I have the choice of buying a 2006 z400...for a good price about 3800...should i buy that or wait a couple years and buy a ltr or a yfz..or like a big 450...what do you think

well if you have to wait a couple of years for the 450 i would just go with the z. but y would you have to wait? you can prolly find a 450 for 4 grand jsut save up 200 more bucks.......

i dont know where you are located but i can get a 07' ltr 450 (brand new) for 6400 otd in CA

i had a race and my z with suspension crapped out so this guy let me borrow his mostly stock piped yfz there is a huge noticeable difference powerwise with a 450, i did better on that then on my z, they just pull way harder out of the corners.

it all depends on ur perferd riding. if u mainly like tracks an dunes the 450 is the way to go but if ur like me an like a variaty woods,dunes,track,and mudin the 400 is the best. i ride mine every weekend we go to the woods one weekend then the sand and so on.. its all ur style of riding or whats the main stuff u have around where u live. good luck

i am like you but without the muddin, it can get pretty dry here in cali

I would just go with the 450. The z's can easily keep up with any 450 out thier with enough mods done to it but you might as well start off with a better bike right out of the box. If I knew back when I bought the Z that I would be doing as much motocross as I do, I would have bought one of the 450's but hay my Z will hold its own no matter where I ride.

go for the 450 all arround better bike

i would definetly go with the 450. you can get a used one for around 4. so i would go that way

i had a z440 and ill tell you i loved it to death but i picked up an ltr monday for 3900 and the 440 had more torque but the ltr has alot harder acceleration. i didnt really beleive it at first but there is a big difference.

How is the ltr revving compaired to the z? Does it rev alot faster?

yes! watch some video's with sound and listen to that thing!

alot faster

I agree with that statement. My dad has a yfz450 and hates to ride thing. I adore my kfx and it can take the stock yfz in a race as well.

the z will take alot of mods to compete to the 450's the 450's will rev faster nomatter what mods you do to it. but quick revving doesnt always matter its all about horsepower and torque curves.

On an LTR the reason( I know it accelerates harder) it feels so much hard is probably b/c of the fuel injection. I have rode one with the making really close to the same HP as mine and it feels harder off the line but we are close together by the end of the race. It could be many of reasons. He is a better launcher then me so therefore he comes out harder the guy is also better at shifting. But at this point with the money he spent to buy the LTR and the mods done I would rather get a cheaper Z400 and mod it out.

I agree with you could start with the better quad. But just b/c you start with the better one dont get it in you head that is going to beat all the z400s out there b/c it isnt until you put alittle work into it.

if you just like to trail ride alot go with the z it is so much more comfortable than a yfz i ride my friends and it rides like crap it is so stiff and i just dont like it but it does have alot of power but if you pipe the z and filter and jet kit and rev box you wont be very far away from the 450's i would go with the z but i never rode the ltr yet.

If i could do it all over again i would probally save my money and get a kfx450 or a ktm450.....a 450 cc with reverse is what i need........

the only thing i hate about my z400 is the value. Plus if you want to use it for more than a trail quad it gets VERY expensive.

i still like the my z and with a few more mods it will be a lethal weapon. I still would have bought a 450 if i knew then what i know know.

LTR hands down. dasa pipe, fuelatv intake, and a power commander 3 is 57 hp. no z will touch that.

that is what one guy had at the eganville races last year and it Dominated!! he lapped my bro. after 10 laps.

I dont think that they put out 57 horse though. i was doing some research on the ltr a couple months back and with a full yoshi pipe + cherry bomb the pwer commander cp high compresion piston port and polish it was supposed to put out around 56 horse but the torque gain was supposed to be where the big difference is. and with just the pipe and cherry bomb web cams and rev box it was supposed to put out around 52 horse.

trail=z400 hands down
mx=ltr hands down
kfx450/ktm450/525=mx and trail!!


gotta figure your priorites.

Whats the big difference between the Kawi & The Suzuki ? LTR/KFX 450
Why (just wondering) you would put the KFX 450 as mx & trail ?
Myself i bought my Z back in 03 & picked up a 05 for 1000bux(this year) . Myself I have al sorts of fun with my Z's . I dont race , just rip around & trail ride ,plus some sand pits.
Basically what im saying is i have fun on my Z. Yes it is older technology compared to a LTR , but its paid for & I have fun with it, but i think everyone on here has fun with their "quadrunner".

i would agree with all that except the kfx 450.. the yfz is far superior compared to the kfx as far as performance goes. i would go with the ds450 before i would go with the kawi, plus the can am is canadian but that is in stock trim. when you spend enough money then everything changes. look at this year john natalie won with the honda yet in stock the honda is rated as last. Then again it comes down to the rider when you are looking at full on race bikes. i think the ktm's are going to do very well but who want to put out the extra coin up front? cant wait for a shoot out to see how all these bike are going to do against each other. yet what i always wanted to see was a shootout between the z slightly modified (450 kit, cams, carb, intake, rev box, +2 arms and axle rebuilt shocks) and an ltr with modified shocks and full intake and exhaust cherry bomb rev box and cams. I think that the ltr would win but still it would have been nice to see a shootout somewhere on them.

