Chinese Hardley - what is, who makes, where get?

[Oengus]

Lifan has a 400cc…should I say 399cc? For marketing everyone rounds up to the next whole 50mL, maybe they should have a rule about that? The international council for rounding off?
400cc

250cc

I’ll take that engine in a café racer….you can have the cruiser it’s just not for me.
I also would take a 250cc V-twin less the shaft drive if you cut the price by a grand. I’d like it to look shamelessly like the HD XL1200. That 250 is actually a 249cc engine…but only has 18.5hp the 400cc has about 28hp.


So there are potentially two bikes I am personally fine with 18.5 hp and I’d like the bike for around 2K MSRP and then the 400 for around $3K MSRP if I decide to move up a notch.
I could sell them on the net and they could be HD’s a XL250 and an XL400 and dropped shipped to your local Harley Dealer. They would get $500.00 for every bike they prep and then charge the customer $150.00 to register them.
So I as a customer would pay for shipping and that could be $250.00, then the dealer gets the bike and hands it over to me with a owners manual and a signed off check list and warranty agreement. Then it’s a matter of quality and reliability. It’s a matter of the dealer having access to the parts when and if they need them. It’s matter of support more than displacement.
The bikes may be selling better in the UK and may be only in the UK for that mater because of geography it’s an island and really not that big of one. Here they have 50 states the person that can and will service it is were?
Would you buy a bike that was sold and serviced in Germany if you lived in France? Comparatively speaking having one or two established dealer in the England is like have one or two in a single US state and with population density they get centric easier.
The HD dealer could use the bikes for their driving training courses, the Buell Blast is now gone. They could use the bikes to feed the higher line bikes, everybody gets caught up in the bigger better faster game.

[Oengus]

Those are both Yamaha designs, both Viragos.
The Virago 250

　
The Virago 400

These are no longer patented designs those expire after 14 years, 20 years for plant and utility patents and they cannot be renewed or reclaimed by another party.
So these are not protected engines anyone can make them, but if you could get Yamaha to provide the original specs it would happen faster.
Any older 400cc engine or any engine that is no longer a patented design is fair game. So if you have a bike you really like you could take it to china and get it copied, if you had the resources and a system in place to market the bike you could theoretically get control of some the production there.
If the product can be sold in every market then its a safer venture, then if going for a product that is only marketable in certain markets as that is more risky. Look at growth and the US has none, so you are up against the competition and the status quo and it conceptions and even preconceptions.
I would not have chosen these two products for the US I would have gone with café bikes and a younger market. The HD XL1200 design to me in my opinion is more marketable, But an exact copy of it is or would be a patent violation. But there is really nothing about the frame of the bike that is new, is there?
Zongshen makes the 250cc engine which one is a better engine make them or Lifan?

[Oengus]

This has some information about 250cc engines being made in China.
http://www.mychinamoto.com/forums/sh...p?1622-YINGANG

[iamcanjim]

The Virago 400 was sold in N. America as a Yamaha Virago XV500. Still, the hp was terrible.

The most powerful Chinese cruiser is actually the Chunlan cruiser, which is a copy of a Honda Magna 250. This has a 249 cc water cooled 90 degree vtwin with about 30 hp.

[davidqc]

Riveting stuff! Keep it coming...

[ZMC888]

Yes, but with cruisers the torque is more important than the hp.

[Oengus]

Why is that Jim is it because most of the cruiser riders have beer guts?
Confucius says skinny man on bike with small crank goes faster?
Yamaha made lots of VX bikes a 400cc and a 500cc, 40hp and 44hp? Not sure what they sold in 1983 one of these or both of these; not sure what they sold in the US, that is.
The lifans are clones of the bikes I posted a 250cc and a 400cc, the 400cc had a shaft drive and so does the Lifan, the 250cc is chain driven and so was the Yamaha.
Both Lifans have less hp than the Yamaha’s but not that much difference. It’s more than likely the jets and the EPA restrictions. When people change the jets on bikes they are violating the law? They could end up with EFI forced on them? You know the environmentalist are a tenacious bunch.
Heck I’d like to have a 250 Phazer a traverse four cylinder 16 valves and it seems like it would be a screamer with 45hp @ 14,500rpm

