It is a "bar" for lack of better terms that goes between the top main brace and backside of the motor on the clutch side. This is supposed to help keep the motor from twisting on hard throttle up's. Just do a google search and you will find a few different types. Or go to do talk and ask which one is the best.
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09 800 XP good or bad
- Thread starter fatdaddy
- Start date
It is a "bar" for lack of better terms that goes between the top main brace and backside of the motor on the clutch side. This is supposed to help keep the motor from twisting on hard throttle up's. Just do a google search and you will find a few different types. Or go to do talk and ask which one is the best.
mjkaliszak
New member
Brace ( In a Nut-shell ) LOL
I have the Racewerks. There was a lot of threads on another forum pertaining to clutch towers breaking and belts wearing out, not running proper RPM's ect... that as soon as I bought it ( the " R " ) I modded it out for my needs. There is another brace that caught my eye also, it was a solid plate of aluminum that bolted on. I can't remember the name. I just looked at the miles and I have 4860 in 5 months of use ( last year & this year ). I have not had any belt, clutch tower issues, & never needed to adjust the " clickers ". I'm on my 3rd belt and change it about every 2000 -2200 just out of "principle". The following is a "information message" from a Racewerks proponent. (IMO) it sums the brace NEED pretty good.
Why there is a need for one:
The traditional jackshaft mounting is just above the tunnel about 1" away. This is a very solid point at which there is not much leverage on the secondary clutch. This will be very similar to using a "stubby" rachet. The XP-XR chassis mounts the secondary about 8" above the tunnel. While this is an excellent concept for the extra legroom they achieved, the downside is that it has allowed a large amount of leverage to be added to the secondary clutch. This is very similar to swapping out that "stubby" rachet with a 8" rachet- all of a sudden it becomes alot easier to move that clutch! This movement in the clutch tower is caused by the motor trying to pull the two clutches together. This is very critical as I will explain later. This movement in extreme cases has resulted in the clutch tower becoming seperated from the tunnel, destroying the tunnel. Considering the fact that there are only 3-- 6mm bolts holding the clutch tower to the tunnel and 1 cross tube above the carbs holding the tower from flexing helps explain why there are so many more issues with the higher horsepower sleds. (800 Summits & XP's)
When this tower starts to flex and pull towards the motor many things occur; The clutches become misaligned which causes friction which in turn creates higher heat in the clutches. This higher heat is then transferred into that little rubber belt causing premature belt failure. Any knowledgable clutch tuner will tell you that heat is the enemy of clutches and belts and eliminating it will help performance and longevity of clutching components and those $$$$expensive belts! Venting kits help reduce the heat but act as more of a "band aid" for the real problem causing the higher heat--which is misalignment. Solve the source of the problem--add some vents to keep them running even cooler and you are putting more horsepower to the track where it counts! Another often overlooked issue when the tower flexes is the added side load on the chaincase bearing and the side plates of the drive chain--again causing more friction which robs more horsepower. Add all of this up and every little bit of friction that you can reduce will add up to increased horsepower at the track!
I have seen time and time again on a track dyno where the exact same sled with nothing else done to it besides chassis blueprinting---eliminating friction by aligning clutches,chaincase,driveshaft, and suspension resulted in 5+ horsepower to the track! Many people will spend hundreds of dollars on clutch kits and performance mods only to have much of the added benefits of the mods get lost in friction because of of the clutch tower becoming misaligned! The higher the horsepower the more it flexes! The cheapest way to to maximize track horsepower is to minimize friction within the chassis---just because you did not blow belts last season does not mean that you will not benefit from a clutch tower brace--lets face it --blowing belts is no fun even if Ski-Doo is paying for them--the mess and bent parts associated with them can ruin your weekend and your clutch cover! The clutch tower brace is actually one of the cheapest performance mods you can make as far as track horsepower is concerned and they cost about as much as some of the new belts available so they pay for themselves after the first blown belt that you don't have.
