Automatic Scooters, How Long Do They Last?

[jackcorbett]

As to motorbike taxi drivers I hardly call them professionals except for the fact they get paid for driving people around.

I think you just made my point for me.

And one of mine is they are paid because no one in their right minds is willing to pay them for doing practically anything else--including thinking. I would no more drive what motorbike taxi drivers drive than I would want to emulate their deplorable driving habits.

Incidentally, lately I've noticed large numbers of Nouvo Elegance 135 c.c. bikes in places that are heavily trafficked by Westerners. One example is my favorite bar here in Naklua. There were five Yamaha Nouvos parked in front. I'd say there were ten motorbikes total lined up in front of the place. And yesterday afternoon the Elegances were lined up in front of Carre Four. I am suggesting more and more the word is getting out with Westerners living here in Pattaya that the Yamaha Nouvo Elegance is the pick of the litter.

My gf got a new Airblade injection 2 months ago. She loves the color I was expecting some power with the injection engine, but my Elegance 135cc is just much faster and stronger.

My first Nuovo MX is 4,5 years old by now. Presently used daily by 3 teenage girls to and from school countryside 60 km a day. Still not replaced autobelt at 52k km. Only replaced battery, sparkplug, airfilter, tyres and lightbulbs.

I mentioned I'll be renting a 250 Ninja upon our return from Vietnam. And after that just for fun I think I will try out the Kawasaki 650 and I'm sure I'll feel both are excellent machines. Back in the U.S. I've had two 185 cc. Honda XL on off road bikes, one 500 Honda XL on off road bike, a 350 Honda twin, a 450 Honda twin, a BMW 650 boxer and a 1000 c.c. BMW K 100 RS. I expect the 250 Ninja's performance to be roughly similar to the Honda 350 except it will handle better and I'll like it.

That being said, I view the new automatics as the absolute state of the art. When I had the BMW's I felt shaft drive was the cat's meow. Then Harley introduced belt drive in some of its models and I felt belt drive had a lot going for it and that both belt drive and power shafts were a big step up from chains. I actively farmed for 23 years and had a lot of grass to mow in my yard. Had a lot of trees I planted--over 200 of them so I needed a big performance mower that would turn on a dime, what is called a zero turning radius lawn mower. First two mowers I got were Yazoos with 60 inch decks. They were built to industrial standards and appeared very heavy duty. Both required a lot of maintenance. Then I got a Grass Hopper and it looked very flimsy by comparison. It had a variable speed transmission that is very much like the automatic motorbikes we are talking about. One controlled one's speed and whether one was moving forward or in reverse with these two wand like levers. That Grasshopper was the most fun to drive lawnmower ever which even the women enjoyed using to cut the grass. The pleasant surprise was there was little maintenance to be done on that grasshopper and it went many years without having anything to be done to it other than spark plugs and an occasional belt change. The deck belts lasted a long time, were very quick and easy to replace and they were cheap. It was light years ahead of its time.

Most of us used John Deere planters. But since most of us had our fields spread out over long distances from each other we had to put a lot of road miles on our planters, hauling them behind tractors down the country roads from one field to the other. On the old model John Deere planters we'd simply loosen the drive chains to greatly eliminate the wear on the chains. But on the last planter I got there was a quick lock out feature I could use to keep from wearing out the drive chains (there were four of them).

I view the new automatic motorbikes the way I perceived the grasshopper lawn mower--a low maintenance piece of equipment that in many ways makes what came before it obsolete. The chain driven motorcyles and motorbikes I see as creatures of the past no matter how seductive they might look, how well they handle, fast or how well they go down the superhighway at high speed. And if you go out and ask 20 Nouvo owners about their motorbike problems, most of them will reply, "What problems?" And as to their variable speed transmissions the best lawnmowers have them, snow mobiles have them, and now a lot of automobiles have them also.

[jackcorbett]

In Hanoi at the moment and this is what I got a picture of today. Looks like a 150 c.c. Honda automatic with fuel injection. And note its relatively large tires. Just checked it out. Here's what I came up with. New 2010 Honda 150 automatic Looks like this one is headed for U.S. shores. My buddy David here with me. David has the 110 c.c. Air Blade and I have the 135 c.c. Nouvo Elegance. David is pretty happy with his Air Blade but he's been extolling the virtues of Yamaha's 500 c.c. trimax and Honda's Silver Wing. I've told David....great for U.S. highway driving but not what you need for MOST of your driving here. They are too wide and too bulky. Well, David weighs around 270 pounds and I weight around 170. But when he saw this baby he said it looks about right for him. He commented on its substantially beefier tires and that they'd do a great job supporting his weight. According to its specs for the U.S. model it has 16 inch diameter wheels like the Nouvo but it has wider tires. In real life these tires seem to be about the same width as those on a Honda 150 CBR.

