Modern Vespa

I think this is pretty informative and worth seeing.

I can only listen to a dude say "EYE-talian" so many times. I reached my limit in the first 30 seconds.

Low wattage intellect.

Old enough to remember when made in Japan was a joke due to inferior quality, then shortly after made in Taiwan was the purveyor of throw away.

When the Honda CVCC hatchback came to the US my buddies older brother was the first to have one in the neighborhood, a lot of people scoffed at him but he was so impressed with the company he immediately set off to become a Honda mechanic.

I won't buy any completely made in China cars or motorcycles anytime soon but Chinese products has a place in my home and garage, just not the whole of my home and garage.

nope

Right? And I like the guy. I'm subscribed to his channel.
I would really like him to point out where Eye-taly is on the map so I can learn about this country he keeps referencing...

Couldn't finish the video either.

My 2010 Piaggio Fly 150 was made in China. The plastics were well made and sturdy, the wiring was of good quality and gauge. The only issues I had with that bike were a bad stator (it got dirt in it) and the speedo cable went out at 20K miles. It was running great when I sold it last year at 22k miles.

If you specify good standards and enforce quality control at a high level, good stuff can come from China. It's just that most stuff is made in China in an effort to reduce manufacturing costs - that includes labor, materials and quality control.

Do your homework before buying something from China that could seriously injure or kill you.

People always draw parallels to "Made In Japan used to be a joke!"... but it's worth pointing out that this was the case for Japan only for a short period of time, relative to how long we've been waiting for China to get it together.

Japanese industrialists and innovators had mission statements not to make profits, but to learn to make things better than anyone else ever had before. The goal wasn't to make the most money, it was to make the best possible vehicle. That was the corporate culture in their automotive world. They accomplished their mission in a relatively short period of time.

Here we are in 2023, half a century later, and we're still not talking about automotive innovations from China, still not talking about how they've turned the industry on their heads, still not talking about how how they exceed all of the competition. Because 50 years later they still aren't there in the auto/powersports world (although I will say Chinese consumer drones are second to none).

Comparing Japan and what they were able to do (in automotive), in such a relatively short period of time, with China and what they seem to refuse to do 50 years later, isn't just silly, it's insulting to some amazing Japanese minds. And as vehicle enthusiasts of any kind, we owe a lot to those Japanese pioneers and innovators, what they did was incomparable. Let's not take who we compare them with lightly.

Well said.

I upgrade camera gear almost every year. I rely on this stuff for a chunk of my income. Even though I'm a GoPro (american company) fanboy who's owned six consecutive generations of their cameras, I will routinely take drones, 360 cameras, and video editing software from three Chinese companies instead of using GoPro or other North American options... When they want to innovate, these Chinese companies apply themselves and go for it.

But it seems like the Chinese auto/powersports industry mindset is totally different, and is still "Make it good enough for as cheap as possible."

Can I just spend more money and get you to make something not shit? Your video guys do it, why can't you? Why do you want me to suffer? lol

But it seems like the Chinese auto/powersports industry mindset is totally different, and is still "Make it good enough for as cheap as possible."

That may be so if someone buys a Chinese bike or scooter online. Importers here have been famous for "Quick and Dirty tactics."

Moto Morini is now a dealer only product with Znen in charge of quality. SSR distributes Benelli and QJ Motors, dealer only, with quality being handled by Qianjiang, a subsidiary of Geely. CF Moto is selling dealer only with quality being handled at the factory using KTM engines built in house in some occasions.

You buy from Powersportsmax, Superiorpowersports, Red Fox Powersports or a host of other online merchants it's "Buyer Beware". You buy a Chinese ride from a dealer it's backed and has a warranty.

Not even remotely like what people think of when they hear that a scooter comes with a warranty. The small companies that distribute containers of scooters, no matter who makes them, typically don't have the parts stock in the US, have ways of compensating dealers that is not standard in the industry and often seems designed to discourage warranty claims, and in general do not offer a warranty experience that is equal to what you get if you purchase a scooter from the company that is the manufacturer and distributor in the US of that product.

