What brands of Chinese scooters are not junk? By oldschoot (Read 9,829 times)

[oldschoot]

Hello, I have been told by many that Chinese scooters are junk .....however I was in Florida recently and saw a great many Chinese scooters (not all of them were 50cc ...several were larger) These scooters had up to 11000 miles on them !! What gives - I thought Chinese scooters were supposed to fly apart before the reached that kind of mileage!!??

[LUKE]

Hold it right there!! before you do any scooter purchases, please watch this video first. i'd like you listen carefully and digest what the guy in the video is saying. i'm doing you a huge favor by watching this clip. good luck!! but still the choice is yours!!!
----->

and oh, chinese scooter speedometers are liars, they give out 3x the actual mileage and speed, few of the people on other forum who owns chinese scoot says they were stopped by cops many times because of speeding because their chinese speedos arent giving them the actual speed. my goodness!!



btw, my answer to your question is NONE!!

[mike6736]

Luke your so full of Donkey Dust... People here in Florida ride them Chino Scoots daily. I own one and have 2 Hondas. You know what else? Go look and talk to the service people and they always have time to work on them and you don't have to wait in line like the Yamaha owners have to wait for parts. Things have changed in the past 2 years.

Oldscoot... From what I see here in Florida and I talk to a lot of people the 150s are really big sellers and almost all I talked to just love them. Now if you can afford to I would go to a Honda or a Japan scoot but watch it some brands you have to wait for parts and the service for them is booked.

Good luck with your choice... I have a Chino trike and have had a blast with it..

Magoo

[kz1000st]

Oh Oldschoot, don't listen to Luke. He's just trying to defend buying way too little scooter for way too much and having a garage Queen. He's so proud of a scooter that he won't tour on, trailers all around the United States and, by his own admission, he has to perform major service on three or four times a year. (See his photo shoot of the variator service he does constantly).

Also this long haired "Expert". See Luke's video of a sub-standard service life from Burgman clutches. No troubles in 45,000 miles. Yeah, that he wants you to know about. It's amazing how wrong he is. The Bali in the video has a broken windshield, broken mirrors and a flat. Can you say, "Idiot Owner?" If you can find a dealer selling a Chinese scooter, who can service and repair it if necessary, BUY IT.

Don't listen to Luke. He needs somebody to abuse after discovering that his scooter was taken out of production after three years since nobody would buy it and Roketa MC-54 250Bs and Roketa MC-13 250s have been built for more years and larger numbers than his trailer puppy.

Puma, Gorilla and Roketa scooters are just fine. It's not the scooter that's generally to blame, it's the owner. Take care of it and it will take care of you. No matter what you buy.

[jct842]

AMEN

[LUKE]

i have finally convinced magoo that chinese scoots are junk, see? he bought a silver weng! attaboy magoo!! now, there's three more that i need to convince. Kz, dragon and jct. ... well , Kz is kinda hard headed, i think it will take yearssss before i can convince him to buy a well built japanese scoot or any NON-Chinese scooty. he is still under chinese medusa hypnotism. and too much in live with the chinese's. , no but if you are just going to strap out a milk box in the back of your scooter, well i guess chinese scooter is just enough for you.. lol
listen to me, save your money, dont rush, go to CRaigslist, look for yamaha C3., those are 50cc scoots, fuel injected, liquid cooled scoots, 110mpg. scoot till you drop! very reliable. people are selling C3 for 800-100 bucks used.
you dont want to ride shiny brand new colorful chinese scoot that after you buy and ride it today tomorrow youll be pushing it to the mechanic because it stalls in the middle of the highway. my goodness gracious!!! spare yourself from embarassment baby!!!

[kz1000st]

well , kz is kinda hard headed, i think it will take years before i can convince him to buy a well built japanese scoot or any NON-Chinese scooty. he is still under chinese medusa hypnotism. and too much in love with the chinese

Heard it all before Luke. Forty years ago I heard all the Triumph, BMW and Harley owners tell me Japanese motorcycles were trash as they spent hours doing "Preventive Maintenance". 30,000 miles on a KH-500 H-1 (Look it up) and 125,000 miles on a KZ1000ST.

You know what I learned? It wasn't the bike it was the owners. I rode conservatively, did my upkeep and got years of enjoyment. (I also never trailered any of them). My 50cc Cub clone (see fuzzy picture above) runs like a Swiss watch (built by Bashan) after 4 years and will smoke a stock C-3 in any contest you'd care to mention. Oh, right, the C-3 has gone the way of a Morphous. OK, a 50cc stock Zuma, then.

Here's what I always say about Japanese scoots. "They're great for the people who need Them" Even those people who won't ride around the block.