Anyone care to run a narrow tired Honda Wave 125 or Yamaha 135 c.c. Spark against this baby?

[nikster]

thanks - good to know that automatics are good these days. what's the gas mileage on the nuovo and on the honda click "i" (FI)? Would be interested to know for Fino too... does that Honda SH150 look a bit like a Fino? Seems very round for a Honda...

motorcyc taxis are going to go for the best value and you can't beat an old dream or wave for that. these bikes have no problems, and if they do then any mechanic can fix it for 100 baht. I have a 6 year old wave that works perfectly, it's a 125i and gets an astounding 50km/l (117 mpg for you Americans). Certainly can't be beat for economy, that one... of course the wave never had a problem. nothing. Leave it for months, start it up - it works.

BTW just looked at the link for the SH150 - it costs a whopping USD 4500 in the states. If it was made in Thailand, it would cost 150,000 baht over here. Don't think it would be a huge seller at that price

Edited September 18, 2009 by nikster

[justchillin]

All promising stuff, it would be interesting to find out if the average size of 'Asians' is increasing, if so the manufacturers will need to enlarge their models to suit. I still can't quite bring myself to buy just yet, I no longer have any issues regarding longevity of Auto's. If a had some way of making any of them 25% bigger, or me 25% smaller, we'd have a match.

I presume new models are launched towards the end of year?

[katabeachbum]

All promising stuff, it would be interesting to find out if the average size of 'Asians' is increasing, if so the manufacturers will need to enlarge their models to suit. I still can't quite bring myself to buy just yet, I no longer have any issues regarding longevity of Auto's. If a had some way of making any of them 25% bigger, or me 25% smaller, we'd have a match.

I presume new models are launched towards the end of year?

Just get a Yamaha 500 TMax. I love the auto on this one 555.000 baht in LOS a bit steep though

[frenchFARANGbkk]

I like Honda Click because it's a scooter style motorcycle and you can put your bag at your feet, but can you tell me if any other scooter of this kind (with the flat feet rest place) is better ?

Thanks.

[opebo]

And one of mine is they are paid because no one in their right minds is willing to pay them for doing practically anything else--including thinking. I would no more drive what motorbike taxi drivers drive than I would want to emulate their deplorable driving habits.

Hmm.. that's some pretty harsh elitism there, jc. Pretty unrealistic too, from what I've seen - Thai motorbike taxi drivers obviously know their stuff when it comes to motorbikes. And they drive rather well from what I've seen.

As for bikes, I've rented practically everything, and owned a Wave (hated it - just terribly boring and extremely cold natured), a Tena/Nova (love it in spite of its being worn out - two strokes are just wonderful), a Suzuki Hayate (hated it, horrible thing due to being a big fat droning gas guzzling automatic).

Of the cheap bikes I've rented I liked the Kawasake Kazes and Suzuki Smash/Bests the most. I dislike automatics but the least bad of those I've rented seemed to be the Suzuki Steps.

Now I'd love to find an old two-stroke 'family' bike - like a Suzuki Swing, Honda Smile, or Yamaha Alfa. Very very hard to find though.. will probably just end up getting another Tena.

[jackcorbett]

And one of mine is they are paid because no one in their right minds is willing to pay them for doing practically anything else--including thinking. I would no more drive what motorbike taxi drivers drive than I would want to emulate their deplorable driving habits.

Hmm.. that's some pretty harsh elitism there, jc. Pretty unrealistic too, from what I've seen - Thai motorbike taxi drivers obviously know their stuff when it comes to motorbikes. And they drive rather well from what I've seen.

