Timbersled Suspension Review
This winter Timbersled sent me one of their Mtn. Tamer rear suspensions to put it to the test. The Mtn. Tamer suspension is already well known in hillclimb circles as the best suspension setup for climbing the steepest, most technical chutes. However, this rear suspension also offers significant performance gains in deep powder and handles drops and jumps flawlessly when tuned right. Timbersled’s suspension has also proven to be incredibly durable over the course of this season.
I ran the Timbersled suspension on a 2009 Arctic Cat M8 this year, with only limited modifications (single pipe, clutch, VOHK tuning). Two of the first features that you will notice on the Mtn. Tamer suspension are the weight savings and the adjustability. The suspension saves 15 pounds on 08 and newer Arctic Cat Ms (20 pounds on the older models), and as much as 38 pounds on other models. The weight saving were immediately clear when I pulled the stock suspension out and compared the two. There was a huge difference when holding the two suspensions side-by-side. The Mtn. Tamer also allows you to adjust the rear ride height and the weight transfer, one of the features that have made it very popular with hillclimbers.
The installation is very easy. Timbersled recommends not running any bogey wheels with this setup. Make sure that you are running ice scratchers, or you will lose hyfax in a hurry… It took about an hour from start to finish to assemble and install the Mtn. Tamer, and we weren’t working at a fast pace.
A few days after I installed the Mtn. Tamer the Utah mountains received 3-4ft. of new snow. I decided to ride a local area that is known for its deep snow and technical terrain. Getting into this area involves breaking the trail up a steep ridge. This section can be very difficult in deep snow and often takes dozens of attempts to get the trail in without turbos. One of the first handling characteristics I noticed on the Timbersled suspension was the increased flotation. I was shocked when I hit the first section in waist deep powder and just flew over the top without even trenching. I almost made it all the way to the top of the ridge on the first run, until I found a 5ft. drift near the end. However, on the next run I busted through. Needless to say, my riding buddies were somewhat surprised when I came back down and packed a nice trail for them. “Did you put a turbo on that thing???†The Mtn. Tamer also makes the downhill powder handling of the M8 cleaner. Stock, the sled has a tendency to float the nose too high going downhill, so it is harder to carve or make quick sidehills when going down (don’t get me wrong, the M8 is still phenomenal in the powder). The Timbersled keeps the back end higher and as a result, the sled carves better downhill.
I must admit that I was initially skeptical about the durability of the Mtn. Tamer suspension. The components are much smaller than the stock suspension and there is much less to the Timbersled suspension (hence the 20 pound weight savings). When I pulled my stock suspension out, it was fairly beat up, as usual. The arms were not straight and several of the welds appeared ready to fail. After three months of riding like crazy, the Mtn. Tamer still looks almost like new.
The Mountain Tamer suspension has also exceeded my expectation on drops and jumps. It is crucial to have the suspension tuned right though. If you have too much pressure in the shocks, it seems to have a tendency to bounce the rear end up, but you also don’t want to bottom out with low pressure. Once I got the pressure dialed in, the suspension was silky smooth on drops and big jumps. One of the real strengths for dropping is that it doesn’t have a tendency to bounce the back end as high as the stock suspension does on big drops, this makes it much easier to stay in control on technical runouts.
If there is one weakness of the Timbersled suspension, I would have to say it is in the whoops. Even here though, the Mtn. Tamer was still better than the stock suspension, which is notoriously bad on the trail. If you are buying this suspension then you are buying it for the mountains, so trail riding shouldn’t be a concern. Matt Entz is also running the Mtn. Tamer suspension and has had similar results. He has not had any durability issues either.
I ran the Timbersled Suspension with a set of Ice Age rails, which have also proven to be incredibly durable.
If you are thinking of making any upgrades over the summer, I think you will find that the Timbersled Mtn. Tamer suspension offers more bang for the buck than motor upgrades without sacrificing reliability.
