Beauty is often in the eye of the beholder. I had been looking for a sled to replace Project Renegade and wanted something newer yet affordable, a project without getting into major structural repairs. I came across this weapon on NL-Classifieds and checked it out with Mark French. We looked it over and seen that although it was dirty and plastered with stickers, there was no frame damage, had a lot of accessories, an upgraded 1.5" track, and the plastics were not cracked. It did needed some work as the motor was making noises and it needed suspension parts replaced. Based on all this I made a reasonable offer, struck a deal, and brought the sled home.

February 19, 2012 so it begins!

This sled needed a good cleaning and a load of monster energy decals removed. These were removed slowly by heating them with a heat gun and then removing any residue with 99% pure rubbing alcohol. I think the sled breathed a sigh of relief when returned to its original clean lines!

The REV was washed, dried and polished up with SC-1 Cleaner/Protector. It was already looking amazing!

The chain case was serviced by removing the cover to inspect the chain and to see what gear set was inside. The stock 23/43 gearing was still in place and the fluid wasn't too neglected. I did find a cracked off cover bolt which was causing a small leak. This was easily removed with Vise Grips and a new bolt installed. This is why its very important to thoroughly check literally every bolt on a used sled when performing your first round of service work.

When I reinstalled the freshly painted exhaust, I also installed new donut gaskets as the original ones were completely fried.

The last item I installed was the Bombardier accessory gas can already in stock from Project Renegade. This can was actually designed for the REV chassis, I installed two metal brackets in locations already marked on the rear tunnel cover.

As of today, the last of February 2012, I only need a centre shock and some snow to get out for a test ride. Over the summer I plan to have the engine freshened with new crank bearings, seals, new pistons, rings and necessary gaskets. This should ensure a trouble free ride for a good few years to come!

On March 9th we headed to the Sooley cabin near Whitbourne for a late and albeit short annual cabin trip. Even with low snow conditions I could do a shakedown run with Project REV to check out my repairs and seek out any further issues to be addressed over the summer.

A 20cm snowfall before the trip was decimated by rain by the time we got to the cabin. Riding conditions were dreadful but with a few flurries we had enough to putt around, and skim a lot of water! This 800 is a wheelie machine on water!

Not surprisingly the motor popped on this trip. It was making a weird noise since we first looked at it, but held on for the whole day Saturday before letting go skipping open water! We towed it back and formulated a plan for repair.

In October, Maffer and I got to work removing the engine. It was pretty straight forward, removing the exhaust Y-Pipe was made much easier by using a metric Allen key socket with a ball end about 4" long. I picked up a set at princess auto that fit a 3/8" drive ratchet and they were extremely handy for this whole project.

We removed the electric starter and unbolted the recoil starter. We also removed the carburetors, RAVE valves & reeds, although the motor can come out with these last two items still attached.

Molten aluminum in the exhaust is usually a bad sign.

We disconnected the last few wires & hoses, drained the coolant and the motor was finally ready to come out. I took a lot of pictures of the wire harness, vacuum lines for the DPM, and the cables which came in handy during reassembly.

The engine compartment was extremely dirty, I couldn't wait to start cleaning it up!

With the motor out of the sled I found a major problem, the connecting rod came out through the lower engine case. This meant I would need a replacement motor instead of just a rebuild. The piston skirt on the mag side let go, some went out the exhaust, more down in the base. This jammed the crank which in turn split the case. I sourced a donor motor in Carbonear and took a trip out over the highway to pick it up. The seller also threw in a good used stock muffler to replace the one I patched together last year.

The donor motor was a year older so I had to swap the cylinder head as my Powertek has a knock sensor the replacement motor did not. This was easily done, I cleaned the mating surface, washed it thoroughly and installed it according to my factory repair manual. While on the bench, I installed the motor mounting plate, RAVE valves, reeds and a pair of spark plugs.

While the electric starter was off I replaced the bendix with an OEM kit from the dealer. The gear on my old bendix was chewed up. This was due to a weak return spring which allowed the gear to wander out and contact the ring gear on the primary clutch while riding, it was a common problem on these machines.

Of course while the motor was out, I took the opportunity to completely clean the engine compartment of oil, exhaust crud (from the old leaky donut gaskets) and belt dust.

The motor installation was put on hold while I waited for bulkhead braces to arrive, so I moved on to the rear suspension. I wanted to pull out the SC-4 skid for an inspection and replacement of worn parts. I replaced every bearing in the skid, as well as the bearing on the driveshaft. The chain case bearings were in great shape so they were retained.

New left old right. These bushings hold the end of the torsion springs and were well worn!