Well, i've watched these taxi drivers drive everyday. Now that I'm in Hanoi I can make the following comparison. Here one can walk into the middle of a busy street into a sea of motorbikes without feeling like a target. The motorcylists simply flow around you while respecting your right to cross the street without being harrassed by motorists. And the traffic's actually a great deal worse than it is in Pattaya. The other day our tour guide simply stretched out his arm while around eight of us simply crossed the street. I commented to my Thai girlfriend that here in Hanoi people "don't try to kill people" crossing the street like they do in Pattaya and she agreed with me. There is a spirit of live and let live here although the constant horn blowing can get on one's nerves such horn blowing serving simply to let other motorists as well as pedestrians know where you are at. Pattaya is a world unto itself that in many ways resembles the Tombstone Arizona, Deadwood, S.D., Virginia City and other boom towns of the old west in that it attracts a lot of bad people from all races and nationalities. Truth is a lot of THai males in Pattaya are all hotly wired on testosterone showing off on their motorbikes about how big of men they are and the motorbike taxi drivers taken as a group are prime examples of this. They are reckless fools on their motorbikes who show little respect for traffic laws or for reasonable standards of safety. There are exceptions to my stereotyping. However do keep in mind that my database is very accurate and extensive as I could mention hundreds of examples of nitwit driving by your so called professionals. In fact the day I took a motorbike taxi to pick up the first Yamaha Nouvo I had just purchased the motorbike taxi driver hit the bike in front of him, not hard enough to cause damage but just enough to convince me that my buying my own bike was much safer than having to rely on motorbike taxi drivers.

Edited September 23, 2009 by jackcorbett

[cup-O-coffee]

All of these bike styles can be had at the Friday night auction on Soi Thepprasit, across from Tesco (in an open-air furniture shop). I always see the bikes being unloaded at about 6pm. These are all repos, and bikes confiscated from criminals by the police, and that cannot be reunited with any owners. They are legit and have papers so that the new owner can have a clean bike. There is a 10,000 THB refundable deposit to get into the auction. If you are patient, or lucky, you will find the model you want and they can go for as cheap as 16,000 THB to anywhere up depending on the bids. I have heard nothing but good things about this auction. Some Fridays, there are not too many, and other Fridays the lot is thick with bikes. It is a crap shoot, but if you are not in a hurry, and have the cash, a great deal can be found here. Good luck in your hunt.

[mixed]

Sounds like good advice, do they have any dirt bikes at these auctions?

I'd definitely recommend a repo 2nd hand over a new one. My SIL's BF bought a 3 month old Mio for 28k, I think they were 45k new at the time.

Even if you don't go to the auctions, just check around, there's lots of repos because so many young Thais just don't make the any payments.

[sendbaht]

In 2008 I bought a 2008 Nouvo Elegance 135 c.c with the mag wheels because I wanted tubeless tires. I also tend to slide around on wet roads. Only thing bad so far

is I slide one rainy night and fell, b roke 2 ribs. My fault, was going a tad to fast for the tires and the fresh rained on road. So, show some respect for those little baby tires and

don't squezze the front brake to much. Love the Nouvo though great little bike.

[guzzi850m2]

Hmm a lot of people here talks very good about the Nouvo Elegance.

I never tried one but would like to, when my wife and I decided to sell the Wave and buy an auto we checked the prices and design. My wife liked the Fino very much, and as the price was quite low compared to some others autos including the Elegance I bought a Fino (cheap charlie, he-he). We never regretted that, its a fine little bike but 2 things pisses me off: Hardly any room under the seat (okay 2 raincoats if you squeezes them in), why do you have to open the seat by removing the start key and use the key lock under the passenger seat? On my last Wave you could open the seat direct via the ignition switch which was very nice.

[justchillin]

I'd be grateful if someone could confirm that Soi Thepprasit mentioned concerning the Friday night Motorcycle auctions a few posts ago is in Pattaya? or somewhere else. Thank you, thank you very much.

[Spoonman]

And as far as Mono shocks, the single spring on the Mios, Finos and Clicks appears to be the same size as the springs used on a Honda Wave that uses two springs in the rear. If it was larger and stronger, I'd say, okay...not too shabby. But I thihk both Yamaha and Honda built such bikes for smaller riders while having larger riders in mind for the Nouvo. And they employed a single shock because it was cheaper for them to do so.

You do realise springs can made with different rebound and stiffness rates dont you.

FWIW, I road a 125cc Suzuki Hayate 5 days a week to and from work for near on two years (50km total trip per day) The thing was flawless during this time, when i sold it had just over 25000km and other than regular book maintainence a battery and 2 sets of tyres i could not fault the thing, had plenty of power to move my 120kg lard ass along on Suk road @ 100km/h and had fantastic under seat storage, used to get (from memory) 110km per tank of fuel.

