Here is the deal:

Harbin is a bike ban city. They do not give plates to bikes past a certain year.

My plan is to take a trip from Harbin to Xinjiang on whatever bike I buy. I do not plan to ride much in Harbin city limits, however the address of my residence permit is in Harbin.

So.. I have three options: (as far as I can tell-if you think of any other methods please tell me)

1. Buy a used bike with a plate and transfer to my name.
These bikes were all plated before the ban and are legal. The problem is the ban was awhile ago (not quit sure which year) and the bikes with legal plates are all in pretty poor condition, aka I would not be confident taking a long trip on one. Most of the ones I've looked I wouldn't be comfortable riding around the block on. They are pretty much all 125ish standard street bikes beat to hell by years of Harbin winter.

2. Buy a new bike, and have a friend in a city outside of, but close to, Harbin and register it in their name. Then it will be legally registered and I could legally ride it. I wonder though, if I got stopped in some random small town in Inner Mongolia if the cop would believe that, or think I was lying and take the bike. Has anybody done this option before?

(not much of an option)3. Ride without a plate, but with a license and insurance. This is illegal. I know. But literally every Chinese person I've talked to (including ones not trying to sell motorcycles to me) has said it should not be a problem. I figure if I get a bike for around 5000rmb, even if it does get confiscated its not that big of a loss. Really this is my last resort if the first two are impossible. If I exhaust all other options and it boils down to riding illegally or not riding at all, then I might go with this one.

Number two seems like the best one. If anybody else has done this please let me know how it worked. If anybody has any other ideas I would be glad to try them. I want to be as legal as possible for the trip I am planning.