AmSnow.com is now SnoWest.com
Power?
You likely already know this has an 85-horse 499cc liquid twin EFI 2-stroke giving it life. Some will scoff at that, but it’s plenty to get you from tree-to-tree and corner to corner. I hit 80+ mph (speedometer reading) quite easily on long, straight clean runs several times. In our Real World tests though we topped out at 74.93 mph. Still, that’s fast enough to have a good time on the trail, where MOST of us do our riding.
One other note, in our Real World acceleration runs, the Sno Pro was quickest from 0-30 mph at 1.86 seconds, even quicker than Cat’s Z1 Turbo Sno Pro at 1.91 seconds. This just shows how quick it can be from corner to corner on the trails.
We found some hesitation on startup and from take-off as well coming out of corners when you get back into the throttle, but there’s a re-flash for this unit now that will fix that Cat tells us. We should note here too there was a recall on the sled due to a potential fuel leak hazard at the fuel pump mounting screws. We had no difficulty with ours.
Some suggested Cat would drop a 600cc motor into this chassis for 2011, but Cat had said no, and meant it. We expect a newer lightweight chassis from Thief River in the next year or so, something that will hold a larger motor.
Still, this is a fine package and the power is applied well to the snow via its 15x128x1.25-inch Cobra track. That’s appropriately aggressive for this cross-country racer.
Gas mileage was up and down, no doubt based on how hard we were pushing the Sno Pro. When we had wide-open trails, abandoned railroad lines, etc., we cranked it, and no doubt gobbled the gas. We got 12.4 mpg in our Real World testing, but only managed 11.73 mpg for the season. This 2-stroke also drank oil fairly regularly too, requiring a quart or slightly more about every two tanks of gas.