Here's a typical CFMoto response to a warranty claim after one week's ownership:

"After a thorough review of the dealer's notes from the warranty claim and the pictures of the vehicle, CFMOTO stands by the denial of this claim. The pictures show clear evidence that the unit was operated under extreme heat well beyond that of normal use. While there are a few ways that can happen, all result from improper operation of the vehicle.

The owner's manual dictates a "break in period" which allows the belt and clutch to properly break in. The break in consists of limiting acceleration and speed to avoid damaging the new unit. Break in periods are standard with powersports manufacturers. With only 25 miles on this unit, the photo evidence points to operation well outside the break in period guidelines which would generate the damages noted by the dealer.

By failing to follow the break in period, the customer caused the damages on the vehicle. Only damages caused by manufacturer's defects are covered by warranty. CFMOTO will not be replacing or refunding this unit.

The dealership is fully prepared to repair the vehicle at the customer's direction.

From the owner's manual (Customer should review full Break-In Period Section in the Owner's Manual):

7. Apply throttle. Drive slowly at first, varying throttle positions not more than throttle for 10 hours or 100
miles, then another 10 hours or 100 miles of not more than throttle (whichever interval arrives first). Do
not operate at sustained idle or sustained wide open throttle.
8. Do not pull or carry any heavy loads during the break-in period

During the break-in period:
Do not operate at sustained full throttle. Damage to engine parts or decrease engine life may result if
excessive wide open throttle is used during the first 20 hours of use.
Do not run engine with throttle over 1/2 open during the first 10 hours (or 100 miles/160km) of use.
Do not run engine with throttle over 3/4 open during the first 10 to 20 hours (or the second 100
miles/160km) of use.
Do not haul or tow heavy cargo."

It lasted 25 miles, and CFMoto says it's because the customer didn't break it in correctly. What a load... I want to see the pictures that show clear evidence that the unit was operated under extreme heat well beyond that of normal use. Did they drive it through a fire? And again the whole scam about submitting photos with every warranty claim is something no reputable manufacturer pulls.
CFMoto also denies ATV warranty claims for off-roading. They sell an All Terrain Vehicle, that is not street legal, and deny warranties because the vehicle was used off road.

But this is my favorite so far:
"We purchased a brand new CF Moto 950 Sport. While driving it the throttle pedal stuck while in a tight corner... causing the UTV to tip. We then received 2 recall notices a couple weeks later one of which was the gas pedal sticking. We took the vehicle to the closest authorized dealer which said 3 days for recalls. Over a month later we finally was advised it was complete after multiple calls to them. They also completed the first service since we was close to 20 hours. We paid and took it home. ... the EFI fault light now came on and it says it is traveling at 186 mph while sitting still, causing the miles to go up as well."

Wow... MotoVista, I don't know if I should shake my head and feel bad for those buyers, or just laugh at how absurd the situation is...

All I can say is... In the past 15 years, no dealer in Toronto, that has signed on to be a dealer of a chinese brand, has still been a dealer of that brand three years later.

Sometimes it's been because the dealers have walked (or ran) away from those brands. Sometimes it's been because the wholesalers/importers realize they've made a mistake, and another fly by night business folds up and vanishes.

We've seen that happen with other brands here too, like Royal Enfield, or heck, even Vespa. But at least with Vespa those dealers were dealers for many years before, and continue to be dealers many years after the change in distributorship... Back on topic now...

We were a Keeway dealer for a while. And to be honest, it was a fairly decent Chinese two stroke scooter, with a one year warranty. They hired a bunch of old Yamaha corporate types to run distribution, and all the warranty, pdi and css forms had a surprising familiarity to them, almost like they sent them to the printer and said, "everywhere it says Yamaha, change it to Keeway."
There were other issues with how they did business though.
For some reason, Keeway hired a company that moves pianos in Kentucky to warehouse and deliver their scooters throughout the US. So they landed them in Long Beach, then trucked them to Kentucky, then the piano guys would eventually get them to you, if the piano delivery business was slow that week.
And then they got caught by the EPA, along with all the other Chinese two stroke companies, using the same paperwork and test results for their emissions paperwork submissions. Again, it was a case of, "copy this, but put our name on it instead."
So they went to a four stroke, and had new models about a year and a half later. But nobody told them that valve springs had to be stiff. So there were warranty issues immediately. And all the Yamaha people bailed. So the company pulled up stakes in the US. Out of five different Chinese companies that only sold through dealers that we started with, five of them were gone in less than three years.

