Purchased both Honda 2013 Models

Just curious, you have never owned a motorized vehicle before? Do yuo have your M-Class license? the PCX requires a motorcycle license tags and insurance in MD? plus new laws require the met be registered also.

Take your time, the PCX will go over 60mph and experience is a must, be patient learning the bike.

Where in MD are you guys? near DC. We have a local DC meetup group, mostly for the 125cc + crowd for day rides and events.

I just bought a new 2012 Zuma 125. Cost OTD was $3354.00. A new 2013 would have been just a hair over $4K. I got the last 2012 they had. I looked at the Met while there. They wanted $3120 something OTD. But this is AZ. You don't get good deals from the "powersports" places here. They add on tons of extra fees. I almost got into a fight with the paperwork guy because I did not buy the extended warranty and a service agreement. Those are where most of the real profit is made.

I don't know about the Met, but the Zuma was made in Taiwan. I first thought it was made in China, but when I gave the VIN to my insurance agent, it was a Taiwanese VIN. So I looked on the scooter and sure enough it said Taiwan. I don't know where Honda is getting their bikes, but Kawasaki is building most of theirs in Thailand.

I never had a M class lic. before in my life. put 800 mi on the PCX before i went & got the M class. Who the hell is going to put any serious mile on a motorcycle/scooter with a learners permit anyway?? been down that road & its Bullshit. I just rode the damn thing illeagel till I was familar enough to pass the test. Alll the M-Cycle safety classes are filled up. Who eles but a newbie would appreciate clicking blinkers ? I leave the things on too long most time anyway --newbie thing I guess. Plus alll the shit I'm gettin at work for riding a scooter is halairous...Some dude with flaming fireball stickers stuck to the fenders on his compact car asked me "if I needed a licience for it" I said "Hell no, as long as the cops dont pull you over" So yea I'm looking not too swift on the 50 CC but hey, I gat a big manly 150 CC too... Telll me more about this MD DC scooter ride thing. I'd like to hear more on it! DCM

http://www.meetup.com/dcspindoctors/ here isa link to the dc local scooter meetup group. for the record i did not come up with the name. we do rides pretth frequent that are 125 friendly.i catch hell from my coworkers all the time about the scooters, i hzve been ruding motorcycles for 17 years, does not bother me much fol,sdo not like what i am riding!

I'd be real careful with that Met in town. I used to have a 2007 Met, and almost got run over from behind so many times in town that I gave up city riding. And mine would do 40 mph. I even wired the turn signals so they worked as 4 way flashers. Maybe helped a little. But if you pull up to a stoplight on it, it is very likely the vehicle behind you is going to nail you. They don't know the difference in a 50cc scooter and a 1000cc crotch rocket, and will expect you to take off fast. I put over 10,000 miles on that Met, almost all of it on rural 2 lane country roads, where I could ride on the shoulder. The Met simply doesn't belong on the street with cars, and you can't ride it in the bike lane.

Love this thread. Does your wife still enjoy riding?
What a great interest to share...
I bought my first scooter 5 weeks ago, and am loving it!
Ken
p.s. I am happy my blinkers click too!

It seems OK to wife to ride for pleasure scootering-- the preference is back roads and neighborhoods. Now that she has confidance she'll ride longer & further. in face enough experieance under her belt to want a 150 or 250 size which is what I was hoping all along... You simply cant beat a 50 cc for running the town errands you can park
with bicycles, or out front, the thing just makes you appear so damn innocent it funny. Cops dont seem to pay much attention if you not goofing off on it. I cant say I experieanced the fear of someone running into me because its underpowered, you simply have to choose carefully the roads you ride. I will say I wished drivers would simply pass you as if you were on a bicycle-- for some reason most will trail behind you even if your going obiviously slowr like a bike.

The PCX 150 on the other hand can attract cop attention simply because it looks like a crotch rocket at first glance....1300 miles so far on the PCX, seems like its more responsive between 50-60 mph now too....It took 1200 miles of riding before noticed. Also recently was running really bad--almost succmbed taking to shop but, waited until the gas was used up. The next fill up had it running normally. Bad gas has a dramatic effect on these vehicles. I drive it 30 miles each way to work weather permitting. Mostly on 35-50 mph roads. Its fine for that. In order for me to ever see 70 mph I'll probably have to lose 70 lbs..............

