying.