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  1. #1 Jialing JH600B Sidecar 
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    Anyone owns a Jialing JH600B Sidecar and is willing to share experience, reliability and other issues, thanks in advance.
    Does the JH600B has the stalling issues as well?
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  2. #2 Re: Jialing JH600B Sidecar 
    foreign China moto dude bikerdoc's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by TB-Racing View Post
    Anyone owns a Jialing JH600B Sidecar and is willing to share experience, reliability and other issues, thanks in advance.
    Does the JH600B has the stalling issues as well?
    Contact Lao Jia Hou, as he has/had one in BJ. He also had it for sale Feb last year.
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  3. #3 Re: Jialing JH600B Sidecar 
    Danger, Will Robinson! Lao Jia Hou's Avatar
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    Yup - had one for a couple of years, and just sold it a month, or so, ago. An MCM member in Shanghai also has one.

    The new JH600B is now called the JH600B-A (weird naming convention). The new "A" has the new ECU, without stalling. Mine stalled, but is was hit & miss. The new owner is having it upgraded, but this is a little time-consuming because Jialing needs to custom-make the wiring harness for the JH600B. Anyways, it can be done.

    As for personal impressions. I really liked it. I'd owned a couple of CJ750s, including a BMW-powered one, and it is night & day. I would never go back to a CJ, if I was to get back into sidecars. I live in the center of Beijing, so the idea of having a wide sidecar in Beijing traffic precludes me getting another sidecar. You are stuck in traffic, cooking in heat & humidity. No thanks.

    My "B" had about 6,000 kms on it and the only thing that ever went wrong was a blown fuse. In my case, the "B" was very reliable. Conversely, I am sure you know about CJs.

    It is definitely a bike that can handle rough terrain, effortlessly. Unlike a CJ, which always gave me sore arms "riding" it, the "B" was light and nimble. A 300 km ride was effortless. Good gas mileage, too (probably double a CJ).

    I am not sure how comfortable the sidecar is, but I did not have any complaints from passengers. I put a sidecar windscreen on.

    Has nice features like disc brakes all around (double calipers on the sidecar wheel), sidecar suspension, and the sidecar wheel that "steers" (yes, it does make a difference).

    Otherwise, it is a JH600, which is also a nice bike. The "B" is only four forward gears, though, because one gear is used for the Reverse (really simple to use).

    It garners a LOT of attention from people. A novelty, at first, but quickly wears thin. I've had strangers jump off the sidewalk when I've been stopped at a traffic light, and hop inside my sidecar because they wanted to try it out. Again, it attracts attention. It is the only non-Harley bike that my snobby HOG buddies would permit me to tag along with.

    If I was to buy another sidecar, it is a no-brainer - I'd get another one. A very decent price, too ... a hell of a lot better than "rebuilt" CJs, IMHO, and you get updated technology. Apparently it is now available in gloss black, but I have personally never seen one. Mine was army, flat green ... an acquired taste.

    Don't know about Shanghai, but the new JH600B-A can now get A plates in Beijing.

    As an end note, I have seen several JH600Bs popping up in some CJ shops around Beijing. People want legal bikes, I guess.
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  4. #4 Re: Jialing JH600B Sidecar 
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    Quote Originally Posted by Lao Jia Hou View Post
    Conversely, I am sure you know about CJs.
    Thanks for the info, had a few CJ's in the past and your correct, would not own one again as well.
    Need to talk further to the Shanghai Jialing rep and the bike will be used on the big island in Southern China (Hainan) for cruising and off road riding. Let's see how everything works out in the next few weeks and shall report back.....
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  5. #5 Re: Jialing JH600B Sidecar 
    Shanghai'ed Shanghaifingers's Avatar
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    Hey TB.

    I have one here in Shanghai... its still a series 2 without the ECU upgrade.... Its in the mail. It does stall occasionallly and sometimes a lot but is managable with the sidecar, not sure how the two wheel JH600's handle it could be really dangerous.
    Another thing my JH 600B has been all over Hainan. I LOVED it there.... It is pretty good in the the Sand but I wish I had brought on full on Knobby for the rear. But the with 4.10 tires help it "float" on the sand Just wash and oil your chain afterwards.... In Bao'Ao on the beach near some abandoned hotels I felt like I was in Dakar racing along the coast in the surf line. Later in the Jungle I was glad to have the Jialing as I had to negotiate many muddy hills that had sheer drop off... the bike did well. I did the same trip earlier and took a CJ 750, which was good but not as good as with the JH600B. Not to mention I could actually get somewhere in a day...

