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I started this topic last night and now in my search for my first bike. I have been browsing on ebay and keep coming across these 200cc no name bikes that they say are street legal and dirt cheap. Wondering if anyone has any experience or input on anything along these lines as I want to start on a 250 or something similar. I dont know if these woud give me the same feel as a 250 ninja or should I just say screw it and pick a ninja up??

High weight, short rough runways.

Makes sense. Thanks

djbrown01 wrote:I started this topic last night and now in my search for my first bike. I have been browsing on ebay and keep coming across these 200cc no name bikes that they say are street legal and dirt cheap. Wondering if anyone has any experience or input on anything along these lines as I want to start on a 250 or something similar. I dont know if these woud give me the same feel as a 250 ninja or should I just say screw it and pick a ninja up??

There's a young guy on the board uses the handle "intotherain". He used to have one of those 200cc Chinese bikes, send him a PM, he'll tell you his experience.

jstark47 wrote:

djbrown01 wrote:I started this topic last night and now in my search for my first bike. I have been browsing on ebay and keep coming across these 200cc no name bikes that they say are street legal and dirt cheap. Wondering if anyone has any experience or input on anything along these lines as I want to start on a 250 or something similar. I dont know if these woud give me the same feel as a 250 ninja or should I just say screw it and pick a ninja up??

There's a young guy on the board uses the handle "intotherain". He used to have one of those 200cc Chinese bikes, send him a PM, he'll tell you his experience.

intotherain wrote:CHINA BIKE BAD, KOREA GOOD, JAPAN GOOD
DONT GET LIFAN or any of those chinese bikes.

I have to tighten almost every single thing on that bike every week. Everything comes loose, the chooke holder, handlebars, pegs, wheel. Its quite scary.

I had the same sit. as you where I just wanted a cheap bike to start with, but now I just wish I saved up for 1 more month and gotten a ninja 260 or 500.

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djbrown01 wrote:I started this topic last night and now in my search for my first bike. I have been browsing on ebay and keep coming across these 200cc no name bikes that they say are street legal and dirt cheap. Wondering if anyone has any experience or input on anything along these lines as I want to start on a 250 or something similar. I dont know if these woud give me the same feel as a 250 ninja or should I just say screw it and pick a ninja up??

I've been fixing a lot of these Chinese no-name bikes for friends and neighbors that thought they were a good deal. They're a nightmare. The tipoff is that they usually come with a 6 month, parts only warranty (which is likely to be used, IF you can find the seller). Generally, the build quality is shoddy. It is not unusually for parts to fall off or weird electrical gremlins to pop up soon after purchase. In my opinion, they are a waste of money. I know of a few people who have ridden several thousand miles on one of these bikes with only minor problems. On the other hand, I know three times as many that had major problems in the first thousand miles.

When one of my friends asks about these bikes, I tell them to do what they want, but I'm done fixing Chinese junk in my garage. After I found a head gasket that had been cut from a soda can, that was the last straw.

A soda can headgasket is hilarious. Bonus points if you were drinking the same beverage as the gasket was made out of.

Skier wrote:A soda can headgasket is hilarious. Bonus points if you were drinking the same beverage as the gasket was made out of.

Not possible. I actually had to do a bit of searching on the net to identify it. The gasket was clearly made from a Sprite can, but it had flames all over it. After some research, I found that it is a spicy brand of Sprite sold in China.