We first recgnized a need for a brace when the 600RS hit the snow in the fall of 07. Snocross racing puts a tremendous test on chassis components. We have been involved with Snocross racing for many years and know first hand the saying "in order to finish first-first you must finish" This is why we were not the first one to get our kit on the market. While there is alot of money to be made by being the "first" to have a kit on the market there is also a fine balance as far as durability is concerned. Only long term testing will tell the whole story as far as how the part will affect the rest of the chassis. For example, drilling a hole in your expensive chassis might be fine if you are drag racing on ice or grass (as long as you make sure the bolts stay tight) but what happens when you slam into that huge hole and your left front shock bottoms out hard...Where does all of that force go? Into your chassis--just like it was designed to do. Now here's where it gets interesting...I'm sure Ski-Doo has done countless hrs of stress testing on this chassis and I'm also pretty sure that putting holes in a stressed member of the chassis will eventually lead to some failures down the road depending how hard you ride and what you slam into. Again if you are drag racing only there is very little stress on that part of the chassis and you should be ok. What was done correctly was creating a triangle between the clutches and the chassis. This provides a very strong "box" if you will. Another very important thing to note is what happens when you bottom out the front shock and the forces are then transferred to the chassis. Now you have created a super strong triangle between the clutch tower and the front frame and forces are actually transferred back into the clutch tower! This is not really an issue for the tower to handle the extra force but that hole that you just drilled into the stressed member might not fare as well. This is also why a clamp on kit for the upper tube, while better than drilling a hole into the chassis, has its downside too. The reason the clamp is rotating is more likely from the impact of bottoming out and the force having nowhere to go vs the clutch tower moving enough to rotate it. The other downside to the clamp on the frame tube is the fact that that tube is very thin. And by clamping that high you have eliminated some of the triangle effect and turned it into a pivoting effect on the heim joints instead--this comes into effect from what I said earlier about the clutches pulling towards each other, not the secondary pushing up towards the frame tube...again creating more of a pivoting effect that an actual pushing effect like the other two braces.
I have the Racewerks. There was a lot of threads on another forum pertaining to clutch towers breaking and belts wearing out, not running proper RPM's ect... that as soon as I bought it ( the " R " ) I modded it out for my needs. There is another brace that caught my eye also, it was a solid plate of aluminum that bolted on. I can't remember the name. I just looked at the miles and I have 4860 in 5 months of use ( last year & this year ). I have not had any belt, clutch tower issues, & never needed to adjust the " clickers ". I'm on my 3rd belt and change it about every 2000 -2200 just out of "principle". The following is a "information message" from a Racewerks proponent. (IMO) it sums the brace NEED pretty good.
Why there is a need for one:
The traditional jackshaft mounting is just above the tunnel about 1" away. This is a very solid point at which there is not much leverage on the secondary clutch. This will be very similar to using a "stubby" rachet. The XP-XR chassis mounts the secondary about 8" above the tunnel. While this is an excellent concept for the extra legroom they achieved, the downside is that it has allowed a large amount of leverage to be added to the secondary clutch. This is very similar to swapping out that "stubby" rachet with a 8" rachet- all of a sudden it becomes alot easier to move that clutch! This movement in the clutch tower is caused by the motor trying to pull the two clutches together. This is very critical as I will explain later. This movement in extreme cases has resulted in the clutch tower becoming seperated from the tunnel, destroying the tunnel. Considering the fact that there are only 3-- 6mm bolts holding the clutch tower to the tunnel and 1 cross tube above the carbs holding the tower from flexing helps explain why there are so many more issues with the higher horsepower sleds. (800 Summits & XP's)
When this tower starts to flex and pull towards the motor many things occur; The clutches become misaligned which causes friction which in turn creates higher heat in the clutches. This higher heat is then transferred into that little rubber belt causing premature belt failure. Any knowledgable clutch tuner will tell you that heat is the enemy of clutches and belts and eliminating it will help performance and longevity of clutching components and those $$$$expensive belts! Venting kits help reduce the heat but act as more of a "band aid" for the real problem causing the higher heat--which is misalignment. Solve the source of the problem--add some vents to keep them running even cooler and you are putting more horsepower to the track where it counts! Another often overlooked issue when the tower flexes is the added side load on the chaincase bearing and the side plates of the drive chain--again causing more friction which robs more horsepower. Add all of this up and every little bit of friction that you can reduce will add up to increased horsepower at the track!
