What year did Yamaha introduce its first snowmobile?
Hint: It was the same year Apollo first orbited the moon! Which was… 1968!
In July of 1968, Yamaha released its first snowmobile to the market, the SL350. However, the development of snowmobile technology began a few years earlier in 1965. Through those three years, Yamaha worked endlessly to get the final product perfect for market release.
The Prototype: YX15
Remember our blog that discussed the invention of the snowmobile? In that blog, we learn that Joseph-Armand Bombardier invented the first snowmobile in 1922. In the spring of 1965, when Yamaha began developing their snowmobile technology, they bought a snowmobile that was made by Bombardier as a sample. How cool is that?
In the summer of 1965, Yamaha completed their first prototype of the YX15. They focused most of their efforts on adopting the double tracks in order to improve stability. In early 1966, the development team traveled to Canada to test the snowmobile… but it ended up being a disaster where the snowmobile would just sink into the snow.
The Final Product – The First Yamaha Snowmobile
With failure after failure when testing the YX15, Yamaha had to continue to clear technological hurdles one by one. In doing so, the product progressively approached the level of quality to where they could release it to the public. And thus, the SL350 was released to the market in July 1968!
Once released to the market, customers in North America complained of some issues with the SL350, such as the inability to take a corner smoothly.
And therefore, the team reconvened and began to work on a solution to these issues. After less than a year of working on the development, in May of 1969, the team released three more models that were successfully launched into the snowmobile market. This time in history officially marks the beginning of Yamaha’s successful snowmobile line!
With persistence and determination, the Yamaha team worked endlessly to release great snowmobile models out into the market over the years. Let us know your favorite snowmobile model by leaving a comment below!
