A buddy of mine texted me asking if I knew anywhere he could “throw away a four-wheeler.” I misread that completely. I thought he had one he needed hauled off. Turns out he just meant: did I want it. Free.
So I show up, and there it is — a 2007 Yamaha Grizzly 660, sitting where it had apparently been sitting for a long, long time. Missing a CV, a lower A-arm, a knuckle, a hub bearing, and any dignity it might have once had. There was a mouse nest in it. There were, and I want to be very clear I am not exaggerating, actual syringes buried in the dirt underneath it. This thing had lived a life.
Before I spent a dime on front-end parts, the plan was simple: see if it’ll even run. No sense buying a lower A-arm for a quad with a dead heart.
Step one was just getting the mouse house sucked out of it. Step two was a $100 Walmart “premium” battery, because apparently I haven’t priced ATV batteries in a while and that hurt more than it should have. Got it wired up, found the key switch was upside down the whole time (that one’s on me), and got lights. Then we found out why it hadn’t run in years — a chewed wire, dead-empty of oil, and a fuel system that smelled like it was bottled specifically to end me.
Splashed in some mystery oil, a little starting fluid down the intake, and — she barked off. Not pretty, but alive. That was enough to convince me to actually spend real money: ordered a CV, an A-arm, a knuckle, and figured the gas tank and carb could get sorted separately.
And then, because apparently one free dead four-wheeler isn’t a big enough problem to solve at once, a different buddy asked if I wanted a second project quad. A 2009-ish Kodiak 400. This one actually cost me a couple hundred bucks, which by DPV standards makes it the fancy one. Threw a cheap Amazon battery in it, gave it a couple huffs of gas down the intake, and it fired instantly. Five years sitting, and it just woke up like nothing happened. Meanwhile the “free” one fought me every step. Lesson learned: whatever fuel sat in something matters way more than what you paid for it.
Back on the Grizzly — new carburetor, new boots, cleaned-out tank, and about four trips to the hardware store chasing a metric castle nut that, of course, nobody local carries. Ended up grinding notches into a regular nut like a caveman just to get the axle buttoned up enough to move forward. Then somewhere in the middle of all this I also managed to dump motor oil into my truck’s transfer case at 1 a.m. because the bottle was red and my brain decided red meant “transmission fluid.” Rough week for fluids all around.
By the time I got both quads running, buttoned up, and loaded for the camping trip with the cousins, I had less than $200 total into the free one. Every part sourced off Amazon or eBay, nothing genuine Yamaha, and it fired right up.
Then my truck’s transmission blew on the way out to camp, so the actual riding footage is going to have to wait for next time. Can’t win ’em all in the same week — but two dead quads came back from the dirt, and that’s a win I’ll take.
Wheel it, Wreck it, Wrench it, Repeat!
Watch the full build: https://youtu.be/F4HXe52bsRA
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