Kahunas
Member
This belongs here also. It is an email I got from Tim regarding my tar sled and the Terminator Exciters.
Hey Guys, Tim Bender here. First of all Thank you to all of you for your interest in some of my projects from the past and sleds over the years. I have been super fortunate to have been able to make a living in a sport I Love and also its really cool that you guys and a lot of others have collected and restored some of my old sleds. I have been trying to find a free day in my travels to stop by Jon Bertilino's near Chicago and see some of my old stuff. I have seen many pics of my old race sleds and they look to be in amazinly good shape. Obviously the guys that had them after me treated them better than I did, LOL. Also Jon did a great job with the Yamaha racing history book.
Anyway the Terminator, here is the answers to the questions, I think it was the summer of 1988 we built a limited ( 20 or so) build of special trail exciters that had hand built Bender Racing pipes, widened front end, Oil/lube tank in stock location, ported cyls, i think 44mm carbs, stock skis, special paint and graphics, airbox I believe was just gutted, fresh air inlet vent area below the head light, no pipe temp and no water temp pods, I believe some had Fox shocks in the rear skid and they did have a warning sticker on dash. As far as clutch and carb set ups go, I do not have any of that info any more.
We also built a total of three I think (88,89,90 i believe) Exciters for me to race in Formula III also called Terminators. I think that those are all still are around, I think Bob Weaver in NY has one and I think there is one is in the Hall Of Fame Museum (that may be Jons), and I have the last one in my attic that was the first (that I know of) race sled with a reverse engine, carbs in the front, straight pipes out thru the seat that I was leading the FIII final with in Valcourt and crashed, hit a frozen hay bayle and broke my femur.
Anyway I hope that helps out with the Terminators.
I did not know there was a forum around just for Vmax4 stuff, that's great. My most favorite race sled of all time was the 92 Vmax4, (now owned by Jon) looked cool as hell, 187HP, 475# (they said 468# when they disqualified me for being under weight at ashland wi in 92 after smoking the field, Their scale was wrong!!) and FAST as sh_t, WOW, what a ride!!! SO fast that in one year on the race track it made the competition lobby to change the rules in FIII down to 600cc. Lucky for them cause we were just getting rolling as the 93 800 would have made well over 200 HP and I probably wouldn't be typing this.
Anyway, for those interested in what Im doing now, after a brief Nascar Career I am back doing what I love, snowmobiles. I am the Team Manager for the National Guard Polaris Hentges Snocross Race Team and the technical coordinator (build and tune all the Mod sleds) for the Hentges, Judnick and LaVallee Snocross Race Teams. I work out of the Polaris Industries Race Dept in WI and am responsible for a lot of what you see on the Polaris IQ Race sled. When you see TJ Gulla, Brett Bender, Levi LaVallee (1st, 2nd, 3rd in 09 Pro Open points) and Ross Martin on the track, they are all on my stuff.
Attached is a pic of Brett (my son) clowning around in practice here in northern MN. We are headed to Duluth MN for the ISOC season opener in the morning. All of the ISOC races are on the Versus TV network this year and the X Games will be on ESPN.
So again, Thanks for the interest,
Tim Bender
Hey Guys, Tim Bender here. First of all Thank you to all of you for your interest in some of my projects from the past and sleds over the years. I have been super fortunate to have been able to make a living in a sport I Love and also its really cool that you guys and a lot of others have collected and restored some of my old sleds. I have been trying to find a free day in my travels to stop by Jon Bertilino's near Chicago and see some of my old stuff. I have seen many pics of my old race sleds and they look to be in amazinly good shape. Obviously the guys that had them after me treated them better than I did, LOL. Also Jon did a great job with the Yamaha racing history book.
Anyway the Terminator, here is the answers to the questions, I think it was the summer of 1988 we built a limited ( 20 or so) build of special trail exciters that had hand built Bender Racing pipes, widened front end, Oil/lube tank in stock location, ported cyls, i think 44mm carbs, stock skis, special paint and graphics, airbox I believe was just gutted, fresh air inlet vent area below the head light, no pipe temp and no water temp pods, I believe some had Fox shocks in the rear skid and they did have a warning sticker on dash. As far as clutch and carb set ups go, I do not have any of that info any more.
We also built a total of three I think (88,89,90 i believe) Exciters for me to race in Formula III also called Terminators. I think that those are all still are around, I think Bob Weaver in NY has one and I think there is one is in the Hall Of Fame Museum (that may be Jons), and I have the last one in my attic that was the first (that I know of) race sled with a reverse engine, carbs in the front, straight pipes out thru the seat that I was leading the FIII final with in Valcourt and crashed, hit a frozen hay bayle and broke my femur.
Anyway I hope that helps out with the Terminators.
I did not know there was a forum around just for Vmax4 stuff, that's great. My most favorite race sled of all time was the 92 Vmax4, (now owned by Jon) looked cool as hell, 187HP, 475# (they said 468# when they disqualified me for being under weight at ashland wi in 92 after smoking the field, Their scale was wrong!!) and FAST as sh_t, WOW, what a ride!!! SO fast that in one year on the race track it made the competition lobby to change the rules in FIII down to 600cc. Lucky for them cause we were just getting rolling as the 93 800 would have made well over 200 HP and I probably wouldn't be typing this.
Anyway, for those interested in what Im doing now, after a brief Nascar Career I am back doing what I love, snowmobiles. I am the Team Manager for the National Guard Polaris Hentges Snocross Race Team and the technical coordinator (build and tune all the Mod sleds) for the Hentges, Judnick and LaVallee Snocross Race Teams. I work out of the Polaris Industries Race Dept in WI and am responsible for a lot of what you see on the Polaris IQ Race sled. When you see TJ Gulla, Brett Bender, Levi LaVallee (1st, 2nd, 3rd in 09 Pro Open points) and Ross Martin on the track, they are all on my stuff.
Attached is a pic of Brett (my son) clowning around in practice here in northern MN. We are headed to Duluth MN for the ISOC season opener in the morning. All of the ISOC races are on the Versus TV network this year and the X Games will be on ESPN.
So again, Thanks for the interest,
Tim Bender
