Home Forums Gear Horses and ATV's Bought a New 2023 Yamaha Kodiak 700 EPS

Love my CanAm ATV, but after this deer season I really wanted something with Power Steering. I have had several Yamaha's ATV's and all have beed very dependable. I went back and forth between the Grizzly and the Kodiak. I ended up buying the Kodiak 700 since the seat height felt better to me. The power steering on this machine is amazing and I like the extra headlight. The receiver tow mount is also really nice vs the flat bracket on my CanAm. I wish the Yamaha had the rear storage box like the CanAm. The power on this Kodiak is really nice and makes this machine really quick. The foot pegs are very similar to the CanAm. I looked also looked at Honda and Suzuki and hated that the pegs were so tall.

You just found the rider triangle. The relationship between seat, footpegs and handle bars that are the contact points of your ATV. Since you didn't mention the bars they must have been just right for you. This is a very smart buy. Congratulations. New bike/ATV day is the best day.

We're on the hunt too. I like the Can-am a lot. If we get a Can-Am it will be the 2 up. But I keep going back to the Yamaha Grizz/Kodiak. It's awfully tough to to beat the reliability of the Yamaha.

Can-Am has stepped up their game and IMO is going directly after Yamaha Grizzly. The rack system is a lot better on CanAm IMO as well.

Nice bike, and I really like the green/black combo. Bet you'll like it. That's the model I was looking for this spring but none were available. I wound up buying the gray one with factory winch.

Enjoying it so far, mainly using it for work. Swapped out the tires and bolted on a few StrongMade basket racks.




I was trying to get to a property last week and the washed-out access trail was super sketchy. I had to stand on one floorboard and hang my body off as to not flip the bike into a gulley. I mentioned that to my wife and told her she would not have liked to watch. She said, "Of course not, you just bought that thing!". I guess I know what she was more worried about!

I really like those baskets on your ATV. I'm going to have to do something. I found a Champion Winch 2,000 lb on sale at Rural King for $69 that I'm going to put on. I found a bunch of CanAm's when I was shopping, but only 1 Griz and it was an ugly Gray. Yamaha needs to fix some of the color options the tan front with blue back is Fuggly. I really wanted a Red Yamaha but figured green was fine for what I needed. I found a Super Store in Lexington Ky that had the best pricing. They had several CanAm's, Polaris, Yamaha's, Kawasaki but only one Honda.

Yamaha sent me a survey last month on proposed color schemes for next year. There was no option to call them “colorblind crackead efforts” but there should have been. Horrid…..

I'm a Yamaha slut - any/all powersports I start and end with them. Good choice on the quad.

I hate that they're getting out of sleds because by the time I'm ready to buy a new one - the SRX will no longer be available and I'll have to buy the Arctic Cat Thundercat - which is ok, exact same sled except Yamaha puts better clutches on their version. 200hp on a 500lb machine. #wheelies (it's tunable to 300HP, turbo 4 cylinder, 998 cc monster)

As to racks: What we like is this for wood and hauling -

Window well mounted to 2 boards and then the boards u-bolted to the factory rack. From the rear it will look like a giant "U" with the curved sides up.

IDGAF about "factory recommended weight" - load it, be smart that the front end gets light with weight and go about your business. Did this on a Timberwolf for, literally, 30 years and now it's set up on the Big Bear.

The curled edge of the well would be forward on the rack. Cut wood to stove size and lay in the well. Throw rubber bungees over the top and creep it out of the woods on the quad. Can also lay a deer in there like holding a baby.



This year - didn't have it on the quad, see how the deer just splays out over the ends? Folding it up in the well would have stopped a lot of that. Again bungee it in, creep out. Saves the back.

Just kill a much smaller deer next time, duh…..

The cut down plastic milk crates are perfect for carrying a jug of bar oil, scrwench and a chainsaw perpendicular to the direction of travel too. We just never found that racks alone are all that actually helpful other than a mounting point for other stuff.

My first wheeler was a 1999 Timberwolf 4x4. To this day it was the best starting cold weather wheeler I've ever had. It was very capable machine as long as you didn't need to go through deep mud. I was in snow up to the fenders and it handled it. Couldn't go past 2nd gear in deep stuff, but it would go!

Agreed and when stuck, light enough that even wabi could pull it out of the mud by hand.

I found a Moose Rear Rack box off craigslist for $50. I have it filled with tools, ratchet straps and gear. I like it so far.

I love Yamaha sxs's and atv's but their sleds are heavy as hell, there is no way an SRX 1000 snowmachine weighs only 500 lbs (closer to 630 lbs). Ski Doo and Polaris have the lightest sleds on the market and those are pushing 500 lbs with 2 stroke 600-850 engines and some even have turbos.

Those weights are useless numbers unless you only move your sled on the trailer. You need to compare riding weight for a real world comparison. Last time we did that, Arctic Cat was lightest, then Ski Doo, and Polaris last. All in the 800 mountain sled. The polaris was lightest on paper but held the most snow.