Originally Posted by
Neomagic
Just thought I would give an update on the bike now I have had it nearly a year now. I know information about these cracking bikes can be a little hard to come across especially in the uk - so here are my thoughts and experiences.
Firstly no problems to report at all. I gave up paying the dealer £85 a pop for servicing (basically a few adjustments, a spark plug and a litre of oil). The main UK importer was brilliant in giving me the specs required over the phone and via email to service it myself (torque settings, valve clearances etc). After the second main service, that is the first one I did, the bike seemed to suffer much less on vibrations. I think this was just down to re-tightening everything correctly. I also found the valve clearances, while not out much, made a nice difference once adjusted to specification. It is such a simple bike to work on and maintain I highly recommend even a complete novice to roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty on it. There is very little to mess up as long as you stick with 'if it ain't broke don't fix it'. I swapped out the crappy generic oil and put something half decent into it, this quietened the engine and although its hard to say it gave it a boost, it just seemed to run better. Same for a quality NGK spark plug rather than the torch one fitted from the previous dealer. It gave me peace of mind to be able to do these things myself as I know everything was done correctly and everything that required greasing etc was done with quality consumables. Although it cost around £30 for oils and grease etc, these will last me a couple of years worth of servicing now.
Overall I am still impressed with this little 125 commuter. Although it won't break any speed records it cruises very happily between 50 and 60mph with a little left if required. I adjusted the rear shocks so the bike sat and rode correctly with no see-sawing, making a huge difference to the whole balance of the bike (don't forget to adjust headlight beam accordingly). I am a hefty bloke weighing in at around 17 stone, but this bike just rides lovely. It can get a little breathless if there is a very strong headwind (I ride it in all weathers except snow) but a change down into 4th allows you to pull the speed back up to 50 if required.
When I first got it I kept having little niggles starting it up, until I found the correct way to start it. If you have this bike and have trouble starting from cold make sure you move the choke lever to the up most position for starting only, as soon as the engine is running move the lever to the middle position were it can stay until its warmed up. Then just close the choke and ride off. Since doing this correctly it starts without fail every time, even on the coldest of mornings.
The best thing about this bike is the grin factor. Nomatter what the weather I still grin from ear to ear while riding it. I now aim to take my full bike test later on this year, but will still keep my Zontes to get around locally day to day (I am thinking of getting a classic for Sunday afternoon cruising though)
I did change the indicators that were cheap and nasty to led ones, changing the indicator relay to suit (cost about £3 from ebay). I also changed out the weedy headlight bulb to a xenon affair and this is much much better. Correct adjustment of the beam is a must on this bike as the headlight reflector leaves a blank spot if not adjusted correctly. These are the little things that you notice after running it a while.
The one thing that could be better is the paint job on the tank. Black is never a great colour to keep tidy but it does show every tiny scratch and there are a couple of blemishes in the lacquer. I am lucky as a friend works in a body shop and has agreed to repaint it when I want as long as I do all the prep work. That can wait for the summer time though. I have painted the exhaust in a satin exhaust paint to keep the rust at bay before it even starts. It was a no brainer as the paint cost £5 and doesn't need a primer. It looks better than the matt finish that came when it was new as that showed up every tiny fingerprint and mark. I took my time and prepared it well so the finish looks better than the factory job it came with. The wheels have stood up well without so much as a stone chip.
A note on tuning. It is not really worth messing around with a perfectly good running machine like this to maybe get an extra couple of mph out of it. Much better to run it as it was designed and just enjoy what you have. You have to remember to get a 10% boost you will have to spend quite an amount and mess with things that should be left alone, and 10% of what this bike delivers in the first place is not a huge amount. Wait until you can afford a bigger, full power bike that will benefit from a 10% boost noticeably. This of course is only my opinion but makes sense to me at least ;-).
Overall I can't fault this bike for the money I paid for it. £1600 with no faults, a great sound and cracking ride for over 3000 miles and a big idiot grinning like a cat, can't be bad. I hope anyone considering a Zontes Monster / Panther / Tiger finds this information of some use.
Happy trails !
