Snowmobiler hurt

From the Keene, NH Sentinel:
"On Sunday, Susan Roser of Gardner, Mass., was hurt in a snowmobile accident in Marlborough when she lost control of her vehicle and went over an embankment — hitting a tree and a granite bridge along the way, according to Marlborough Police Det. Steven E. LaMears. LaMears didn’t know the full extent of Roser’s injuries but said her arm was badly hurt.”

Angie and I were there, we'd ridden past the spot maybe 30 minutes earlier. We hit the end of the trail turned around and came back to find:


We were asked to stay back as they pulled the woman up out of the ditch. Its not really a bridge as the article says its a stone culvert under the railbed. She was riding north toward Keene, facing the same way as the sleds in the picture and drifted off the trail (to her left, the right in the picture) . She left the trail and fell into the ditch, fortunately she didn't hit the stone of the culvert but still the force must have been tremendous, it buckled the trailing arm on that side of the sled, broke the tie rod and flipped the sled on top of her.
After she was removed I got to take a picture of the sled:

Amazingly the sled fired right up and ran fine. Some firemen and a police officer muscled it around in a circle and used their Polaris Ranger to winch it up out of the ditch.

A fireman then tied a stick between the two skis to keep the one with the broken tie rod from flopping around and managed to ride it out of the woods.

For our part Angie and I had a nice 40 mile round trip from Fitzwilliam to Keene.

-Curt

The new sled is fun, but....

Tried to go up to NH the other night with the new Ski-Doo. That thing goes like a bandit! Its tall though, I'd stopped a couple weeks ago at a tree down across the trail. This time I said to hell with it I'm going through. It was just the windshield pushing against the trunk anyway. The windshield dismounted itself, the little plastic posts that hold it on came off, so there was no real damage. I got stuck again not much farther along at another tree down, then damn near got stuck trying another trail. I'm going to try to figure out who owns or has responsibility for the trail so I can see about getting the two trees removed. I'd also like to see about getting permission to clean up the trail a little too, there are some major whoops that could be smoothed out and some bad ruts put in by idiots driving 4x4s down the trail. I'd like to get that turned into a real snowmobile trail and at least groom it a little...

Anyway the bigger problem I had was the sled wanting to overheat. Last time I rode I thought the temp was higher than I liked but it was pretty stable, this time it was leaning waaaayy up toward the hot zone making me nervous. Part of the problem was that the snow was crusty so I wasn't getting the snow up on the coolers the way I'd like to. The other issue I *think* is that there was some schumutz (theres a technical term for you) on the radiator cap preventing it from sealing correctly. I think it wasn't building up as much pressure as it ought to. I really should drain the coolant and replace too, it doesn't hold that much and who knows how good the stuff in there now is...

Anyway Sunday we got some new snow and I rode it around the yard without the schmutz in the cap and it seemed to stay cooler. I even got Angie driving it. She's really scared of the size and at first she'd only ride behind me and only with her head down and eyes closed. I took her over a couple of snow piles that I guess scared the snot out of her. After a couple loops though she got confident and was going faster than I ever would...

Registration

Now that I've got the new sled (c'mon, compared to what I normally ride a '94 is brand spanking new) I'm thinking its time to get legal, get a trail pass.
The NH trail system is just north of my house, I get there and I'm good to Canada...

However, Eddie has registered in MA. The MA pass is actually 2 parts, you need a MA registration and a SAM (Snowmobile Association of MA) pass. To get a SAM pass you need to join a Snowmobile Club. MA registration is $40 for 2 years, the local club here is Coldbrook and membership with 1 SAM pass is $65. So $85 a year gets you on the trails...
NH wants $93 for a non-resident, non-club member. The closest club to me is the Monadnock Sno-Moles, they wants $25 for a memebership at which point NH only wants $63, so $88 a year. Personally I like the NH method more, it seems more upfront and I do appreciate that supporting the club is a good thing to do.
It also seems to make more sense for me to register NH since its a short ride on the sled to use the NH trails. To use the MA trails I have to trailer someplace...

The other thing is that when Angie and I go north to do the NHSMA show we may go up earlier the day before and ride the nice central NH trails... I think thats probably the best reason right there to register.

One last thing, to register in MA I'd have to go to Worcester and find the OHV (off highway vehicle) registry (or go to Boston). To register NH I drive to "Bottoms Up Grocery" in Fitzwilliam about 5 miles from where I sit right now...

Wankle Panther runs!

