Seat Fire...Listen up!!

[treewhacker]

For what it's worth, I suspect a leak or seperation in the exhaust rather than fuel in the exhaust. Excess fuel in the carbs causes a rich (Cooler) condition, not hotter. Also, on a 4 cylinder engine when you lose 1 cylinder, you lose far more than 25% of your power.....Why? Because the other 3 cylinders not only lose the help of the 4th cylinder, but the running cylinders now have to carry the dead cylinder. I would venture to say there would be at least a 40% decrease in power. That kind of loss would be more than noticeable. 1 dead cylinder on a V-8 makes it feel like 1/2 power. Just my opinion. Fuel in the pipe theory won't wash.

 

[Sled Dog]

I have stated earlier that I did not think it was fuel in the exhaust. To get that hot it would need air and all that is in there is hot spent gases with very little oxygen.

 

[RX1 Yooper]

Gilby,
I thought Mike lived in Escanaba.

 

[Tork]

.............

I heard from my friend the details and here they are:

The sled has a very poor charging system. It puts out 25 watts charger, exactly like that of the motorcycle, but of course the motorcyle usage is not winter time, and there are no thumb or hand warmers using straight resistance heating to draw down the charging capacity. The tech actually said that the sled will discharge if you use high heat on the thumb and handles, and.....plug in a face shield.

Secondly that the computer brain that runs the engine (cpu), does NOT like low voltage. It will start, and it will run sometimes with lower voltage, but there is lots of troubles IF YOU HAVE A LOW battery. It will "do strange things" to quote the tech on this computer, and therefore is very sensitive to any voltage drops.

If I run full warmers and my GPS my battery discharges and needs to be jumped at the end of a long ride

 

[kviper]

Sled Dog i am not saying this is what happened but if you have a cylinder not firing, It now becomes a air/oxigen, fuel mix pump that will burn in the exhaust with egnition frome the other cyl's. When this heppen's it is like a tourch and will get very very hot. What will make the situation even worse is if the plug was fouled by an over fueling problem, Than you have even more fuel than normal with the O2= Big time heat. Tork i don't know about your GPS but our's uses a lot of power, It eat's batteries fast. Maybe some of these charging system's are not puting out max and should be checked. kviper

 

[F1Rocks]

For the guys out there that have done the lightweight battery mod. Are you seeing your batteries dead after a long ride. I was going to do the mod but if the charging system is that marginal, the last thing I need is a dead sled after riding for 6 or 8 hours.

 

[smokeless1]

Tork confirms that the charging system is weak. It is NOT the best in the business since my 02 articat four stroker has an automotive type alternater which puts out 50 or more watts. It will take all the resistance heating from thumb and hand warmers including those of the passenger rails. It also has a cigar lighter for gps, shield heater etc. So be forewarned that this low wattage output on the RX is not a great charger and could cause the battery to go the other way....and if that happens then the cpu could "do strange things" which could very well have caused the poor burn of fuel and the ensuing fire.

And as far as suing is concerned, instead of having the sled fixed, you could have simply sued for money. The sled malfunctioned. End of statement. Since this was NOT the only event to have this happen, and probably fewer than 10,000 sleds like this have been made, the odds of this happening are down to one in one thousand, which easily exceeds product safety issues and recall requirements. He could have taken Ymaha to court and as far as I am concerned, since the sled was never in an accident, or modified Ymer would have settled out of court to keep publicity from being a hampering factor. Just because the sled was fixed by Yamer, doesn't mean he could not have sued or still could.

Yamer has modified the sled in 06, and should therefore be far less likely to have the same issue occur. A sniffer in the exhaust will prevent huge volumes of raw fuel from exiting the engine since the efi will quickly run the machine lean and send a fault to the cpu which will put an idiot light on and alert even a half asleep ridder.

IF YOUR SLED BATTERY GETS RUN DOWN, BE CAREFUL WHEN RIDING FROM A JUMPED START. THE SAME CONDITIONS WILL THEN EXIST WHICH CAUSED THE FIRE IN MY FRIENDS SLED. Now what you do with this info is up to you. You have been warned.

 

[RS Venture 66]

This has happened to 2 different 03 RX1 mountain sleds in this area. One was just out from service for changes to the float adjustments. The dealer said that the vent was kinked off and caused excess fuel accumulate in the muffler.

This is not an isolated problem!

 

[vtrxrider]

I have never been in a lawsuit but it seems there will be plenty down the road If these NEW sleds are burning when flooded this problem is going to grow as the sleds grow older and change hands a few times. A lot of us plan on the engine outlasting the chassis not burning it down. This has me thinking of adding more of a heat shield because I dont think it should be able to get hot enough to set the seat on fire! If a ghosting ecu and to much fuel can touch it off anything that causes excessive heat is a risk. Plugged can, timing, Imagine having a stuck float and then a tors malfunction...BLAM a little more than flames out the exhaust!

 

[smokeless1]

WEll, I don't want to say the sky is falling. But as 66 says this is not an isolated incident, as there were many more of these sleds catching on fire. Enough so my friend said, what the heck and dumped the sled.

But the idea of adding a better shield is a good one.

And as far as I am concerned this issue isn't going to go away quickly. It needs to be watched. Leaving a sled sit out in the weather like you used to do, isn't going to cut it as more than likely the older these units get the more likely the sparkplug wires will deteriorate the carbs will stick, etc. and since the ecu might act up if the battery gets old and not as good, then perhaps it will become a bigger deal than when the sleds are only one or two years old.

I expect that the whole line will be quickly moved to efi, to curb this and sooner than the carb guys want them to. Soley because the sled with carbs is much more likely to have this issue crop up.

If you stay on top of the maintance of these sleds and get off if it sounds the slightest bit odd, then perhaps you can catch it before it gets so hot that your butt gets torched.

 

[Ingolf]

if you sue yamaha, and get another snowmobile. its gonna blow up when your riding it.. LMFAO KARMA LOL

 

[alterhi]

Well, I just got done reading through this whole thread.
I have posted to some of you directly but I am hope to find some other responses.
Bought an '05 warrior in Jan.
From day one I have had a " misfire/ popping sound " in the exhaust at 4000-5000rpm ( 15 -25mph). After that the sled runs great.
Now, before you even start, I know what you are going to say: " Then just get on the gas!"
No. I just spent too much money for that answer.

 

[rxrider]

Just read this post for the first time.

2 years and 9 months since the last post.

How many sleds have caught fire?

How many batteries have went dry causing the ECU to fail?

I'm still running my '03, now with an aftermarket battery, should I be worried?