If huffy made an airplane would you fly in it ?

I used to wear this tee-shirt when I worked on the salesfloor at a Big 4 dealership. Wasn't popular at Quaker Steak and Lube bike nights or AD Farrow. Not sure why.

nope

It was funny when $800 Chinese scooters launched the engine so the carburetor was halfway up into the pet carrier after they hit a bump (yes, that happens). But this stuff is 5-20K now, and the companies treat the owners just like they did over that same $800 scooter.

IMO the Japanese have the best, most straightforward engineering for autos, trucks and motorcycles, above USA, UK, Everyone, even Germany who over engineer, over bedazzle and don't consider ease of maintenance and repairability.

Based on what? One CF Moto? I'll counter that. My latest crate scooter came with a small tear in the seat from abusive shipping. I took a picture, sent it to Dong Fang and they sent me a new one.

Basing comparisons with the Japanese is spurious. There was always American Honda, Suzuki, Yamaha, Kawasaki here. Someone want to show me where the American Znen HQ was even five years ago. American importers ordered cheap and crappy to boost profits online so we got cheap and crappy here. Now you can buy Chinese bikes from dealers instead of from a crate. Dealers losing money from warranty repairs bitch to the factory. Even Diana Hammer from Wolf climbs all over Znen's butt and flies to China to do it.

I rode a CF Moto at Americade and pinged the metal all over them and QJ Motos stuff. A CF Moto Adventura is high on my list of next purchases.

So the quality of the seat cover couldn't survive shipping... Bravo

Countries whose products I'd class below China include, but are not limited to, Russia, India, Mexico, Brazil, Turkey.
Even US has number of products that are lower quality than China.
I'd rather buy a Chinese made motorcycle than a US made one. Same with cars, smartphones, cameras.

Yeah. It couldn't stand up to a forklift hitting the cardboard box and seat. The shipping company, independent of the manufacturer was to blame. Not only that it got a few scratches which I laughed off.

After all, what kind of a biker sweats a few scratches?

In his defense, it's possible that from an EYEdaho standpoint everything just gets pronounced that way.

Didn't see that coming. I figured you get them free after a certain number of posts lauding the quality of Chinese scooters.
And I didn't post the only review I could find about CFMoto being junk, only the one where the ATV was sitting still as the speedometer rose to 186 mph and voided the warranty. There are lots more, but they do tend to run together after a while.
It would certainly be interesting to see the receipts from your actual purchases from US distributors, who have no connection to the motherland, of the expertly crafted and finely assembled Chinese scooters you have gotten world record reliability out of.
I hate to cast aspersion on your latest CCP talking point, but Chinese manufacturers that only sell via dealers have been around for at least 20 years in the US. So stating this is new as a way to get more suckers to buy cheap, poorly constructed scooters and motorcycles probably isn't going to gain a lot of market share.
I hate to be Captain Obvious, but people join and participate in forums for various reasons. What possible reason could someone have for only posting positive information and disinformation about Chinese brand scooters and motorcycles on a forum that is not in any way about Chinese brand scooters and motorcycles? What possible motives might that individual have?

Says the man who pays his mortgage selling Italian scooter parts.

First. Who are the companies selling Dealer only Chinese Motorcycles or Scooters, not ATV's or golf carts, for 20 years? Flyscooters...Nope....Puma.....Nope? Ok, Lance.

Second. Again!!!!! I don't work for anyone in China. I ride Chinese scooters because for what a scooter can do I'm not paying what the person did in the following story.