For the first time in 3 years my '71 Arctic Cat Panther 303 Rotary took victory laps around the yard. I'd taken the recoil off and sprayed the points with contact cleaner and wiped 'em real good with a business card, then put it all back together. Seeing more like 6-8v at the coil now, up from 4-5v. Pulled the plug and got spark, not terrific but there.
Pumped the primer and pulled a couple times, nothing. Shot in some starting fluid, I hate starting fluid but I was getting desparate. Brapp, brapp, brapp. It started but ran fast and when I gave it throttle it'd die. I let it run for a second and killed it to make sure the switch still worked, it does...

Pulled the sled farther out of the garage and with another shot of starting fluid it fired again and this time idled, high but it idled. Hopped on and gave it throttle and off we went! Made a lap around the yard and back to the garage for more fuel. Then restarted and around the yard a bunch more times to get it warm.

Downsides: The switches are loose, getting it shut off sometimes involves fiddling.
The brake basically doesn't work at all...

Upsides: Very smooth, apply power and it takes off, no hesitation, no waiting. Feels powerful, comfortable seat.

Oh and its VERY loud. I need to do some more muffler work, its only leaking a little but has basically no stuffing inside. I think this summer I'll try to make a reproduction...

-Curt

The Snow compells me

The snow from before Christmas is gone, warm weather and rain stole it away. New Years eve it snowed again, the weather guessers said 6-10", we got a paltry 5", the guessers are not doing much for us this season...
Still I gassed up the Tigre today, it started with relatively little trouble, I could tell immediately when the new gas started hitting the carb, theres always less power in last year's gas... I may take a try on the trail tomorrow but I doubt it. No real snow in the forecast either....

First ride of '08/'09!

Not strictly vintage but I took my '94 Ski-Doo Grand Touring for its inaugural run tonight. We had a good 14" of powder over the weekend and then a deep freeze so I was hoping it would have packed down some.
Some is the operative word, its still way too fluffy to ride for real but somebody else had been down the trail before me so I gave it a shot.

The Grand Touring really soaks up the bumps in a way I'm not used to at all. Stuff that was a real kidney pounding on the TX-L or Tigre (and absolutely brutal on the Olympique) is just bumpy on this, theres miles of suspension. Its also got tons of power. I've never had it over half throttle, don't know what I'd need that for.

At one point I hit a water hole which hadn't frozen solid (of course the GT weighs a million pounds) under the snow and thought I'd had it, I gave it some throttle and we made it through. I'd gone slower into the hole than I'd have normally because of a tree leaning across it. We had an ice storm a week ago and many trees are down or leaning badly.

Finally I had to turn back because the GT is too tall to get under a big tree down across the trail. I'd been under that same tree several times last year with the Tigre, TX-L and Olympique. I know theres a path around it but I couldn't see it in the dark. The reverse gear on the GT was super handy, I'm not sure I could have handled humping that sled around...

On the way back I carried some more speed into the water hole and had less of an issue, I probably should have given more throttle when I hit the water though.

No real issues to report, this is the first time I've gotten the sled all the way warm. The temp gauge got to just above level, theres no numbers but it was maybe 3/4 of the way through its swing. I'm not sure if thats normal or not. At some point soon I'll drain and replace the coolant...

-Curt

Uh oh - New sled

Heres one for the uh oh file. Picked up my newest sled yesterday, a '94 (could be a '95 I forget) Ski Doo Grand Touring SE 670. We've had a good 14" of snow so I took it for a spin tonight.


First impression is that its a MONSTER. I brought it home on the trailer because I couldn't imagine hauling it back out of the pickup. It DOMINATES my trailer. I'm reasonably sure even with my extensions (assuming I make a second one) that I can't carry this sled and the Tigre at the same time.
Its got electric start which is VITAL its dammed near impossible to start without it, it'll rip your arm clean off, but you wanna hear about power? This is a fasssst sled even if it does weigh a million pounds. I only had it up to about 40mph because with the way the snow is still coming down I couldn't see anything but this is easily an 85mph sled, maybe 100 but as I say its heavy...

Features: Electric start, reverse, 2up seating, liquid cooled 670cc which supposedly puts out around 100hp, heated grips with thumb warmer, kiddie bars with heated grips. ~8 gallon gas tank.

Downside: Its huge...

So you don't think I've completely gone to the dark side I did have the Tigre out and buzzing around the yard yesterday. Much more fun to throw that around our little back yard than the GT. If I'd had more mix gas I'd have run it some today. We're going to Maine on Thursday, will probably take the Tigre with us.