IFS DEERE AT WACONIA

[Horicon Joe]

The first thing I noticed when they brought it in was the hood straps ..... not liquifire. That made me look at the hook points
and I quickly realized it was the tunnel was not liquifire but was probably Sportfire and was decaled as 82 on the tunnel. The bulk head was Liquifire. The bumper was Sportfire/Trailfire .... I also noticed there were smaller carburetors.. probably a 34 mm and they had special boots
for connecting to the air box. The dent in the front bumper hints that the sled was driven after Polaris received it possibly for more testing.
The oil tank was moved for lack of room on that side for ease of removing belts. It used a low oil sensor from a sprintfire and the light on the dash was Sprint as well. The TR800 clutch face plate was cut out like a triangle in order
to get belts off and on because of the lack of room with the strut tower being very close to the clutch. Perhaps the most impressive part of the
whole sled was the under carriage ................


Joe

[AirborneX4Special]

I noticed the bumper damage as well. I agree on the Roseau boys taking it for a ride, but why not? It's not like any one of us wouldn't have jumped at the chance. Copy the undercarriage. It's what Deere needed to bring to the table and looks like production ready hardware.

[smitfire]

where was this one from?

[AirborneX4Special]

Roseau, MN is where Polaris used to have their sled R & D, but I guess I really haven't kept up to that, so who knows? I just guessed....

[smitfire]

I know there are some prototypes in Waterloo

[AirborneX4Special]

Which ones, specifically? The word is that Polaris owns this IFS Liquifire but nothing else exists in their collection. The scuttlebutt going around yesterday revolved around how to buy it from them.

[JDT]

There maybe the possiblity that Polaris would donate it to a museum.

Such as the HOF but It would need a visit to a dedicated Deerehead before public display.

[AirborneX4Special]

It could use a very careful restoration prior to that, if it happens. I'd even volunteer to help out.

[JDT]

Restoration possibly but a through clean up and some cometics to be sure.

It is not very pretty in the eyes of your average person as it sits.
But with a few dollars and some elbow grease it could be displayed in a as driven/tested state.

A better seat would be in order and that would be the big expence.

Polaris would probably insist that it never be driven for liability reasons so the engine could be left as is.

[webman]

I have a large amount of closeups I will put up tomorrow.

[S_Kyle]

I was lucky enough to hear Dick Teal (bad with names sorry) talk about the design and testing of the machine. There were multiple bars they had to adjust the ride in the front based on what you wanted to do with the machine. He also talked of the jetting problems they had with the sled during testing, it was extremely rich in the mid range and it took alot of work to get the jetting dead on.

The sister sled in question with the 550 engine. He talked about it and I think he said it was not a kiortz or kawi mill. It was from another brand that he cannot remember the make of. It was great to hear of the time he took his family on a trip with them, apparently his wife gave him alot of flack for driving the sled to fast. It was supposed to have been great for floating over the rough stuff.

This is what I remember him saying, some things may be slightly off. Also during this talk John Carlson came over and showed us where his 76 I500 helmet had cut outs to fit the two radios, and also a few stories of its use.

[AirborneX4Special]

The sled mechanic at my local dealer knew about that 550 powered prototype. I think it's the only one he found interesting because he had raced many Deeres, and that was his mindset. After Deere sold to Polaris he lost interest fairly quickly, so it took some persistence to get very far into the history and his experiences.

A friend of mine knew another dealer guy who somehow had the right connections at Deere and had driven that 550 sled prior to the product line sale to Polaris. His description was very favorable, but he made a living selling Deere products!

[That Girl Racing]

After carefully looking at all the pictures both back in the day and at Waconia. It looks like there are two sleds. One has 82 tunnel graphics and one has 81. We have pictures of both the engines and they appear to be 440 Kawis. Was there more? They may have tested 550 motors in the leafspring chassis. This is great stuff. Peter

[JD600]

AirborneX4, welcome to the site. The Horicon guys tell us that this A-arm sled had a 550 fan.

Peter,

This sled was suposedly a 550 fan cooled sled. It had the A-arm style IFS

DE

[Matt]

Larry just posted a video on his site describing the IFS Liquifire: www.vintagesleds.com.

Horicon Joe mentioned it here, and Caledonia Joe mentioned on the video that the TPR panels & bumper were Sportfire - could you see a reason for this or do you think the parts were just thrown on?