I have seen time and time again on a track dyno where the exact same sled with nothing else done to it besides chassis blueprinting---eliminating friction by aligning clutches,chaincase,driveshaft, and suspension resulted in 5+ horsepower to the track! Many people will spend hundreds of dollars on clutch kits and performance mods only to have much of the added benefits of the mods get lost in friction because of of the clutch tower becoming misaligned! The higher the horsepower the more it flexes! The cheapest way to to maximize track horsepower is to minimize friction within the chassis---just because you did not blow belts last season does not mean that you will not benefit from a clutch tower brace--lets face it --blowing belts is no fun even if Ski-Doo is paying for them--the mess and bent parts associated with them can ruin your weekend and your clutch cover! The clutch tower brace is actually one of the cheapest performance mods you can make as far as track horsepower is concerned and they cost about as much as some of the new belts available so they pay for themselves after the first blown belt that you don't have.
We first recgnized a need for a brace when the 600RS hit the snow in the fall of 07. Snocross racing puts a tremendous test on chassis components. We have been involved with Snocross racing for many years and know first hand the saying "in order to finish first-first you must finish" This is why we were not the first one to get our kit on the market. While there is alot of money to be made by being the "first" to have a kit on the market there is also a fine balance as far as durability is concerned. Only long term testing will tell the whole story as far as how the part will affect the rest of the chassis. For example, drilling a hole in your expensive chassis might be fine if you are drag racing on ice or grass (as long as you make sure the bolts stay tight) but what happens when you slam into that huge hole and your left front shock bottoms out hard...Where does all of that force go? Into your chassis--just like it was designed to do. Now here's where it gets interesting...I'm sure Ski-Doo has done countless hrs of stress testing on this chassis and I'm also pretty sure that putting holes in a stressed member of the chassis will eventually lead to some failures down the road depending how hard you ride and what you slam into. Again if you are drag racing only there is very little stress on that part of the chassis and you should be ok. What was done correctly was creating a triangle between the clutches and the chassis. This provides a very strong "box" if you will. Another very important thing to note is what happens when you bottom out the front shock and the forces are then transferred to the chassis. Now you have created a super strong triangle between the clutch tower and the front frame and forces are actually transferred back into the clutch tower! This is not really an issue for the tower to handle the extra force but that hole that you just drilled into the stressed member might not fare as well. This is also why a clamp on kit for the upper tube, while better than drilling a hole into the chassis, has its downside too. The reason the clamp is rotating is more likely from the impact of bottoming out and the force having nowhere to go vs the clutch tower moving enough to rotate it. The other downside to the clamp on the frame tube is the fact that that tube is very thin. And by clamping that high you have eliminated some of the triangle effect and turned it into a pivoting effect on the heim joints instead--this comes into effect from what I said earlier about the clutches pulling towards each other, not the secondary pushing up towards the frame tube...again creating more of a pivoting effect that an actual pushing effect like the other two braces.
Howiemn,
What did you find out with your lights going on? I had a similar problem in low snow conditions and actually noticed that the snow flap was previously trimmed not allowing snow to circulate in the tunnel to cool the heat exchange..I have spoke with one dealer thinking that the heat exchangers were getting to warm. Definitely interested to see if you find out anything else.
What did you find out with your lights going on? I had a similar problem in low snow conditions and actually noticed that the snow flap was previously trimmed not allowing snow to circulate in the tunnel to cool the heat exchange..I have spoke with one dealer thinking that the heat exchangers were getting to warm. Definitely interested to see if you find out anything else.
I swore I would never buy another doo.but I was out boondocking this weekend with a guy with a 09 800 summit 146 and was verry impressed with what that thing could do.most impressed with when it did get stuck it usually only needed to have rider off sled and push Handel bars and it would creep out of its hole.that wont work with my xfire was I impressed enough to jump ship on cat ummm no unless it was a smoking deal.had to work on a 08 summit this weekend also. bad y pipe gasket what a pain in the *** to get to well over a hour with 2 guys I think you need a can opener to get them open to work on.BTW the 09 had 3000 mi on it already with no probs.
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