Rtv 900xt speed loss

jw65turbodiesel

New member
I purchased an RTV 900xt s a week or so ago brand new with a big smile on my face as I pulled out of the dealership. After doing alot of reasearch online between the old 900 and the new 900xt I thought I had waited long enough and now was the time to buy. That being said I took it out for a ride for the first time with me, my wife and my 3 year old son in the front seat and nothing in the bed. The first hill I came to I was going 25 mph at the bottom, when we got to the top we was going 19-20 mph. Keep in mind it wasn't a very steep or long hill. I was wondering if this is normal for the 900xt or if I got a lemon. I called the dealer and they said that's the nature of the beast basically. I've got a friend who has an old 900 so I decided to compare mine to his. His left me sitting still. I told the dealer this and they said mine has a winshield and his doesn't and that will cause enough wind resistance to slow mine down. I decided to take it back to the dealer and have all pressures checked. They called me and said everything is at kubota specs. Don't want a belt driven machine, somebody tell me that not all of them are like this. Thanks for your input in advance.
 
The first hill I came to I was going 25 mph at the bottom, when we got to the top we was going 19-20 mph.

Welcome to the forum.
First, with all respect, if you wanted a speed machine, you bought the wrong Utility vehicle. RTV's are slow, but are some powerful machines.
Now, with that being said. Operating a Kubota RTV is different than any other vehicle you will climb into. Personally, I think you machine is fine.
Another thing, And many will tell you this. The more you run the RTV, the stronger it gets. You have to learn how to run the machine to get the full performance out of it.
The story you gave about it dropping back to 19-20 mph, seems about right.
Mine acts JUST LIKE YOUR DID FOR AWHILE. And as time went, it got better. I live by the Mississippi River, we have levee down here. And when I first purchased my RTV, it would act like it was weak at first. But then, after I learned to run the machine, and the machine loosened up, things pick up.
Most of the so called weakness was I had to " Learn " how to run this hydro tranny.....
Another note: After your fifty hours service, Go back with OEM Kubota filters, and go back with the KUBOTA Super UDT fluids. iT WILL MAKE A BIG DIFFERANCE....
With these utiltiy vehicles ( Kubota RTV's), you got to learn how to run the transmission in these. You don't just " push the pedel" , and expect it to blow your hat off, it don't work this way.
Many, including myself, felt the same way when we first run ours ....
Don't let it worry you, it will be fine !!!

What are your plans for use with this RTV ?

........ two guns
 

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Two guns, thanks for the reply. I wasn't looking for a speed demon just thought it should hold it's speed a little better on the hills. My dealer said the same thing that over time it would get stronger. That makes me feel a little better. I plan on purchasing a snow plow and push snow in the winter and use it around the farm in the summer. I bought it with the mind set that I don't have to be first just wanna be there. Thanks again.

I plan on adding a swag turbo kit to it, just didn't want to add that to a machine that could have something wrong with.
 
I plan on adding a swag turbo kit to it, just didn't want to add that to a machine that could have something wrong with.

65turbo,
You will, and your machine will be fine. Learn your machine. You will see.

Need anything else, just feel free to let us know. We will do all we can to help.

.......... two guns
 

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jw65turbodiesel,

Welcome to this great forum. I hope you find this forum to be as beneficial as I have. I too have an RTV 900 XT that I purchased in July 2011. I just love my machine for it's abilities mainly on my small cattle farm in Arkansas.

I agree with TwoGuns that all is well with your machine. Mine has about 130 hrs on it and does seem to get better with age.

You stated farm use which normally means dust. If not already acquired, please consider a hi-rise intake. There's a lot's a well founded posts on this forum concerning the need to raise the air intake. By all means, consider this to be your fist modification if not already performed. Also know that the spark arrestor screen will foul causing loss of power. Many haave removed the screen (arrestor). I've thus far just cleaned about three times.

Good Luck to you.
 
65turbo........In total agreement with the above and would like to add about on a hill to let off on the throttle a bit. This has been discussed quite a bit; but it bears repeating.

I have NO IDEA as to the whys but when going up a hill one will typically end up at full throttle to keep the speed up as it naturally drops. What this does is to "bog" the engine down it seems. When one backs off the throttle just a bit you can actually hear the engine begin to work harder and feel the speed increase a bit or at least stop slowing down. So, try just backing off the throttle a bit when going up a hill.....It does work..........God bless.....Dennis
 
Welcome to the forum and congrats on your RTV!

I'm late so I'm just piling on to what has been said already.

Dennis - There's an aux pump that gets engaged when you back off the pedal. I don't recall the details on its operation but think of your log splitter. When the splitter encounters a heavy load, it slows the ram but there's a huge power increase. Something about high-volume/low pressure vs. low-volume/high pressure?
 
jw65turbo,
All stated to back off pedal is perfectly correct. Myself, on the levees here,
and they are steep. Going up the levee, when I hear the engine "loading up", I back off the pedal to about 60% down, and you can feel the pump kick in and away you go.
Don't know if you will ever get the opportunity to see or do this. But down in these woods and swamps down here. Winter time, wet season, it gets down right nasty. Going threw these bad places, you will be dragging your axles, and times pulling a trailer with corn to put in deer feeders, it gets worst. When you feel the machine loading up and slowing down, we just get off the pedel a little and you will feel it "Kick-In" and rpms pick up and never stop pulling . These are some very powerful machines when you learn how to operate them ......
 

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This kinda goes in a couple different threads, so just thought I would stick it here. I did remove my spark arrester on my 500, but it didn't look anything like the one pictured in the other thread. It was just a little screen and it was pretty much clean @ 100+ hrs. Is alot of that just build up from the deisel engines on the 900/1100? I did notice alittle pick up in power after removing it. And have any 500 owners did the high rise air intake? On the 500 it is right under the bed in the rear instead of on the passanger side. Looks like alot more work to reroute it to get it up by the ROPs???
 
I did remove my spark arrester on my 500, but it didn't look anything like the one pictured in the other thread. It was just a little screen and it was pretty much clean @ 100+ hrs. Is alot of that just build up from the deisel engines on the 900/1100?
Yea, gassers don't clog up the screen nearly as quickly as the diesels.
 
I have a new 900XT after owning a 2005 900 since it was new. My experience with the new XT is that it pulls much better under load than the other older version - and the old ones will pull just fine, too. Mine will keep its speed up on a short steep incline on my county road whereas my old one would slow down. The XT has a redesigned sensor system for detecting loads. And, I don't have to back off the throttle to keep pulling like I used to do with the older version. One of our frequent contributors to this board, Bordercollie, reports the same performance with his new XT.

I'd run it a little longer, then do your scheduled 50 hour service and see if there is a difference. You'll get better performance if you ante up for the Kubota SUDT fluid instead of the regular UDT.

The RTVs are sensitive to the fuel/transmission linkage adjustments. They're intertwined and they're complicated. If they are out of wack your performance will suffer. After a couple of years, and help from a posting on this board, I found that my 2005 was not advancing the injection pump to full throttle. I gained a better throttle response, less bogging, and a mile or two faster speed after troubleshooting.

They do get better with time but at the same time they run a little slower before you change the filters/fluid. But, you should be easily out running your buddy with the older model on inclines.
 
Thanks everyone for the warm welcome and great advice. I must say whenever I am climbing a hill power is not the problem the motor is just back there singing away. Whenever I let off the throttle it just slows down. I too think that my buddys old 900 shouldn't be putting mine to shame but maybe when I get some hours on her it'll get better. Thanks again.
 
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