Sorta new here

[thomasakehoe]

Well I've posted some questions and some answers on here, but thought I'd do an introduction. I'm Tom. I live in Manchester, VT and I'm 34 and the father of 4 kids ages 5,5,6 and 15. I've ridden wheelers on and off over the years, but never rally had an interest to own any. Well that changed last year when I bought an old Polaris Trailboss 250 4x4. An as things worked out I ended up busting my knee on that same ATV. Well this month I found what I thought was a great deal on a 98 Grizzly 600 4x4. It was cheap and I thought all it needed was some carb rebuilding as it was loading up and dribbling gas out the overflow line. Also new it needed a new battery. So I ought a new Odyssey PC545 battery to replace the junk one and I also ordered a jet kit, uni filter and a carb rebuild kit for the carb and thought I'd be riding in no time. Fast forward, apon puling the carb apart I found that the carb housing itself was busted, so after trying to find a good deal ona used carb I decided the prices for used were so high I'd just by new so the carb was ordered and while I was waiting for that from Yamaha I decided to do some belt check and repair. Well the belt housing was filled with black goo and the primary sheaves were badly scored so upon some good advice I contacted Coop45 and he is going to do the 2 and 3 mods to the primary sliding sheave and the cam and I bought a new fixed primary sheave to fix the wear and give me more lower end grunt. So again waiting for parts and I dig a little deeper into the quad to install the EPI wet clutch springs I got with the EPI clutch kit and severe duty belt. Well I cleaned the carrier and it had some wear on the shoes but still had a lot of life left and after putting in the springs I wanted to replace the seals etc... on the clutch housing to make sure no oil would be getting on the new sheaves and belt, well I look inside and there are deep grooves in the clutch housing. So now I have to buy anew clutch housing and I'm going to replace the carrier as well so there's another 800 bucks from Yamaha. So that's about it for me until all the parts arrive. So I guess it's true if it seems too good to be true it probably is, but hey I'll have an almost new old Grizzly soon. Even though I probably could have bought a 700 for the same price. Well that's it for my racing. Thanks for listening.

[desertdweller]

Tom thats one HeII of a story buddy. You have got to be that Grizzly's saving grace, and I'm sure when all is said and done you will have a Grizzly that will perform top notch for you.
Twins HUH!, man have you got your hands full!!!!
Thanks for sharing with us and keep us up to date on your progress. You will absolutely enjoy Coop45's work, Post some pictures of Project 600 as we will now call it, OK!................

[thomasakehoe]

Will do some pics ASAP the Grizzly is naked at the moment plastics off clutch case removed waiting for all the goodies to finish coming in.

[ColoGrizguy]

Good for you Tom. Sounds like a decent project and when its all said and done, you will have a real nice machine. I'm sure you are still below what a new 550 or 700 costs.

I'm excited to see some pics of Project 600!

[UpstateNYGrizz]

Congrats on coming aboard. Look at the project this way, you've invested a lot of money, but at least you will know your grizzly inside and out.

[donster57]

Gidday from Oz.
I hope you didn't inherit the previous owner's poor maintenance regime. All will be forgotten after a few decent rides with some mates.

Four kids huh! Better man than I, Gungadin! Sounds like you're a tiger for hard work. I hope things work out for you.

[thomasakehoe]

Well folks... a quick update "Project 600" is sitting in a holding pattern at the moment. Coop should have the sliding sheave and cam from my primary tomorrow and keeping my fingers crossed that he can work his magic on the parts. Basically my big hold up is the time to get parts from mother Yama I paid 78 dollars for expedited shipping on the carb and it will be here tomorrow, but now that I had to order a new clutch housing and carrier assembly (witch by the way was almost as much as my used 01 Blaster LOL) it's just going to be sitting for a while hoping to have all my ducks in a row maybe end of next week or the beginning of the next. Then I will start posting with some short how to's with good pics for everyone, I know most guys in here seem to be running the newer Grizzes 660's and 700's etc... But hope you will at least like the look back in history. Now I'm off to Boston for a weekend with the kids, museums, aquarium etc... and when I get back I will start uploading all the pics I took today from the overall to the nitty gritty of the destroyed parts. Take care and thanks to everyone for their help so far it's really a great site.