While everything was apart I striped, cleaned and sanded the suspension rails as I wanted to black them out. I decided to try some POR15 paint which is supposed to chemically bond on bare metal, plus I already had some left over from my trailer rebuild project. If this doesn't hold up I may have them powder coated, but they sure look fantastic! With the rails painted I also replaced the worn out hyfax.

The last item on the rear skid was to replace the worn out leaking stock shocks. Mark Murray of Rock Suspension, my local shock rebuilder, had a pair of freshly rebuilt Fox shocks for sale, so I picked them up and bolted them in place.

While the skid was out I tackled my next appearance mod. I wanted to coat my tunnel black without the expense or the hassle of completely disassembling the frame to have it powder coated. I decided to try Duplicolor aerosol truck bed liner (blue can from NAPA, not the black water based crap from Canadian Tire). This product worked well on the racks of my Honda Foreman ATV, holding up great over the last three years. I prepped the tunnel by cleaning with brake parts cleaner, thoroughly sanding with 120 grit sand paper, then wiping down with 99% pure rubbing alcohol. The more time you put into prep, better are the results.

I taped off the areas I did not want coated and applied the product in one generous coat. I did not paint the top of the rear heat exchanger in part to aid performance of the cooler, and because this area is covered with a plastic panel. With the bumper and plastics reinstalled the sled looks fantastic!

When I bought the rear shocks from Mark Murray I picked up a set of front ones as well. He had a bunch of brand new Ryde FX 9200 series rebuildable shocks in stock for a great price. The old shocks were easy to remove, just one bolt top & bottom and they were out. To swap springs we mounted the shock in a bench vice, turned the tensioners as low as they would go, then Maffer pulled down on the spring while I removed the keeper plates. The springs were easily installed on the new shocks as there is a infinite adjustment. They fit in place perfectly, we made a rough estimate to the tension adjustment making sure each side was adjusted equally.

I bought a pair of brand new black/yellow marble Pilot 5.7 skis identical to the existing worn out skis on the sled already. I installed four carbides I had in stock from my last sled (they only had a couple hundred kilometres on them) but I replaced the rusty nuts with stainless lock nuts & washers.

Next I swapped out the stock x-package bar pad for one from a 2009 REV-XP Summit (thanks Steve Long). This piece is a bar pad and riser cover all in one, and looks much cleaner as it covers all of the wires on the riser block. I let the brake line and throttle cable hang free outside the cover so they wouldn't bind during sharp turns.

Finally after nearly a month my bulkhead braces arrived from fellow dootalk.com member "wwracer" in Alaska. He designed, fabricates, and sells this brace kit which bolt & rivet to the bulkhead frame under the engine making it much stronger. This way if you strike something and bend an A-Arm or even the Nun, the bulkhead under the engine has a better chance of not being damaged. A minor bend here means pulling the motor to fix, a major bend means replacing the entire tunnel.

The new braces almost triple the thickness of the frame in this vulnerable area. Now if I strike something I can replace the Nun section of frame as it bolts in place. The frame under the engine is one piece all the way to the rear of the sled.

It's a lot easier to install these with the motor out, delaying installation of my new motor was definitely worth the wait.

With the bulkhead braces installed, I was ready to reinstall the motor. As mentioned previously, the engine will fit in with the RAVE valves and reed cages installed, so I left them on, but took out the spark plugs. When I had the engine half way in, I connected the Oil Pump Cable, main oil feed line, impulse line for the fuel pump and bolted on the starting motor. The engine slid in the rest of the way with a little wiggling and negotiation but it really wasn't too bad. The rest of the job involved reinstalling the Y-Pipe & bolts with red lock-tite, connecting all the electrical & vacuum lines, installing the carburetors, and bolting up the recoil starter.

When everything was checked and re-checked I pulled the sled over a bunch of times holding the oiler wide open to remove air & pump gas to the carbs. The sled fired right up with a small amount of mixed gas dropped into the cylinders and ran great. I bled the cooling system by elevating the front of sled to remove air from the heat exchanger.

With the belt installed I hung the rear of the sled to adjust the track alignment/tension and to perform the torque procedure for the primary clutch as outlined in the shop manual. Knock on wood everything seems to be working great, I have the sled cleaned up and ready for snow. Lastly I removed the factory 2000's style decals, carefully trimming and leaving just "Skidoo MXZ" on the side panels, but removing the rest. This really gives the sled a sleek uncluttered appearance. A new set of black/grey hand guards from a current XP chassis sled are on the way from eBay to replace the cheap floppy Acerbis ones on the sled. 

Cheers, MIKE  

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