    I have a winch and shovel mounted to my bike and need both, but never need tools. The tire are so rugged that I have not had a flat tire yet!!! and I have encountered may a nail and metal on the roads. I have found stuff jammed into the rubber but nothing penetrated into the interior.

    Winch and spotlight, shovel is attached to the back...
    DSC00218.jpg
    Hainan, in Sanya
    DSC00081.jpg

    TB if you want to play with it call me the next time you are going to be at that German resturant of the Hu Qing Ping or at your clubhouse. I can swing by... You should have my new number (gave it to you last time we saw each other at the Ducati Cafe) or just PM me and I will give it to you.

    Winston
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  6. #6 Re: Jialing JH600B Sidecar 
    foreign China moto dude bikerdoc's Avatar
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    ^That is a serious looking outfit! Nice! How does the alternator/generator handle running the extra load? Did you ride the outfit all the way from SH to Hainan and return? If so how many km's was it and how long did it take you? Aside from the two mods on the front of the chair (spotlight and winch) what other upgrades have you done? Who fit the spotlight and winch?
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  7. #7 Re: Jialing JH600B Sidecar 
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    Quote Originally Posted by Shanghaifingers View Post
    if you want to play with it call me the next time you are going to be at that German resturant of the Hu Qing Ping or at your clubhouse. I can swing by....
    Thanks for the offer and might get back to you, have to discuss with the Shanghai JL shop (Mr.Fan) about registration / license plate next week.
    As soon the license / rego is worked out shall order a JH600B-A sidecar rig.

    side-note: the german restaurant "Wirtshaus" (HuQingPing Highway) closed last month. The German chef / owner will set up a new restaurant near the WISS school (Qingpu district, one block left from HuQingPing Highway) shortly or is already operating, need to check.
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  8. #8  
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    Can anyone comment from personal experience on the reliability of JH600B-A? What year did they switch to making these as A models?
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  9. #9 Re: Jialing JH600B Sidecar 
    C-Moto Regular tombaxers's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by gt7599a View Post
    Can anyone comment from personal experience on the reliability of JH600B-A? What year did they switch to making these as A models?
    I cannot tell you when they changed to making the A model, but I can comment on the reliability as I have had one since October 2012 and have done a couple of big trips in Western China on one (6000kms and 3500kms respectively). In short the engine is good (it was designed by an Austrian offshoot of Bosh for Jialing about 15-16 years ago when China didn't have larger bore motorbike engine technology if my understanding is correct). The bike is relatively well assembled and on the whole being a supposed military bike has been designed with reliability in mind but there are some severe flaws with certain areas:

    1) The sidecar wheel turning system and it's alignment are a total bunch of fucking arse . Both big trips and on a few shorter journeys the cable has stretched that attaches the head steering column (handlebars) to the turning column that in turn attaches to a shaft that then steers the sidecar wheel in the same direction as the handlebars. When this happens the alignment of the sidecar wheel gets out and when riding you have to fight the constant pull of the sidecar in a different direction than you want to ride, which after a few hours in the saddle tends to put a lot of pressure on your back and shoulders and has gone so far as to totally screw my back on one occasion. Now you maybe asking why don't you just realign it before carrying on, and that brings about the next issue the realignment is the most disingenuous ballache of a system to sort out even when you are in a workshop and have taken the sidecar completely off let alone on the side of the road in the dark. It is possible but it requires an enormous amount of patience as the 4 bolts that manoeuvre the position of the steering cable are nigh on impossible to get to with a spanner and when you can they can only be turned about 1/20th of a turn at a time as this area of the bike has a lot of permanent subframe getting in the way. In short it is an absolute cunt of a job! However, I should add that this problem probably won't come about if you are on roads all the time - it was only really on hard off-road where the alignment is pulled out. Sand for example did a fine job of screwing it!