Edited October 30, 2009 by Spoonman

[Saraquin]

Hi i cant compare or rate the bikes and im no mechanic but i can give you info from my experience with a yamaha mio (the mio Z i think) simple little auto, im heavy (115kg) and it hauls me around with no problem drum brakes a bit weak but i stop fast enough, the disc brakes freaked me out when i had em on another bike. bought it second hand had it for a year now only ever need basic maintenance bit of a hard ride but thats not only the bikes fault eh I think a more sturdy looking manual would be better for me but the mio has done me fine so far fingers crossed.

[jackcorbett]

Hi i cant compare or rate the bikes and im no mechanic but i can give you info from my experience with a yamaha mio (the mio Z i think) simple little auto, im heavy (115kg) and it hauls me around with no problem drum brakes a bit weak but i stop fast enough, the disc brakes freaked me out when i had em on another bike. bought it second hand had it for a year now only ever need basic maintenance bit of a hard ride but thats not only the bikes fault eh I think a more sturdy looking manual would be better for me but the mio has done me fine so far fingers crossed.

My ex girlfriend had a Fino in bright red. It was gorgeous. And I did drive it a fair amount and enjoyed driving it very much. For the money it's a great machine. However, for the money and here we are talking only 10,000 to 12,000 baht more the Yamaha Nouvo Elegance is A LOT more machine. Now.....you weigh 115 kg, which is substantially more than I weigh-----76 kg. But get your calculators out and start adding. My weight---76 kg.+gf's weight---41 kg. +estimated friend's weight--90 kg equals a total of 207 kg. Now that's around 440 pounds put on a small motorbike that has a dry weight of only around 230 pounds. I have a friend in the U.S. who's six foot seven and who weighs 130 kg. When he visits me and we want to hit the bars he either walks a mile, takes a baht taxi at over 100 baht to travel that same mile or rides behind me. If we want to hit a restaurant a mile North of me, he can't go and neither can my English pal who would ride with my gf and me---that is unless he gets on the back of my motorbike with me. And with that kind of weight on the back of a Nouvo, things get a bit dicey. Mios, Finos and Honda Clicks simply can't handle these kinds of loads nearly as well and those who try it are going to go much farther into the danger zone than I do.

Those much smaller tires on these smaller bikes aren't going to handle higher speed driving very well either. So for those who plan on keeping their speeds low, Finos, Mios and Clicks are just fine so long as they don't put too much weight on them. For that matter, I don't think I want to be going 120 km an hour on my Nouvo Elegance, assuming it will go this fast. Try it on a large BMW and even 140 km will seem slow, but not on a scooter type machine. My point about the Nouvo Elegance is that it's very flexible and can do most things very well. For those who wish to save a few bucks, who just like a smaller machine, who prefer the style of say a Fino, etc they are great machines, but you are not going to have nearly the bike that a Nouvo Elegance 135 c.c. is. They aren't going to be able to handle the same kind of weight on their seats, they aren't as powerful, they don't compare for under the seat storage and they are not nearly as stable at higher speeds.

And as for putting a single shock over the side of the back wheel, this is just common sense. Even my pal who just bought a new Mio admitted that this arrangement simply won't handle extreme duty. In my opinion the companies that put that single shock on their 40,000 baht small bikes are simply doing it to save a few baht so they can offer such a low price. But it is not a good arrangement because if it was you can bet that Nouvo Elegances, Honda Airblades, Suzuki Hayates, Honda Waves, and Yamaha Sparks would all have it. They don't and the reason they don't is this arrangement simply does not perform as well when the chips are down.

Still......these smaller bikes are great machines so long as one understands their limitations. Pity the poor guys in the U.S. who have been driving Italian motorbikes such as Vespas since the 1950's with their little 10 inch diameter tires. I remember my Dad telling me from the time I was about 8 about how dangerous those scooters were on account of their small tires. It simply amazes me to see that it's taken this long for my fellow Americans to move up in tire size aside from much bigger scooters such as Honda Silver Wings and Yamaha T Maxes. So for those who question the reliability of the automatics just keep that in mind. It's taken, what--forty years to get out of that rut of accepting that things are as they should be and that all scooters need to have small wheels. I think we will see a much shorter time span for acceptance of the variable speed transmission technology to become widespread.

