Ah, the old front mount versus rear mount debate... I can't speak for front mounts but I personally have over 3K miles on my rear mount at 12 psi with no cracked headers or pipes, but did have the normal donut leaks (that is typical on the stocker) until I put in the copper donuts and solved that.
A few front mounts I rode with had habitual cracked headers after almost every ride (some, not all) until they got tired of always wrenching on them and dumped them for SC's. One had a log manifold that worked good and the other ones are just for racing so don't get ridden often.
The front mounts do spool quickly, no doubt, but in reality that ends up being pointless when you can't get all that power to the snow and have to take it away with clutching anyhow??? With the right turbo combination the rear mounts are responsive. My rear mount FPP is responsive enough that I still have to subdue it with clutching so it doesn't just blitz the track and so it actually accelerates harder on the trail, cruising at 25 mph and hit the throttle it almost rips your arms out of their sockets and you really need to be paying attention. However, boost level has a lot to do with this too, 7psi doesn't rip as hard as 12...
I think turbo lag on the trail turbo's has everything to do with the heavy clutching and helix angles you have to run to keep all that power harnessed... and rear mounts got a bad rap in the past for some real bad clutching, I know because I had it.
Clutch tuning options have come a long way in the past few years...
There might be a reason that the current fastest time on asphault is with a rear mount turbo???
For trail riding I have logged enough data to show that the intake temps stay pretty cool on my rear mount with the snow cooler in the tunnel (within 30 degF of ambient temp when cruising) and under 90 degF after short several second blasts under boost). I actually am displaying the intake air temp on my dash now. This way I found a pretty good correlation between charge air temps and slider lubrication, when there is low snow dust and the sliders are on fire (melting and smell) then there also isn't enough snow to cool the tunnel snow intercooler either and hence the intake temps are higher. When the sliders have enough snow dust to lube correctly, the temps also stay down... Total proof to me the rear mount tunnel snow intercooler / charge tube is a benefit.
