I have a 2011 Bear Cat XT 570 I bought new. It has 2,800 miles. My buddy owns a 2013 Bear Cat XT Z1 4 stroke with less then 1,000 miles on it. I own a 8X 16 ice fishing shack that I move at times with my Bear Cat. I have had great luck with the 570 but I really need a low gear or more power to tow the shack. I tend to burn more belts then I would like and at $150 it gets costly.
My buddy is only 130 lbs. He says his sled is just to big for what he needs. He doesn't tow much of anything. He told me if I wanted to sell my sled and buy him a smaller trappers sled he would trade even. I took his sled for a ride yesterday and at 135 hp I was really surprised at the difference between the two.
Any of you have any experience towing big loads with the Bear Cat Z1? I looked at a 2022 Expidition SWT 900 turbo (the only in stock sled I found in Eastern Maine) but at $17,000 I dont see me getting that much use out of it.
Mostly concerned about the dependability of the 1100 cc 4 stroke engines.

I have a 2012 Z1 XT. No issues with the motor at all, but I put the workhorse gears in it to lower the gears. I was burning belts all the time until I did that, since then I am getting around 1500 miles on a belt (running Dayco belts). You would probably not be as bad to burn belts just taking off and pulling a shack across the lake, but I would still highly recommend the workhorse gears. I do a lot of low speed driving and stop and start, which is hard on belts.

So they also make those gears for the 570?

I have a 2012 Bearcat 570 I bought new that now has 7200 miles. I put 3 belts on it the whole time and I only replaced them for piece of mind, never burned one up. I am not nice to my sled. Run it as hard as it will take every week on trapline, hauling firewood and material to the cabin. When I bought the machine the dealer/friend insisted I put a different helix on it right away with all of my stop and go driving so I did. I’m still on both original clutches and hope I have this machine forever. Love it.

Not that it matters but whats the top speed with that set up? And do you know who made that Helix?

Top speed is 52 MPH. I ordered and had it installed by the dealer when I bought the machine. I want to say it was 30 something deg helix.

Not sure, you can google workhorse gears for Bearcat and see. I know they make them for the 1100 and 660 4 strokes, they probably make them for the 570 also. Cost around $400 if I remember correctly. Not a big deal to put in at all, it took me about an hour.

2014 bearcat xt. I’ll tell you one thing....they don’t float

Keep on ticking..

Heck Steve, all those pics still have the track down! In all seriousness, I used to go 'track up' quite often when running the little Skidoo Tundras, sometimes multiple times a day. I find when running the Bearcat I do that very little, usually only a couple times a winter. They are WAY more stable. Of course when you put a Tundra on its top you pick yourself up and grab it by the handlebars and roll it back over, fire it up and you're on your way. When you put one of these big four stroke wide tracks on its top it is a major recovery effort to get the track back down where it belongs. So you tend to be a bit more careful.

Got pretty lucky having that big spruce tree up on the bank behind the sled. Never go without a rope along.

What do you find the differences are between the 570 and the four stroke?

I have owned both and weight. The older 4 strokes were tippy. They fixed that though my 2015, 570 ski stance can be changed from narrow to wide. If your riding where ski stance doesn’t matter the wide stance makes it for a good ride!

^THIS

And fuel mileage, the fourstrokes get much better fuel mileage. I have always ran mine with the ski stance set narrow, because that is WAY wider than the Skidoos I used to run and way more stable, and with it narrow I still have problems fitting some places. Ran a 570 with the skis set wide though while working for an outfitter, about convinced me to switch mine, super stable ride and didn't seem to have many issues fitting places, but that is probably due to it not being the wide track and turning much better than mine.