Around here, almost everything besides residential streets is 45 mph. There are a few streets that are 30-35-40 mph, but if you want to actually get anywhere, you have to take the 45 mph streets. My '07 Met topped out at 38 mph. It is common here for everybody to go 50-55 on 45 mph roads, and when the light changes, they just have to see how fast they can reach that speed. If you are in front of them on a Met, you're in trouble. Once they see how slow you are, then they just get mad and start blowing their horns. The real danger is before they know. They expect you to take off like a rocket, and will run over you before you even get across the intersection. There have been many scooter accidents here because of that. Even with the 4 way flashers I never felt safe enough to ride it in town. Much safer out on 65 mph rural roads where you can ride on the shoulder. My Zuma 125 keeps up fairly well on 45 mph roads when they are flat. Slight hills got it down to 40 mph, but I weigh 220. It can be ridden on 65 mph roads, as long as you stay to the far right, and move over if a car comes up behind you and there is oncoming traffic. A 50cc Met can be ridden from coast to coast if you are determined enough, and plot your course well. Now that is what I would call and adventure ride, and it would not cost a fortune to do it either.

Why would you "put synthetic in it --no reason just what auto parts store had availble." ?

You should let it break in a bit first. Especially where you said it wouldn't do 70MPH. It
will still break in just very slowly. I had a truck once that took 40000 miles to break in
but that was because I put slick 50 in it at 2000 miles!

I'm very interested in one of these but wonder what top speed to expect and how
the mileage is...

They can get 110 MPG but that might be the 125cc with the auto stop. Not sure
why they can't sell them with that here. It adds about 10 MPG! I wonder if you can add
it back on?

70 MPH would be nice...

Modern engines are 99% broken in from the factory. Every new engine is run to redline and checked out before the bike is crated. Most of what is left of the break in, seating the rings, should happen in the first 20-30 miles, when it is important to build up a lot of pressure in the combustion chamber for short periods of time. I always break in new engines with many short bursts of full throttle, going all the way to top speed at full throttle by the time an engine has 30 miles on it. Main thing is to vary the throttle, and to not let it overheat. if the rings are not seated by the time you have 30 miles on the engine, they never will. The cylinder walls will glaze, and at that point all you can do to fix it is to rehone the cylinder and replace the rings, and break it in right. If you baby it when new, you will wind up with an engine that is down on power, and burns oil.

Even the owners manual does not specifically state that you cannot use full throttle when new, though it does imply that. Most owners manuals state to avoid PROLONGED use over a certain speed when new.

Once the rings are seated, the remaining break-in occurs over the next several heat/cool cycles. This is called "seasoning" the engine, and does not refer to using spices in it. New metal, like the piston and cylinder, are relatively weak compared to that of a used engine. They become much stronger as they are repeatedly heated and cooled. I remember reading about an experiment preformed by a race mechanic a long time ago. He took one new piston, and one used piston, and put them in an oven side by side, and heated them to a fairly high temperature for some time, then let them cool. He then measured the pistons, and found that the old pistons dimensions were almost the same as they were to start with, but the new piston was badly deformed. The same thing happens in a new engine, which is why it is important to not let the engine stay hot for long periods. Fortunately the piston is contained within the cylinder, which helps keep it from becoming deformed by the heat. As it ages with use, it becomes much stronger.

Though the manual usually says 600 miles, an engine is usually completely broken in by 100 miles. by the manual, the break in period on the '09 and older Honda Met was only 50 miles. On many 2 stroke mopeds it is 300 miles. On the genuine Stella 2 stroke, it is 1200 miles. Yes, you read that right. 1200 miles. But, the Stella does not have a modern engine, and worse, it is made in a third world country, where the metallurgy and build quality are poor. If this same engine were built out of the right metal, and built to better tolerances, it would be 10 times more reliable, and the break- in would be much shorter. It would also last longer. There is nothing wrong with the Stella's '60s design, IF it were properly manufactured. The Chinese use much more modern designs, yet their engines are even less reliable than the Stella's, for the same reason.