Take a look at all the spare parts Luke took for a scooter he was going to ride a few miles on after trailering it to a destination. All those extra parts for an expensive scooter to ride at a rally. Really, so confidence inspiring.

scooterdoc.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=talk&action=display&thread=8008&page=1

[kz1000st]

And here's a picture of the Cub clone (name is Rocket) when it was new.



Notice a difference four years later in the picture above? Me neither.

they give out 3x the actual mileage and speed, few of the people on other forum who owns chinese scoot says they were stopped by cops many times because of speeding because their chinese speedos arent giving them the actual speed. my goodness!!

Obviously Luke isn't associated with Math often,
If a speedometer reads three times as fast a rider would have to be doing an indicated 180 mph to be speeding in a 55 zone. My Chinese bikes read 10% too fast, radar tested, the same as my 2000 W650 Kawasaki and my wife's 2009 Honda Rebel and most bikes this side of a K1600 GTL. So if my Chinese speedo reads 100 mph,....well I'm going too darn fast.

[mike6736]

Looks like a good little run around to me... Luke I have always like Honda and Yamahas, till Yamaha came down with the we don't have the part and it will take awhile, ear that from a few riders. You better go look at some of these Chino scoots, they have come a long way in the past 2 years. I have seen a few of these I consider. Like I said your full of Donkey Dust to dump on people that come here about scooter for the first time

Magoo

[LUKE]

i always wants to play the devils advocate, somehow we need to give the newcomer a choice that hey, not all scooters are made from china, there are a lot to choose from, i am introducing him into a new horizon. a better horrizon.
i recently ordered three kinds of oil seal from yamaha and they all came after 6 days.... no biggie!!

[kz1000st]

I got in a lot of trouble taking this argument seriously once. I'll tell you the same thing I told Mr. Burgman years ago. I see you have to service your variator constantly, carry spares on your scoot and believe that Chinese scooters aren't up to snuff.

Saying
"i am introducing him into a new horizon. a better horrizon."

Only says "My scooter is the best, why settle for less?" like a Chinese scooter is less. Not so, and you know it.

i recently ordered three kinds of oil seal from yamaha and they all came after 6 days.... no biggie!!

Really-SIX days? I ordered my transmission shaft from PFS and it came 48 hours later. I just ordered some parts for the 150 from Scrappy on Friday night and they were in my mailbox Monday afternoon. Yamaha needs to work on that.

[kz1000st]

So sorry this discussion has gone awry Oldschoot. The answer to your question is that if you don't beat up a Chinese scooter, do the services when needed and buy it from a dealer who did a good job setting it up it will last a good long time. The Chinese scooters falling apart are the ones people buy in a crate, and who don't know a thing about prepping a scooter out of the box, are the ones falling apart. Those people need Yamahas (Except for John, JCT842) . There are a lot of people here, too, with big miles on China scoots.

[jct842]

Sorry to hear of the poor parts delivery for your morph luke.....6 days actually for a yamaha thats kind of quick though. to bad your dealer don't have a parts dept. I would be willing to bet most brick and mortar chinese dealers would have oil seals in stock and if they didn't it would be 3 days std shipping and next day if you spring for an additional shipping charge. If i order a yamaha oil filter from the auto parts in town it comes after 8am the next day, and comes with the two o-rings. If I order from the yamaha dealer at least 8 days and no o-rings. And to top it off the auto parts filter is a wix brand better made than oem yamaha.

how long do you think a car dealer would be in business with 6 day parts delivery?

[cookees]

In my humble opinion:
Top tier scooters would be the Japs....Honda, Yamaha, Suzuki.

Running a close second I'd put the Taiwanese scooters, Kymco and Sym ( There are a few others from Taiwan, but these two are most prevalent.)

In the next level down, from mainline China, comes Linhai and Znen. Znen-built scooters can be very good as long as the importer spec's Znen's higher quality components. However, Znen will build to any quality and price level you dictate.

Down in the basement I'd put Tao Tao, any of the Jonway family of companies, Dongfang, Peace, et al. An interesting side bit is Roketa. They will buy from virtually any factory and specialize in buying whole inventories. That being said, you can actually find some good deals from Roketa if you take the time to research the WMI and determine the actual factory that produced the scoot.

[oldschoot]

I asked this question - and seem to have kicked over a hornet's nest.
Seriously - HAVE Chinese scooters improved in recent times so they might legitimately be considered worthy purchases of first time scooters in the 150>250CC range?

Good Lord, I watched a nightmarish valve adjustment on something called a Jonway scooter. The prodecure is .....scary.
The poor mechanic had to take the whole scooter apart to get to do this simple prodecure. (Takes about 20 min on a Kymco)

Is it just a matter of keeping up on the maintenance, oils and adjustments? I have read so many places that it doesn't matter what you do to a Chinese made scooter - they are so poorly constructed that they are best considered a disposable toy.....which is why you can buy 'em for 1/4 to 1/3 the price of a real scooter.