When I was at Americade the SSR rep told me a young man pulled up to their booth at Daytona on a new 150 Vespa and asked to ride the QJ Motors LTR 150 water cooled and fuel injected scooter. He buzzed around for while and came back. "Not Bad", he said, "how much?" The rep said, "MSRP is $2795." the Vespa dudes jaw hit the floor and he exclaimed, "$2795!!! I'm in to the Vespa for close to seven grand!!"

You see, in Florida they get what they get on top of freight, prep, tax, title, tag and whatever else. Maybe you can take $7k out of petty cash for a 60 mph scooter but not me. My Dong Fang 168cc cost me $1700 shipped, assembled, taxed, titled and tagged. And what you may not know is the 168cc scoots are not bored out QMJ engines but are K block motors with beefier bits and bigger bearings.

Why? Because they are also used in ATV's by ten year olds who beat the living crap out of them which means mine has a good long life ahead of it at my usage.

I don't make stuff up and it's not disinformation. I read, I get around and I have been in my lifetime a member of both Scootdawgs, The Scooter Professor, Scooterdoc, Scooterrebels, Scooterclones, It Is The Ride and GY6-Scooters on Facebook. This myth that GY6 engines are crap is just a stereotype. In the last 15 years since I came into possession of a scooter I have seen maybe five stories about blown engines. If head gasket stories count then ten. Like a certain Italian brand most failures are in the support components.

Most of the problem with Chinese scooters and motorcycles are the dolts who buy them. If you'd like I can start posting all the YouTube videos to support my claims but it will be very, very long.

So yeah, Bret Tkacs does apparently say "Eye-talian", but he's really a smart guy and if you only watched the first 30 seconds of the video and had never seen him before you might not realize that the way he was talking at first was "in character", doing the voice of the Common Know-it-All.

His riding videos are very informative and an additional talent he has that you can look out for when watching him is that he can ride up, take his helmet off, and then put his hat on so quickly that it almost looks like he had the hat on under the helmet

IMO Bret is one of the best, if not the best Youtube moto instructors guys out there and without being a know it all a$$

I'd rate FortNine pretty high up there too

I'll give him another chance then. Maybe with closed captioning.

The Eyedaho joke was still pretty good though.

Also, a bike having an atv-based motor doesn't sound like a selling feature to me. It sounds likes a warning that this will be a slow, boring, agricultural experience. If that was my end goal I would just get a KLR and be celibate.

Why do the British drink warm beer? Really....Big difference between Cask conditioned beers/real ales and Ice cold Lager beers and never heard of a Lucas fridge in the UK ever, only car parts.😉👍

nope

Here's a fun fact that has nothing to do with what we are discussing. Starting in 1923 or thereabouts, V.I. Lenin recruited a special corps of propagandists to spread communist ideology in The West.

Lenin feared that unless other countries went communist, his own revolution would be doomed to collapse under economic failure.

This drove him to try something new at the time: in addition to paid propagandists, Lenin would feed a special group of unpaid "useful idiots" disinformation and propaganda to spread throughout the West. (The term "useful idiot" is actually not Lenin's, and is often credited to Ludwig von Mises.)

But I digress.
Whenever the overwhelmingly dismal quality of Chinese scooters is brought up, there are people who try to equate the ownership experience of the first Japanese motorcycles to hit the US Market to the ones that are now being sent over by China.

So, let's take a little test.

The first Honda motorcycles were sold in the US in 1959. Ten years later, in 1969, Honda motorcycles developed a reputation for being:
a. cheap and unreliable.
b. inexpensive and more reliable than other motorcycles available in the US at the time.

Chinese scooters and motorcycles have been sold in the US for more than 20 years. In more than two decades, Chinese scooters have gotten a well deserved reputation for being:
a. cheap and unreliable.
b. inexpensive and more reliable than other motorcycles available in the US at the time.