Now, while I would consider any modern properly made engine broken in by 100 miles, and able to be used normally, it will still loosen up over the next several hundred miles. The build tolerances take this into account, so it will wind up with proper tolerances after being used for several hundred miles, instead of being to loose, meaning worn out. Sometimes this means the vehicle will get faster over time, sometimes not. My Vino 125 still has the same top speed after 20,000 miles as it had after 200 miles. It has not actually required a valve adjustment in all those miles, though I did adjust them once, just out of boredom, and to get them perfect.


In modern properly built engines, use of synthetic oils from the very beginning should not be a problem. Many new cars come from the factory filled with synthetic oil. This does not apply to engines like the Stella, Royal Enfield, or anything Chinese.

As for Slick 50, it is still on the market. DO NOT use this stuff. It contains Teflon, which is a solid, and which can build up in and eventually plug oil passages, and destroy the engine. Dupont, which developed Teflon, does NOT recommend it's use in internal combustion engines.

IMO, in any small scooter, like the Vino 125 or Zuma 125 or PCX150, the oil should be changed every 1000 miles, regardless of what the manual says. This is due to 3 reasons. One, these small engines, even though not highly tuned, are put under a lot of stress by running them at full throttle most of the time. Two, they have a very small oil capacity, and oil functions not only as a lubricant, but as a coolant as well. Three, most of these engines have no real oil filter, which means the oil gets contaminated faster than it normally would.

I do not personally see any reason to use synthetic oil in these engines, unless you just want to, and can afford to. It won't hurt anything, but if changed every 1000 miles, won't do any good either. The only known benefit to synthetic oils is that they hold their viscosity longer than conventional oils, a moot point here. You still have the contamination problem to deal with, so you should still change it often. I would much rather have an engine full of clean conventional oil than dirty synthetic.

Synthetic is VERY expensive. It's cost is way out of proportion to what it costs to make it. It is sold for what the market will bear, and many people have been indoctrinated with the idea that it is bad to use anything else. Around here, a qt. of Mobil 1 motorcycle specific synthetic oil costs $13.99. You can buy a 5 qt. jug of Walmart Supertech oil for that. That's right, it costs FIVE TIMES as much as conventional oil. The SuperTech oil meets all new vehicle warranty requirements, even when it is used for the full time most new vehicle manuals recommend, which is way longer than I recommend. I change the oil in all my cars, and my larger liquid cooled motorcycles every 3 months or 3000 miles, whichever comes first. And when you compare new oil to oil which has been in an engine for 3 months/3000 miles, the used oil is always a LOT darker. Whether it is synthetic or conventional. My engines tend to last a LONG time, because I properly maintain them, not because I use super expensive oil in them. My Vino 125 still runs like new, after being run with SuperTech oil for 20,000 miles, changed every 3 months/1000 miles. And most of those miles were at WOT. Now if the tires would just last that long.

UPDATE PCX 150 Surprised theis scooter doesnt get more atttention on here. It really is a nice scooter. ... . PCX is really worth considering if you want to get your feet wet and spend under 4 K- . I never figured out the hook thingy under the seat for the helmet--it fits under the seat- yes- but sometimes circumstances call for hanging it off the hook. I bent it upwards a tad to enable hanging it on the hook. it works but finesse required to get the helmet strap "D" ring over it. The engne light came on 2 times in the 3100 miles ive ridden it so far. suspect light is temp related. followed the manual, set for 5 min and drove off-- no issues. The cooleant level appears normal..The fasterners Honda uses for the misc. removable plastic covers-- "screws" appear to be nothing more than plastic pins that will dissapear all too easily. looking it over it does seem odd there is a thin rubber drain hose hanging out the bottom with the end factory pinched sealed. dont know what to make of that ... I secretly (or not) so secretly look at other, larger motorcycles but truthfully, this thing meets 98% of my commuting and pleasure riding needs. Id like to have a biggger beast in the garage due to testosterone level but reality is one bike or the other will just collect dust .Also wonder how much difference a windscreen will make? The cold weather we have now is keeping me off it plus I have my mama's geo prism to drive ..... As for the Metropolitan, well, the wife is ready for a bigger ride so, not sure what to do, I guess keep it and get a vespa for her or maybe her buddie with 35 motorcycles in garage has something she'd like... ....She's gotta be retro cool nevertheless...

This thread needs pics.

OK....



Too bad these aren't PCX 300's. I'd own two by now.