Drive by wire (DBW) technology is spreading in the Ski-Doo camp (and at Yamaha) this year with the addition of an Intelligent Throttle Control (ITC) system on the popular and updated 4-TEC 1170 engine and drive-by-wire on Vector and Venture 1049cc triples from Yamaha.
The ITC system on Ski-Doo’s 1170cc 4-TEC was admittedly (by Ski-Doo) put into play to counter what we’ve been griping about for over five years – throttle lag. Does ITC system have any effect on what we now refer to as “Delayed Throttle Pick Up” or DTPU? In a word, yes.
However we rarely use just one-word answers around here, so here goes. I would personally suggest the use of ITC on the 1170 has reduced DTPU by 60-percent in my estimation.
Is this improvement noticeable? Yes. However the situation still lingers and the 1170 suffers by comparison to the Yamaha. Here’s why: Interestingly, in the same year Ski-Doo decides to address DTPU with ITC, Yamaha comes to the market with its own version of drive-by-wire throttle control.
Before we go any further, let’s say this: The biggest compliment any DBW system could receive from a user would be “This has drive-by-wire? I couldn’t tell”. This is precisely what we experienced with the 1049 Yamahas equipped with YCCT (Yamaha Chip Controlled Throttle).
If Yamaha hadn’t introduced YCCT we might have been more pumped about ITC on the 4-TEC. However, Yamaha has clearly aced this technology and is the benchmark for DBW in the immediate future.
By the way, ITC on the 4-TEC includes three throttle modes. Our feeling is this: Does anyone buying a 130-hp performance snowmobile really care about ECO Mode?
