A number of the most popular, most beloved 2-stroke engines in snowmobile history were actually grossly inefficient and EPA dirty.
They simply had to go in an effort by the OEMs to clean up their total corporate average emissions. I call these engines “rotten” because that’s what they’re doing – rotting – in older sleds while the pricey tooling used to cast their myriad pieces literally rots away.
PART 4: Yamaha’s SRX 700cc 2-stroke Triple
This nimble triple delivered top-end power that was nothing short of insanity when you pulled the trigger.
I think Yamaha got fed up with delivering less than industry-standard power output during the 90’s and someone on this side of the pond faxed Hamamatsu with instructions to build the baddest triple 2-stroke the sport had ever seen. This engine was a good answer to the industry question: “Do we really need a bigger engine than a 700?”
It used triple carbs, case reeds and triple pipes and introduced detonation-fighting knock sensor technology to the sport in the late 90’s that just dared the owner to lean the fuel mixture out.
Pretty clearly – in fact, undoubtedly – the SRX moniker experienced 100-percent redemption with the intro of this lake shredding, drag race dominating engine.
Committed Yama-fans still get tears in their eyes and bury their hands in their mitts when the topic of the 700 SRX triple comes up for discussion.
It was the last of a great run of high performance 2-strokes for Yamaha and we all know what happened to the 700 and every other 2-stroke in Yamaha’s repertoire soon after: The 4-stroke arrived in 2003 and the rest is history.
