A Chinese 150cc Scooter Saga

There's a good reason for that. There was a 30% across the board pay increase for rural chinese factory workers earlier this year. Pretty massive. Some of them are actually pulling down $300+ a month now. When they are payed enough to qualify as poverty level the scoots will be $3995.

Damn, thats more than I made in my 1st job after highschool. I made $200 a month but that was in 1962.

There is a design flaw in the 150cc GY6 that causes high pressure in the crankcase, and most manufacturers don't vent it properly. You can get a vent kit that goes where the dipstick is from partsforscooters.com that will vent it. One of them has a catch container for oil that returns it to the engine, and is good if you are riding the thing WFO all the time. The one that just vents up is fine for most people, and can be installed in about ten minutes. Of course it comes with no instructions.

I agree with the wisdom of using 20-50 in these things, or even straight 50 weight during a
Texas summer. They are designed for stop and go traffic in an urban setting, and not to run at full throttle for miles at a time.

Mine had the high pressure crankcase issue. It simply drained oil out of the air box. I never did resolve it before I sold it.

So, what happened with the OP and his scooter?

Still going. My buddy's Siadic nerve has been killing him for the past couple of weeks so not much scooter mileage. Just had to add air to the tires. That's it for now.

Nice write up, whats the mileage at now?

The cheap scooter is back in my hands. It needed some work. Carb cleaning, rear brakes, mirrors and inspection. Now it is back on the road. The guys at the inspection place took it joy riding. Yikes! Mileage now over 5,000.

Floor mats starting to peel up?

The aluminum part is bent and holds it up on the edges. Without that trim it would lay flat.

Is that garage going to be featured in a future episode of the Hoarders?

Ah, I see.

I'd heard about people having trouble with them.

Ladies and Gent post 291 features a TROLL in there natural habitat, making themselves feel better by knocking others down... wow probably a former school yard bullie too!!! s

Wondered what happened to ya clayjars, glad to see the machine is still making ya happy.

This is a great report. Thanks for sharing.

I think the idea of placing all Chinese scooters in the same pile of quality is not very accurate. I'm sure the quality varies greatly from factory to factory, and day to day. Worker to worker, for that matter.

I learned something about bicycles from China. Pretty much all the mass production bicycles in the US are made by China workers in a total of only 5 factories. Some of the highest quality US bike company frames come from China, but they're built to very tight tolerance and high specifications. In the same factory they make crappy Walmart bikes too.

For $888 shipped to your door? At least $700 of that has to be shipping and profit.

I'd really like to know how many different factories make this GY6-150 motor. I also find it amazing that it's so standardized. There has to be over 20 different brands that use the same motor. I find the whole thing incredibly interesting.

Thanks again for sharing, and I think 5,000 miles is a success. It takes some tinkering, but I'm sure this is repeatable.

-Kevin

I did not realize how many parts these have in common, either. Thanks for the education

Over the last couple of years the prices for these scooters were around $700 from a company in Milan, IN called Dirt Cheap ATV's. These were in the crate prices. They're not showing any prices on their web site right now but they advertise in the weekly local ad paper called the Indy Auto & RV (section B). I haven't seen a price on these particular scooters lately. Another distributor here in Indy decided to blow them out to the public and priced them at just over $600. These were the full prices less state sales tax.

It was damned tempting to buy one at these prices. What was funny was my neighbor paid around $1500 on-line for his and was really bummed when I showed him the ad selling them for less than half of what he paid...

Has anyone bought a 150cc scooter and found the carburetor's float bowl screws of the non-removable security type that are brought to torque and then the heads break off? I worked on a neighbor kid's 50cc Tao-Tao and was surprised to find it had these screws on his carburetor. I was able to remove them by milling the remaining screw head surface flat and then drilling them out.

...anyway if anyone encounters these float bowl screws on a 150 please holler.

My Kymco Super 8 has a 150cc GY6 motor. Over 7,100 miles and it hasn't missed a beat. I've changed the oil, spark plug, air filter and adjusted the valves. That's it. There is nothing wrong with the basic design of the GY6, it's just a matter of manufacturing quality, or lack there of.

Yes, you are right, the GY6 is very stout, but when it comes to generic Chinese scooters there are no guarantees.

The requirements set by Kymco for parts to meet quality control are much higher than those set for generic engines. You might get lucky and get an engine that had good components on it and will last as long as a Kymco, or you might get one with a few crappier parts, like the one on my Chinese scoot.

I'm actually ready, eager to get rid of mine.

I had a similar situation on my Ford Escort (stop laughing please). I encountered the good old security torx. The first one I did like you and painfully drilled the center post with my drill, sweating balls that I wouldn't ruin the torx threads. The second I tork my grinder and made a big slit and used a flat head screw driver and had it out in 5 seconds. (grinder 1, drill 0).


As I stripped the torx heads in front of a buddy on my harley brake calipers, I learned that harbor freight sells the security torx drivers. I still like my grinder.