yellow warning light, water temp

[ldb]

My light was coming on today, it would come on and stay for 10 minutes or so and then it would shut off for little while and do this over and over. checked level of antifreeze and popped the cap off the radiator to check for air, everything seemed alright. anyone have a problem like this before. Will take it to dealer in a few days if I dont come up with something. sleds a 09 short track.

 

[nate007]

Try draining out the coolant, and making sure the coolant has the proper ration of water to coolant. Yamaha has a tendancy to ship the sleds with 100% coolant. Granted youre not too far from me, and I know it's been pretty decent temps, but I've had it do that on mine also, and the coolant mixture was the culprit.

 

[Ironmanstl]

Did it happen to be your first trip out with the sled?

 

[Goddo]

As Nate said...Definitely a pure coolant thing. What were the snow conditions like? Much hard pack?

If you were riding a lot of hard pack snow, cooling and hyfax wear could be issues.

I would get a cheap antifreeze guage and check the thickness of your coolant. You may need to drain off 1 or 2 litres of coolant and replace with deionized water.

 

[Grimm]

Am I to assume that you still rode it while the light was on? Pull off to the side of the trail and turn your sled off, else you may very well cause engine damage. That's what the warning light is for.

Riding in subpar conditions, ie. low snow or riding on ice increases your chances of an overheat situation as snow isn't being thrown onto your front heat exchanger to cool the engine.

As mentioned before, check antifreeze strength. Too much coolant reduces cooling efficiency. Add some "Water Wetter" type product as well.

 

[Goddo]

Also, as Grimm alluded to, pull over immediately. I had it happen once. I chipped a large chunk of icy snow off the ground and held it to the heat exchanger for a minute or so to help cool it down.

 

[ldb]

yellow light is a caution not a warning. We were riding in 4 to 10 inches of soft snow so snow on the heat exchanger is not the problem, also have pics so should be ok even on hard pack. If you stop it will heat soak, if the engine runs the fan will cool it at idle and air flow will cool if moving. checked antifreeze dont know if its to strong, tested to -60 and ph of 8 so by what I have to test with should be ok. Called dealer and checked codes and only thing we came up with was a throttle cable too loose, reajusted and said to ride it and see if it acted up agian. He could not answer my questions on temps if I checked with a heat gun. I'm thinking temp sensor problem or thermostate problem.

 

[Goddo]

If your coolant is good to -60 (celcius) then it is too thick. Mine tested to -68C originally and I diluted it down to -40C. I've not seen the light since. This season as a secondary precaution I added some water wetter to my coolant.