[CLHC]

Looks like a Great project, looking forward to the pic's!!

[T-way]

Project 600??? Man....with all the $$$ he's spending to get that bear back on its feet, we should probably double it and call it Project 1200!!!

Good luck with the rebuild....hope you have that Grizz back into running condition soon!

Welcome to the forum!

[thomasakehoe]

Well back from the trip and ended up having to erase my memory card that I had my Grizz pics on for more pics of the kids per the wives insistence but no worries I'm home recovering from the weekend with the kids and I will get some more pics, sucks though that now that I'm home its started raining. But on a very positive note I did get my new carb in while I was away and was also notified by Coop45 that my primary sheave was modded and it removed the wear pattern from it so basically I got a new modded sheave for the cost of a new factory part and thats also including the modification to the primary cam to regain the top end and then some. Still waiting on a bunch of Yamaha dealer parts some things were not in stock so still waiting for that, but getting closer to a ride.

[Grizzly4fun]

An official welcome from Florida, though I know you've been around here!
You will have a steep "get to know your Grizzly" learning curve with all that you are doing to yours. It does reflect that you want to do it right, and I applaud you for that. Keep up the good work.
Good luck

[thomasakehoe]

Well working on the best way to get pics on here the storage size for the site is kind of small so hoping this will wrk. Heres the New carb from Yamaha ain't it cute?

[BSG]

I am sorry to hear about that bum deal. You are making the best of it though. Welcome to GC!

[thomasakehoe]

Hey everyone been working and tinkering with the green mountain grizzly, still on the injured list but looking to make a solid come back. Have a shipment of Yamagoodies set to be here tomorrow, but still have another order from cheapcycleparts to come late next week. Here is a link to my photobucket page for the "Green Mountain Grixzzly" I finally got some pics of the machine in its neglected state up. as well as the new battery and tender leads installed. Think I'm going to machine some 3/4" tall brass spacers to move the leads up a bit as the Odyssey is a little shorter than stock and I had to bend the negative lead to get it on the bolt. Green Mountain Grizzly pictures by thomaskehoe1976 - Photobucket

[thomasakehoe]

Well next week I'm going to be putting it what I hope to be the last order for factory parts from cheapcycleparts.com anooother 625.00 plus shipping so Im up to over 4K in Green Mountain Grizzly and that's not including the custom vinyl kit and misc. nuts and bolts and grease, fluids etc.... so I really hope the 675 Green Mountain Grizzly is going to hall balls.

[Grizzly4fun]

Sounds like you're getting much closer to completion. Keep up the good work and posts to let us know how things are going.
Good luck

[thomasakehoe]

UGGGGGGGGGG I have one part on back order from cheapcycleparts, buts its an important one the wet clutch so hopefully they can tell me when it will be in and out to me.

[thomasakehoe]

Well not as bad as I thought but still sucks, the girl on the phone at cheapcycleparts.com looked into it and said that Yamaha is supposed to send them the part on April 19 so hopefully, I will be able to get the grizzly together before the end of April. Think I'm going to do some cleaning and repainting of the floor boards and supports etc... to kill time and keep my mind off it and I should be getting the vinyl to wrap the plastics in any day now as soon as the new Canon batteries get here for my digital camera I'll post some more pics.

[thomasakehoe]

Well got two shipments in today from Cheap Cycle Parts and to my surprise the wet clutch assembly that I was told wasn't going to be released from Yamaha until 4/19 was in the box, so I'm almost ready to roll. I just realized that I am missing two parts an oil seal and a large bearing that supports the clutch housing, it wasn't shown in the clutch diagram I found it when I disassembled the old stuff so as soon as that comes in I will start posting the pics of the reassembly process. Getting really close now.

[thomasakehoe]

Now Im just waiting on one seal, a bearing and the Ultramatic grease from Bike Bandit then I'm good to go.