Well my opinion i just went from 4 stroke back to 2 stroke for simple aspects. MY honda i rebuilt i had to go threw and pay for valve job,new valves,cam chain,aftermarket cam, and timing the damn things. So i bought a 2 stroke scrambler and tore it apart and have none of these worries anymore. When it blows up ill pull it apart rebore and reassemble and not have to worry about all the 4 stroke parts. My opinion go 2 stroke myself.

 

Big bore 2 strokes are alot of fun!

 

I love my Predator, but cannot give a great opinion as I have never ridden the 400. I say what ever has the best price, and consider the future. I know there are quite a few mods for a Pred, not sure about the 400. Is it going to be enough power in a month, a year?

 

the 4oo 2 stroke has as much hp as the 500 ho 4 stroke , not sure how much power or the reliability of the predator 500 motor . you can buy those old 2 strokes pretty cheap,and fix 'em up cheap too, but just remember when you get tired of it and it's time to sell ,you won't get much for it 'cause people still have the stigma that 2 strokes don't last.

 

I say Predator for 2 good reasons. First of the suspension on the Pred is leaps and bounds better than the 400. And secondly the Pred's 500 engine is much better than the old school technology 2 stroke. That's a no brainer for me. I have a mildly worked 250 Trailboss that's quick, but my Pred is so much better its crazy. The 400 is old technology that will get spanked by all the new stuff.

 

this is true.

the 400 is pretty fast. but the aftermarket is weak on them, the suspension is outdated, as well as just about everything else. in theory, maintainence is cheaper on a 2-stroke, but you will be rebuilding the top end a lot more on it then a 4-stroke. resale value will also suck on it.

the pred on the other hand is also pretty fast stock, but has a much better aftermarket following, the suspension is way better. they can be made as fast as you really want it to go with the right amount of money. motor and gearbox are reliable

i wont say which on i would take, because the choice is ultimately yours

 

I have a 400 sport too, mine is heavily modified. It has an aftermarket pipe, vforce reeds, porting,bigger piston,higher compression head, clutch stall,minuki carb,starter delete,oil mix delete, and kn open air filter. It is stupid fast for a sport it will outrun my friends 400ex like thats its job. There are some downsides though, i dont run it in the winter so i wont blow it up, you cant take long rides at top speed You have to run expensive oil like clotz. but on the upside you would have something no one else has, and i havent found a hill it wont climb. If it was me i would choose the pred its much easier to maintain and better suspension, and no worries about blowing up.

 

He is correct i just sold my 400 sport it had aftermarket pipe vforce quad carbonfiber reeds and a few othere things i bought it cheap from a guy 1000.00 bucks within the first month it blew a headgasket not major on a 2 stroke if you can work on them alittle bit its about a 30 dollar parts from polaris take about 2 hours to do since you have to remove the body and gas tank and drain fluid a bit . next up about a month later it blew the base gasket so i went ahead and put rings on it this time it cost me about 80 bucks for parts and about a week because i had to get the cyl. cleaned up . got it back together ran great a month later i was in the woods about 2 miles deep and it died on me no spark . got home went thru the wires and traced it back to a broken wire behind the flywheel the connects the stator to the exciter rewired it and soldered all joints put back together and she ran great again . so my point is it is a super fast atv with a few hot parts but be prepared to work on it constantly as is with anything highly powerfull . if your thing is flat out speed runs and fast hill climbs you will prob like it but if you at all like slow trail rides and want to ride it in a local area with houses id say stay clear . i spent 1000.00 dollars for mine and ended up spending about 400 on it in one year with all the repairs and good high dollar mix oil and i sold it for 1000.00 dollars to a guy they donot hold any real value and most are pretty beat when you buy them because they where made to run hard and fast and you better belive that anyone who owned it before you has riden the heck outta it . id stick with a smaller 4 stroke just to have that peace of mind might be slow as snot but think of all the time and money you will save .

 

400 sport

The 400 sports are good machines. The 400 2 strokes are lots easier to work on and maintain then the 4 strokes . Big draw back on the 03 predator no reverse they dont shift smoothly and they had some transmission problems with them shift forks bend.The stock gearing is also pretty high making them a little hard to trail hard slowly. The 400 can be rode year around just need to put a bigger main jet in carb in the winter.Jet change only takes 15 minutes or so to do and jet is only a few bucks.Big thing on 400 is keep the air filter clean they need lots of air to run good.After market performance parts are easy to get also.I have as 400 scrambler that i trail ride all the time year around with no problems. just like any other machine just keep it maintained.

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i new to this forum and this is an old posting but wanted to give my two cents there are good and bad to both bikes i have a polaris sport 400 its bored 40 over has billet head head stud girdle kit intake carb exhaust clutch kit this bike was setup for drag racing but changed a few things to go on the trail so far no problems aas far as lasting well who knows its all in how its taken care of a fourstroke will cost more in the start but will last alot longer than two but a two stroke will cost alot less to maintain in the end espeically if you do not have alot of money to do so a top end kit will cost no more than 100 to 150 tofix on a two banger where as a four will sock u upwards of 300 or more if u replace everything not to say everything will need to be replaced but u never know till u take it down the two banger well theres nothin in there but a piston and rings nothing to the head but a plug and gasket my choice will always be a two stroke for the silly power they produce and the quikness that comes with it longgevity is lowered but a fourstroke can go as fast as a two stroke the suspension end its all in how ur going to ride mine does quit well to dated to other quads the clutch end well there nothin that can beat the cvt clutching hands down it always in the right gear and u lose more concentration on moving with havein to shift a quad instead of worrying about whats coming around the next turn hop up parts are there in a serious way for the sport it just finding then theres aeen performance hot set perfomance and then there hpd thats where most of mine came from ur also not going to get 92 horse out of a predator that u can get out of a two stroke local polaris shop has a scrambler with that on it no 450 or 500 four is going to get near that remeber two stroke fires every revolution four stroke every other u do the math thats why they produce twice as much from factory that also why no one could touch the lt 500r back in its day go for the sport u cant ever go wrong