    2) The paint job is shite. I went for the black model and they had very very badly spray painted over the army green so that within the first trip the entire frame and other non plastic areas turned from black to green. So if you are going to buy then the army green is probably the safest bet - tho they do now do it in a Hello Kitty pink which would be very fetching! Ha

    3) The spoked wheels from the factory are very badly built. Basically not one drop of threadlock was used on the spoke nipples when building the wheels, which means after a long haul on tough ground these get loose and I have actually had 3 entire wheel collapses (all rear wheel). Bearing in mind this is a very heavily loaded bike with camping gear and 2 people there is a lot of weight on that rear wheel, but still shouldn't mean the bloody things collapse no matter how rough the terrain is. Luckily every time I've had the spare to change out, but it was very very close to call on the last trip when the we'd had one semi collapse, I'd retightened it as best I could by hand and then put it as the spare, then the one I changed in collapsed fully and I had to use the repaired one to limp the next 100kms to a town where we found a Michelin Tyre place open at 11 at night who were absolute heros and worked on thru till 1:30 in the morning to get one wheel fully fixed using the remaining functional spokes from the two fucked wheels. A very close call! Since then I have had the wheels rebuilt with Loctite and a torque wrench and then balanced. I'm yet to really test if that is gonna make the difference as no big trips or bad terrain since then.

    4) The clutch is not the best. I have had two fairly hairy moments both at +4000m and both on steep ground and fully loaded also, but the clutch began to overheat and slip heavily. First time it had nothing left at all and no power was going to the rear wheel whatsoever. Had to tighten it up and wait an hour for it to cool off. Both times once off the steep ground it sorted itself out luckily, but I think when it overheats it creates a super smooth layer on the friction plates and they just slip more and more freely. Interestingly when I came back and opened up the clutch the plates didn't actually show much sign of wear. I'm assuming these are bespoke to Jialing but I'd like to research whether it would be possible to get some from elsewhere with higher quality ceramic friction materials. Likely a pipedream though!

    5) I've now had the frame crack in two places. One underneath the headlight and dash mount which seems strange as this really isn't holding much weight. And the other underneath the backbox I have, which admittedly I had probably far exceeded the suggested limit of weight to put on the back (tho I'm not sure Jialing even specify this).

    6) Others. The general quality of bits and bobs is a long way from it's Japanese and European counterparts (not that it really has any counterparts). The plastics are not great; the welding of the frame is shoddy in areas, the stock chain broke on me; the wiring loom is not well shielded; all plated areas are showing corrosion - some worse than others; and there is a bit too much squeaking & rattling in general.

    This all sounds very negative, but I must add I have had an enormous amount of fun on this bike and hopefully lots more to come. It needs TLC if you take it to the terrain it's supposedly designed for, probably a little too much, but then both the big trips I have done I have absolutely thrashed the tits off the bike on some of the worst terrain and highest altitudes I have ever ridden, which is gonna give any bike a run in. If you want a sidecar to tour on that is A LOT more trustworthy than a ChangJiang; that can take 2-up plus loads of camping gear; spare fuel; food for a week and still take on brutal terrain and up decent inclines then I don't believe that there is a better off-the-shelf sidecar outfit for the job (queue other user disagreements...).

    Yes lots of improvements could be made but this is all part of riding a China Moto!

    (I'll add some photos of the various issues I have had later, now on the train using 3G)
    Shanghai
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  10. #10 Re: Jialing JH600B Sidecar 
    C-Moto Regular tombaxers's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by tombaxers View Post
    (I'll add some photos of the various issues I have had later, now on the train using 3G)

    DSC_3017.jpg
    Rear wheel collapse Golden Week 2012 - Qinghai province, looong day, cold as fuck, not ideal! Thank the old gods and the new I had a jack with me.

    DSC_3033.jpg
    Day after the rear wheel collapse - notice the lack of spokes on the spare wheel.

    DSCF2365.jpg
    Heroes at random Michelin place sorting another rear wheel collapse Golden Week 2014 - Yunnan

    IMG_3732.jpg
    Good paint job.

    IMG_3735.jpg
    Good stitching job on passenger seat. This was like this almost out of the factory.
    Last edited by tombaxers; 06-23-2015 at 12:07 PM.
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    2003 Hyosung Aquila 125 (UK) 200? Yamaha YBR 125 (Yangshuo)
    2010 Triumph Bonneville A2 (sold)
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