[Oengus]

What’s interesting is changes in EPA legislation is bringing about revolutions in two-cycle engine technology.
I have to wonder what the Chinese are doing? They use the R&D moniker on or for most of motorcycle manufacturers. They could be waiting on the expiration of patents that are relative? Getting a head start and maybe even buying some patent rights?
They obviously study the products and decide which is best to replicate, which can be made compliant to EPA and EEC standards. Those that can be replicated most cost effectively, then what about the 2-strokes they are glaring examples historically of more for less.
So when government sets a time line and mandates on that date the engineers begin to consider the options.
What and who is Surrich/Orbital 2?
In the interim what bikes from the past that were resurrected may be replaced with clean efficient 2-cycle technology which will be lighter and more powerful? I am hard pressed to believe that Zongshen PEM is not working on 2-strokes and 4-strokes engines as well as electric motors.
I wonder if they still are investing in resurrections? Seems there is potential in the EFI being applied to some of the older engines, seems like the resurrection of the 4-cycles looses about 25% of it power under the EPA current restrictions. I wonder if they spend resources on improving that? Only some I would say and its more the short term.
I would seek out expired 6-speeds and dual carb engines, but maybe they do that?
But they are selling what over 80% of total production into the domestic market. Once imperialist then militarist now transitioning to capitalists. They flooded the market and now they are knee deep or even up to there necks? The line type system that being shit flows from the top theocrats and the no excuses kind of thinking is not revolutionary.
I like seeing the reference to ERP on the Jinan Qingqi site, and in plain English, it is helping.
A research and technology group needs something new, they sell patent rights. The Chinese are like holy cow anyone can make what we make, if its old technology we are copying each other. That’s why they are not so anxious to reveal everything. In the future if it is unique then only those that buy the rights can make it, the R&D groups sell patent rights.
So they are leveraging the selling of the old technology into developing new technology.
But in the mean time the USA market is all about brand recognition, too many brands and we will have some reluctance….all the same with many different names even worse.
So take what you have and make unique starter bikes for the USA sell them through the internet. Each brand from each manufacture with excellent parts access and service, test the hell out of the products. The best starter bikes for the least amount of money. The high end Chinese market and the low end USA match.
But they have to connect to the existing dealer network as feeder, to establish the relationship and reputation.
The process and the system of sales is plowing the ground for the next generation of products, what comes from the R&D will or should be advanced and then the mechanism to sell them and reputation are in place.
You can see how reactionary the market is, hard time as in adversity brings about change. The hacking brings about better defenses, they need to be careful with that because they may get a back hand or a delusional set of fabricated information they think they are sneaking out when in fact they may be handed something faulted and misleading intentionally. The blood hound sniffing a pile of poop.

[Oengus]

http://www.mychinamoto.com/forums/sh...er-Links/page2

this may help or just further confuse?

[ZMC888]

Some of the fault that there are so many Chinese manufacturers is the Japanese manufacturers. For example in my city there is a Quad manufacturer called ODOS, or something similar. All Yamaha technology, a joint venture with Yamaha in fact, manufacturing low and medium end quads . The quads are sold through Yamaha dealerships overseas. The salesmen tell customers, 'if the original Yamaha bikes are too expensive for you, you can get an ODOS, parts and service are interchangeable, and same warranty'. Why the Japanese don't apply this logic to the Chinese motorcycle market is anyone's guess! This is clever marketing, it keeps Yamaha in control of the high, medium and low end of the market, if there are any Chinese undercutting their prices, it is probable that they are crap.

The Jianshe Phazer 250, 400 and 600? The Sundiro VTR250 CBF500? Qingqi Bandit 400? Why not? This re-branding and lower cost base for already successful products can keep lots of the 2nd rate Chinese manufacturers to a small market share, and stop the Japanese dragging their own brand names through the muck when someone who hasn't had a day off in six months is doing the wiring. These joint venture companies already exist, they just don't have much vision other than 125cc bikes.