My rubi does something simular but goes away after its warmed up. It sometimes looses the gera display like you said while accelerating. I slow down and wiggle the shifter until bdisplay returns. It always has.I think my problem is the gear position sensor located on the rear of the engine. it never does this when it's warm. let me know what you find.

 

My Rubi goes into the same limp mode to protect the transmission. Ususally happens when I am pulling someone out of a hole or have buried my machine with the agressive mud tires on.

I'm pretty disappointed in the lack of low-end power with the aftermarket tires. Probably my mistake for not matching the machine with my riding style.

 

Sorry to take so long to let everyone know what happened - anyway after many times of starting and reseting and driving and starting and reseting and driving and............ well you get the picture, the problem seemed to just go away. I have riden it several times since the problem occured and it worked fine. However just recently it has showen up again and seems to go away afer a few times of running trough the above procedure. After it is warm it does not seem to happen for some reason. I have since then heard from many people that this also happens to them. I now think that this is a problem with all or at least most Rubicons at one time or another and not just mine. Maybe Honda needs to start hearing from all of us to develope a fix as they have apparently sold a great many machines with a factory defect. (do I hear recall?) Well I have no technical help to offer however I can say that with a little patience you can get your machine going a gain if this happens to you. So until Honda wants to live up to this one that is all I know that can help. We might want to consider a petition to get this thing fixed. If any one agrees let me know or if you have heard how to fix it I am all ears. I would also like to get any tips on how to breath a little life into this 500cc engine that acts like a 200cc beginner machine. I have been loyal to Honda for a long time but for $7,200.00 I expect a little mor than this.

 

Muddud -

I'm also pretty disappointed with the performance of this big bore machine. I bought it because it was an automatic (selling point for my wife) and did not have a belt drive (selling point for myself as someone that likes riding in very wet conditions). But when I put after market mud tires on it, it performs very poorly as compared to my 600 Grizzly.

My friends live and die Honda and this is the second Honda I purchased. The first is still in the shop with a major engine repair and the Rubi is now in my garage with an idling problem to solve. I have to tell you, I'm losing the faith. That Kawasaki Prairie 650 V-Twin is looking pretty tempting right now.

Jeff