[LoveDaBlues]

All promising stuff, it would be interesting to find out if the average size of 'Asians' is increasing, if so the manufacturers will need to enlarge their models to suit. I still can't quite bring myself to buy just yet, I no longer have any issues regarding longevity of Auto's. If a had some way of making any of them 25% bigger, or me 25% smaller, we'd have a match.

I presume new models are launched towards the end of year?

Just get a Yamaha 500 TMax. I love the auto on this one 555.000 baht in LOS a bit steep though

Did you get/have a price quote for the Suzuki Skywave 650? I've been reading a lot about it lately. Seems to be a pretty decent combo scoot for around town/long cruise. I *think* they are roughly the same as the TMax.

[LivinLOS]

And as for putting a single shock over the side of the back wheel, this is just common sense. Even my pal who just bought a new Mio admitted that this arrangement simply won't handle extreme duty. In my opinion the companies that put that single shock on their 40,000 baht small bikes are simply doing it to save a few baht so they can offer such a low price. But it is not a good arrangement because if it was you can bet that Nouvo Elegances, Honda Airblades, Suzuki Hayates, Honda Waves, and Yamaha Sparks would all have it. They don't and the reason they don't is this arrangement simply does not perform as well when the chips are down.

If its 'just common sense' that a dual shock is superior.. Perhaps you can explain what modern sportbikes have a dual shock setup, and why the obviously inferior single shock is the industry standard on high end bikes ??

[katabeachbum]

And as for putting a single shock over the side of the back wheel, this is just common sense. Even my pal who just bought a new Mio admitted that this arrangement simply won't handle extreme duty. In my opinion the companies that put that single shock on their 40,000 baht small bikes are simply doing it to save a few baht so they can offer such a low price. But it is not a good arrangement because if it was you can bet that Nouvo Elegances, Honda Airblades, Suzuki Hayates, Honda Waves, and Yamaha Sparks would all have it. They don't and the reason they don't is this arrangement simply does not perform as well when the chips are down.

If its 'just common sense' that a dual shock is superior.. Perhaps you can explain what modern sportbikes have a dual shock setup, and why the obviously inferior single shock is the industry standard on high end bikes ??

Must say the single rear shock on my Kawasaki Ninja 650R works just brilliant. A single shock on Honda Click can not carry 150 kg safely

[jackcorbett]

Living loss---You and I are talking about oranges and apples. If you read my post carefully and I do think I clarified what I was talking about more clearly in a previous post, I stated "And as for putting a single shock over the side of the back wheel'. I was not referring to a mono shock that is centered properly, an example of which is the new Kawasaki ER6n. And which no doubt you are referring to in the larger bikes you mention. Which furthermore seems to have a very robust design. What I am talking about is the much smaller motorbikes where there is a single off center shock to the side of the back wheel in the same spot as a similar bike such as a Honda Wave, Nouvo, etc has just one of a pair of identical shocks. The larger bikes such as the Honda Wave I am referring to are engineered so that both shocks each one being equal distance from the center of the back tire work in concert with each other and each one takes half the load in equal proportion. They were designed to work optimally with two shocks in this configuration, not one. Now to me the smaller bikes such as the Fino seem to have approximately the same size shock but there's just one of them not two. Now I'm not sure what the comparative specs are of the shocks but I'd be willing to be they are similar. And not only that but the whole setup is off balance. I'd think that this works fine for light duty. And these bikes are after all designed for lighter people but I doubt very much if they are equal to what a two shock setup does for their larger brothers. Personally I think this was done to appease the bean counters who are out to cut costs to be more competitive at a lower end of the market.

Edited October 31, 2009 by jackcorbett

[bangsaenguy]

Tried to buy my wife a Nuovo but she has a Fino. Nuovos don't come in pink

[katabeachbum]

Tried to buy my wife a Nuovo but she has a Fino. Nuovos don't come in pink

good point

[McGee]

I bought my first Nouvo when they came out nearly 7 years ago. Drove it every day between Nai Narn and Patong.

I changed during this Period of Time:

3x Headlamps ( they get darker with the time)

2 x Battery ( the last one was a gel maintenance free and last 3 years)

1x Drive belt.

enough Power to get up every Hill , Consumption was Okay for an Automatic and she was much quieter than a Honda

otherwise i had never a Problem.

That's why i bought a Yamaha again after a Stupido crashed in my Side and bend the Frame.

Now i own the new Nuovo Elegance and I loved it from the Start.

I rented a New Honda Click for a Week and she made Noises as a Lawnmower. ( Thumbs down)