An obervation from a Polaris owner.

[Old Scud-doo]

This is quite funny but also quite telling.

I currently own 4 Polaris sleds. I had a disagreement with the local Poo dealer so I have decided to take my business to the Cat/Doo dealer here in town. That's enough background about that. Fact is only that I will never take a sled there again.

So last weekend I take my boys up to ride on Saturday and we end up with our IQ 600 RMK acting up. MFD goes dead and sled dies until it cools down. Keeps doing it. Pretty sure its the stator. So we come into town and drop off the sled and the Cat/Doo dealer. They are so slow in the shop that they are working on someone's mini van. A mini van!!! Not a sled, not an atv, not a spyder. A mini van! The Polaris dealer averages 2 weeks out!!!

I call this morning, the next business day, and they have already tested and believe I am right. Only producing 7 volts so the stator is bad.

I have never, ever, ever, been able to drop off a machine and have it diagnosed or fixed with the first week at the local Poo shop.

Poo guys, you can say whatever you want to about Cat and Doo but when you can get right in at local dealer to have work done that quickly, it tells me they are both pretty dang reliable. Funny thing is that all the Poo guys just rip on Doo and Cat these days on here but those are the guys riding while us Poo guys are bringing in our dead sleds or waiting for the local Poo dealer to just work us in without losing more than 2 weeks of riding.

I just found it very telling on the difference in reliability. Now I know they all can have problems. From the outside looking in though it looks like Polaris has a lot more problems than Cat and Doo.

 

[mountaincat 800]

Not sure how to respond to that. Good luck.

 

[Jaynelson]

 

[jsledder]

Sounds like a dealer issue and not a Polaris or Arctic Cat issue.

Or does Polaris Industries set the service schedule for Joe Blow Polaris in bum****kegypt?

In the end, glad you found a dealer that serves your needs.

 

[Scott]

Depends on the dealer.

I've had sleds in that needed a whole new small block. I was on the snow in 10 days (Hamilton Polaris).

 

[Snow Duck]

SAME AS ABOVE ^^^^^^^^^^ DEALER DEALER DEALER!!!!!!!!!!

 

[rmscustom]

With all the snow right now how busy is that poo dealer you won't step foot into anymore? Lack of snow and the fact there is probably 10 pros to a cat riding around right now your experience seems perfectly normal and has nothing to do with one being reliable or not.

 

[Old Scud-doo]

Polaris dealer is out at least 1 week. There is definitely not 10 to 1 out here. 2 to 1 maybe. 3 to 1 at the most.

I am not even dogging the Polaris dealer, I just had never had work at a different shop before. I found it crazy. Seemed like a pretty good indicator of reliability to me. Kool-Aid stains must be wearing off.

Could also be that this dealer is an awesome dealer to work with. Hoping so since I will be buying there in the future.

 

[nosajlleb]

Good one, are you one of these paid posters for Polaris. Running around pouring the company line in every thread outside of Poo's forum. I've heard they do this, care to spill it.

 

[Jaynelson]

Yes, I am sponsored by Polaris to make smartass comments on Snowest. Payment includes a percentage off my next top end rebuild for every cat meme that gets positive rep.

Also, a small bonus for quoted posts from bitter off-brand posters.

So it's turning out to be a lucrative little Monday so fars.

 

[mountaincat 800]

Good one, are you one of these paid posters for Polaris. Running around pouring the company line in every thread outside of Poo's forum. I've heard they do this, care to spill it.

I just don't think he has anything better to do.
Gotta love the snowest professional's.

 

[slyrydr]

have a good friend that owns 3 different shops, all franchized dealers...he can sell me anything i want between the shops, doesn't matter to him in any significant way...his take on brand dependability is that poo is by far the least dependable....flame away "j", your continueing and obvious bias goes before you..

 

[Thunder101]

jay that was funny !

 

[knifedge]

have a good friend that owns 3 different shops, all franchized dealers...he can sell me anything i want between the shops, doesn't matter to him in any significant way...his take on brand dependability is that poo is by far the least dependable....flame away "j", your continueing and obvious bias goes before you..

--A Cat dealer who added Polaris told me the Polaris Pro helped save his business -- sales dont generate much profit but service and warranty work does

 

[sledr900]

Old Scud-doo
I am glad that you are moving on and getting an Arctic Cat. I personally am tired of your whining. Plus the fact that you fail to mention that at least one or more of your polaris engines that went down was modified. I still bleed green as I have owned 13 cats since 1997, but have now owned 6 pros since 2011 with not one engine issue. Maybe I'm just lucky.
PS: Ron and his boys from the AC dealer are great.

 

[mmsports]

best thing a cat dealer can do is get a Polaris dealership for there business.

I will give you am example. In 09 I think it was economy down turn right. Polaris had recall on there motors. That would have added an extra 65k of shop work to my shop. Typical Warranty on cat little things like maybe clutch, hand warmer,leaking gauge, pipe temp sensor. All less than .5 hours labor.

 

[Johnny]

It's the same concept as what we see here on the forums. Right now there are 700+ people on the cat forums and 1500+ on the pol side.
And even that is misleading, because I can visit either the cat or doo forums and find a discussion on the axys. LOL.

 

[rmscustom]

I will give you am example. In 09 I think it was economy down turn right. Polaris had recall on there motors. That would have added an extra 65k of shop work to my shop. Typical Warranty on cat little things like maybe clutch, hand warmer,leaking gauge, pipe temp sensor. All less than .5 hours labor.

I thought only Facebook was worthy of your input?

 

[tincuprider]

Man I'm tired of this b.s. Scud doo your data set is horrible. We've owned 8 Pros since 2011 and have had 2 injector issues and one secondary clutch. In the meantime my brother had an XM and a Pro climb that both had multiple days with major issues. Every cat I've owned had issues before I stopped riding them. To make statistical data assumptions on the kind of information you are using is really not very valid. I suspect the cats have a better motor but that's it, they have a lot of other issues but they keep getting better. I'm pretty sure there is a thread on the Polaris side where they've beat the Pro reliability issues to death, and they are really pretty good based on the polling.

There are tons of Polaris sleds in this area (SE Idaho) and I can get my sled in next day. Sounds like you have a crappy dealer. Our Pros have been the best running, most solid sleds we've ever owned, gas em, oil em and ride! Oh, and every time we check fuel consumption the cat loses by about 2 gallons out of ten....every ride, and don't say it's rider style...we're twins.

I love the way the cat handles and it has more juice, but to say the Pro is super unreliable just hasn't been our experience....did I mention we've run 8 of them....

 

[Jaynelson]

have a good friend that owns 3 different shops, all franchized dealers...he can sell me anything i want between the shops, doesn't matter to him in any significant way...his take on brand dependability is that poo is by far the least dependable....flame away "j", your continueing and obvious bias goes before you..

sorry for not taking the 1000th sled reliability comparison thread with no numbers seriously enough to not try for a laugh. I honestly though this topic had been beaten to death enough, but I guess you learn something every day.

If it's any consolation....in real life I absolutely don't care what brand anyone rides....like at all....