Fortnine review uses Yin Xiang quality as stand-in for all Chinese bikes--thoughts?

[dsh]

They analyzed first-service oil samples from bikes from 12 manufacturers, including a Yin Xiang. The Yin Xiang's results were, quite frankly, awful.



"The Chinese motor was so full of shit it broke the fancy microscope... Seriously, these are just the contaminants from a quarter of our sample. The lab software couldn't analyze any more, so they tested 25 milliliters and multiplied by four. Remember that we're talking about carbon and metal shavings but also cloth fibers, sand from molds, plastic from packaging--all things you'd find in an assembly area but not things you'd want in a cleanly- and precisely-built motor. While most samples play in the hundreds of thousands, Yin Xiang hits 11,880,000 particles. The only other bikes in the millions, unsurprisingly, are Italian: Aprilia and Ducati.... The small particles mean grinding, blasting, abrasion, premature wear; medium particulate will cause actual mechanical alterations like scratching and imprinting, while the biggest stuff can lead to clogging and engine failure--all bad. We tried to count particles even larger than that, but our results were skewed because the Chinese and Italian motors are so grubby, their particles clump together and fool our microscope into seeing one big contaminant."

I generally like Fortnine's content, but I think the fact that he's using Yin Xiang and then implying that it's representative of all Chinese motorcycles is...not great. From what I can tell, they're not top-tier even among Chinese manufacturers.

I'd love to see a test like this done on some CSC (Zongshen) and Lifan motorcycles.

Thoughts?

[krat]

Shoot the messenger?

The oil that is shipped from the factory in our china bikes is trash and we all know it. That is why we drain it before we crank the engines, replace it with "good oil", and then change that after 100 miles. According to Ryan we should be flushing it repeatedly before starting the motor.

I changed mine back in April and found it black as soot after only 300 miles last summer. I had the same condition in a used scooter I bought during the winter. 900 miles and the oil was black.

He is testing the oil in the bikes, not the mechanical quality of the materials or build. He also trashed Aprilia and Ducati for the condition of their oil, not the quality of their bikes. He is simply telling you that the conditions under which the motor was produced, or the oil used to fill it, was filthy.

The trash in the "shipping oil" (no it is not break in oil) combined with the lack of a real filter in 90% of the china motors is a recipe for premature wear. We all know this and should be taking precautions during assembly and doing frequent oil changes.

The fact that your bike was made in the next city down the road, or that you paid more for it, does not exempt you from the possibility that your oil is crap.

The real moral of this story is that you should be buying bikes made in India!

[China Rider 27]

Interesting. I settled on a break in procedure that uses hours of use with mileage. I change the oil before initial startup, again at 1 hours use, again at 4 hours, and then at 250 miles, then to 500.