Now, this question elicits opinion, and is entirely subjective. Would you feel more comfortable trying to cross the US on:

a. 1974 Honda CB350 that runs well?
b. something called a Dong Fang that was dropped off in a crate in front of your house?

trick question! the CB350 was only produced until 1973...

but I'd still take an imaginary Honda over some hong-kong phooey bike that I don't know where I'm gonna get parts for.


however, the CB350F was produced in 1974 which even with 300% more the carburetors I would still take over a chinese bike

But isn't that there bike then model year 1974?

Fact: A 650 Burgman does 0-60 in 8 1/4 seconds. A Kawasaki 650 Versys does in in 4. Agricultural is in the eyes of the beholder.

The first Honda motorcycles were sold in the US in 1959. Ten years later, in 1969, Honda motorcycles developed a reputation for being:
a. cheap and unreliable.
b. inexpensive and more reliable than other motorcycles available in the US at the time.

Unreliable for the new breed of "Nicest People". The old timers who converted from leaky British Twins got reliable, high mileage out of them. Like those people running around the countryside on Chinese bikes and scooters.

In this age of "It's not my fault" don't blame the cow for soggy corn flakes.

Dates are kind of irrelevant. Time isn't.

Chinese two wheelers have been sold in North America since at least the 90s. Sub-par then, sub-par now.

In thirty years, the Japanese caught up, innovated, and took over the entire industry.

There is no comparison. One bested the giants before them, the other merely tries to imitate, cheaply.

If you want innovators, you know what to get. If you want second tier copy cats, you know what to get.

I just don't know why anyone in their right mind would want a second tier machine. If the guise is "the value", that still doesn't add up. You can find so many low mileage used japanese bikes offering better value, for a lower cost, higher quality, and better parts availability and dealer support. The value proposition on chinese bikes compared to a low mileage japanese bike is a joke. No matter how you cut it, it doesn't make sense.

My biggest issue with buying Chinese Motorcycles ( apart from the really cheap electronics ) is the atrocious resale prices because no one's going to gamble on a bike that's got no heritage, no real support network and no promise of the brand still being in business a few years down the road.

My other problem with Chinese brands is that they don't lead. They follow and copy.

Yup.

In their eyes R&D doesn't mean research and development, it means rip-off and duplicate.

I've heard of a lot of people having problems with Chinese bikes. My personal experience?

I bought my ZNEN 150 in 2013 from a local dealer. Two were destroyed in shipping on the way here and he ate the cost. The third one I put 10K miles on it. Was it a Vespa? By no means. But I paid $1700 for it out the door.

It had a two year bumper to bumper warranty. He told me if a bulb burned out he'd replace it. He did the PDI. He's a good dealer. He sells Lance scooters now.

I have a feeling there's a factor that isn't included in most comparisons. Many people who buy cheap Chinese scooters aren't the type to spend a lot of money on service. They buy a scooter for a grand, fail to maintain it and throw it away when the clutch goes bad for the first time. Then they get the reputation that the Chinese scooter was junk because ... Chinese.

I will admit, I had some friends buy a pair of TaoTaos and had them shipped directly to the door. French fry oil in the case, crappy belts, cheap plugs. All things I would have changed right away, but a lot of people wouldn't. Jason installed a Gates belt, iridium plug and put good oil in mine before they drove it to my house.

Did I have to work on it much? You bet! I learned a lot. The build quality was ZNEN, which was better than many, but it wasn't Japanese. But it was sub $2k with a good warranty.

My experience is probably atypical, but if I were in the market I'd buy another one from Jason.

Something to consider, too, is all of the Chinese bikes run a GY6. Developed by Honda. Just like when the Indians took over Vespa's design. Or Enfield. Good design with less quality, but good design nonetheless.

It's been said, do your research. Buy from a dealer. Expect to fix stuff, but I wouldn't rule out a Chinese bike simply because it's Chinese. I mean, Even Honda made the Ascot.

Just my 2¢.

The GY6 was not invented by Honda. Early on, when they were just starting to flood the market with containers of cheap scooters, Online sellers would say that, because it added credibility. When I was at a Honda store, we used to have people come in and demand parts, because the guy on Ebay said it had a Honda motor. For some reason, it stuck, and is still repeated today.