Redline sleds?

[Lowlife82]

My buddy just phoned and asked if i'd ever heard of these which i have not. Gave it a google and looks strange. Anybody ever had or seen one?

 

[tex78]

Just on one skidoo mag I seen a test ride of one. They didn't think much of it.

from my HTC

 

[Modman]

My buddy just phoned and asked if i'd ever heard of these which i have not. Gave it a google and looks strange. Anybody ever had or seen one?

They are defunct now, but some of the innovations that are on the new sleds came from the Redlines. They hard mounted the motor and clutches, much like Cats current design. Redline had a radical sled, had it taken off it would have been the predecessor to the Rider Forward movement IMO. They used a "custom built" 800 motor originally, mounted backwards, in a custom chassis. However, the "Custom" motor bore a striking resemblance to the belt driven water pump motors that Polaris produced in the day...... LOL.... The suspension was insane. Most of the issues with the sleds ability were around the suspension set up on the prototypes that were ridden, but had they been given more development they probably would have been refined much further.

They were marketed as a "lambo" of sleds of sorts, light and fast, the price at the time was just too much for how the sled performed I think. Again, more development and I think they would have had something.

Search the Fast Blade as well, it was another sled like the Redline.

 

[Free Rider]

I think I read somewhere that the redline sleds had a small de-tuned helicopter engine in them. Not sure if that's was true or not though.

 

[thekrust]

That helicopter engine was a 1300cc triple that made over 200hp. It was for their "top of the heap" model. Looked pretty cool back in the day. It could have been interesting if it had come to fruition.

 

[Steve D]

Redline spent 5 years showing pictures of prototypes and in-development machines. Finally, they started producing sleds, built like 50? a hundred? and went bankrupt.

The early prototypes they showed off had a fourstroke 100hp 950cc Vtwin aircooled motor in a tube frame chassis that boasted 15" of suspension travel and it was gonna weigh something like 350 lbs too! They *looked* pretty cool, but then between the coming market crash and the factories coming up with their own improved designs, by the time they were ridden by anyone, they were old-school sit down, with an 800 twin that wasn't putting out near the horsepower that the big 4 were doing by that time. They were ahead of their time when first shown to the world, but couldn't make it to market fast enough.

The amazing thing though, was during their hype period, they threatened to jump into snow cross. With this huge suspension, and (most importantly) a light weight machine, I recall reading that the manufacturers actually responded by pushing WSA to increase the minimum sled weight in the name of "safety". Whether there is truth to that or not, I don't know, but Redline made a lot of noise. It's almost a shame they went out with such a whimper.

 

[sledneck_03]

heres everything you want to know about them. Yahmaha bought their front suspension design, if you look close its very close looking to the rx1s front suspension

 

[mxz sledhead]

I see them at Edmonton sled show a few years back I wish I had a chance to try one they were cool well though out sled

 

[meatbag]

Ya, they were interesting all right. I liked how they drove the primary clutch. Blade mad a V-twin four stroke, looked all chromy and big cruiser like. S&S? Air cooled heads sticking out the top of the hood. They called it the Patriot or the Rebel or something. I have the info in my vast deep library vault somewhere's....