I am guessing with the shootout you want to see it is purely mx, right?

ONE WORD = reverse

on ltr vs kfx450


The ktm-I honestly dont know anything about it. Never even saw one in real life. I group quads on thier capabilities.

450cc+reverse=good for anything if the arms arnt too wide.
450cc no reverse wide azz suspension=mx only

yes i am mainly an mx guy but woods and dunes drag race are still equally important on a stock bike, especially in a shoot out.

the ktm has reverse so does the polaris.

the ktm has fully adjustable suspension : camber , caster, rear ridehieght adjust. triple rate front shocks!! the axle is adjustable too all the way up to 48.5" wide!

the whole bike looks super easy to work on ie: fenders are quickly detached for cleaning same with the air filter it is very quick to change. the bike looks super cool saw one at royal distributing back in october.

i would like to see a shoot out done with all the bikes running the same tires and tire sizes that is the only way i think that it would be fair to compare the bikes in the same situation. in most shoot outs its always stock tires so yes thier will be better areas like woods that the ltr would really do badly but if it had 20 inch rear tires it would do much better especially ground clearance. and lets face it almost everyone will change out thier stock tires when they get wore down and go with a set of tires that suits thier own riding style better.

I was just making sure I was understanding the shootout you wanted to see.



There is a topic on here(I am pretty sure, maybe not) and on yfzcentral about the Polaris450. My dad has one and he really enjoys it. I like the soft seat.

ya the seats are supposed to be really nice. the only bad thing that i have heard about them is the air filter setup kinda sucks but other than that they are supposed to be a pretty solid bike all in all.

The filter set up sucks extremely bad. For kicks when my dad got his quad dyno'd the guy dynoing put a ron woods on it with the seat off b/c there is no where to put it and there was like a 5HP increase and that is from a modded air filter tube and k&n we have already made. The rear shock is really in the way. Right now we have used a stock z400 filter and made something to get alittle more air. We are trying to work something up to work the best for the Outlaw450, but they are going to have to build something around the shock which is the hardest of problems.

what kind of horsepower numbers was it putting out? i have heard rumors that the 525 puts out close to 50 horse bone stock.

Okay it wasn't 5HP increase the Ron Woods put it up to 45 HP. My dads quad how it sits now is 43HP.

that is still with the stock exhaust? if so thats pretty damn good.

Slip on fmf that is for a 525.

thats not too bad. you race him yet?

Yeah. I walk all over him. He is use to that thou.

Nice!! so thier is still fight left in the Z's then.

Only to some point. It depends on the mods.

i wish that thier was a bigger amount of competition here in ontario. where i live it is mostly dirt bikers and they are always talking trash about the quads, yet when we (me and my bro) whip them on the mx track they seeem to have nothing to say. Where the big race scene is is in quebec.

your right! I made a typo. I meant 47 hp. although, fuel atv dyno'd it at 52hp with the dasa, fuelatv intake, and pc3. thats just a #'s game though. either way, a piped 450 is the cheapest way to go if you want power.

also, the ltr losing in trails? whats up with that? whats the difference between a z400 @ 49" wide with +2's vs a stock width ltr @ 49" wide?

Yep i would definitly should have bought a 450 when i could have, especially fuel injection no more screwing around with jetting.

i have +2 arms and i drive it in trails and i have absolutly no problem with it, i havent drove the ltr in trails so really dont know, but what i think people mean is a stock z vs a stock ltr with 18 inch tires. but with 20's i bet it would be wicked in trails just like any other 450.


The Ltr is by far the best bike you can buy as of right now, if i would have known last year what i know now i would have waited for a 450 instead of tricking my bike out. because the canadian dollar got so strong all the prices of the 450's went way down in price.

the honda 450 was around 10000 bucks now it is 6000 bucks!!! unbelievable price drops but i guess you live and learn.

very easy...ground clearance. i rode with a buddy of mine when he first got his ltr450...i had my z. we went riding at finger lakes in missouri...most of that place is sand, out in the open it was a blast....i'd smoke him off the line with my stock z (believe it or not) he'd get me on top end every time though( by top end, i mean when i hit 4th). we hit the trails and that thing was a pig in the woods, smacking every tree that everyone went through without a problem, carrier high centering on every root and rock, they dont come with chain/rotor gaurds i dont believe either (his didnt). not to mention they right like log wagons, and the seats are hard as concrete. it as the most uncomfortable quad i ever plopped my ass on. i am a woods rider for the most part, the LAST quad i'd look at would be an ltr for any type of trail riding.

what you forgot to mention is the tire size! if he was running the 18's then yes it would have been very low, but using the same tires i cant see the difference, like i already said i use +2 arms with the 20's and i hammer the trails HARD! and it is just as wide as an LTR, but when i use my 18's in the trails it SUCKS HARD!! its all about the right choice of threads.

word. I'll be running 20's...

I just had to clear that up for all the guys that believe everything they hear in magazines. if we believed everything we heard you guys would still think us canadians live in igloos

I hear ya. I meant the ltr and z setup the same anyway, as in width AND tire size. my razr2's wont be sold with my z!