Hmmmmm.....I haven't seen any bickering....just points of view, typical guy talk about their equipment. Hope we are not becoming "politically correct here". My statements about the 450i being faster is easily read about in various forums from other manufacturers. Many posters have commented about a Kymco 450i outrunning them up to around 30 mph then the bigger engines take over. many comments from Polaris owners with the 570, Honda owners with the 500, Yamaha rhino owners with the 660, and yes the new John Deere 590i has taken a slight back seat...all based on comments from their owners. I would also like to see an official drag race in a regulated setup but for now I thought we were just shooting the bull with one another doing a little bragging about our own machines.

 

Ok good. you admit your just BSing. That would explain the lack of sources for the claims you make lol. Still waiting on the reliability index that shows Kymco is the least problematic brand and I'm waiting to see some info about the kymco 4x4 racing championships. Ive searched and couldn't find anything on it. I can't find info on anything you claim

 

I guess this Asaran character just likes to be contrary. He just wants to disagree with everyone else just for the sake of disagreement. Just ignore him and he might go away.

 

After his last post....I have already forgotten who he is..

 

Kymco 450i, you have hit on an excellent point that most miss out on. How a given machine is used has a huge impact on perception in the users eyes. Most utv are geared very low, like you have seen they can hustle up to 25 or 30 mph usually. In the tight northeast where I live, that is plenty fast in the woods and enough to keep time in the open reasonable. My wildcat will do 45 in low, I almost never get above that when using high.

Asaran, I have seen a few favorable Kymco reviews and long term tests in the rags. Specifically the mongoose models have been ran in 24 hour events and endured well. I ran into a group that had a maxxer last summer and they had done a lot of work to it, but they also admitted it was used as a mud bogger and had been run hard.

 

I think at the point anything other than the Chinese models are pretty reliable. Even some of those aren't too bad if you don't mind fixing minor things that seem to wear out that don't normally wear out quickly. At least the parts are very cheap. I think at this point, Kymco has been around long enough to garner a good deal of respect. They probably don't sell as many utvs as someone like Polaris because they don't have as many dealers in the U.S. People will many times simply buy from their local dealer regardless of what they sell because its more convenient to deal with them. If their local dealer is a Yamaha dealer, that's what they buy. If its a Polaris dealer, they buy a Polaris and so on. My local dealer sells almost every brand now. They keep Kawasaki, Arctic Cat, Yamaha and Suzuki on hand and the owner also owns a Polaris and Honda dealer at another location so if say I wanted a new Rzr 570 for instance, I'm sure one would be sent to that dealer if they knew I was serious about buying it. They did that recently for a customer who bought a new Pioneer 1000. I think the brand bashing should be kept to yourself. All the machines have their good points. I'll admit I've dogged Honda a bit for being underpowered but numbers can lie a bit when the power is being delivered more efficiently. The difference doesn't feel as great as the hp numbers says. A 50" Pioneer 700 would be a great model to add to the lineup I think, just a suggestion. Keep the paddle shifters, just offer the 700 as a higher end engine option over the 500. Sometimes people will buy the machine that "feels" the best to them. That differs from person to person.

 

Lack of dealers is a big problem for Kymco, I know that if you are a Polaris dealer the Polaris people will not allow you to sell the Kymco products other than scooters. I have had two dealers within 75 miles of me tell me that same thing. Now because Polaris is such a big seller the dealer has no choice but to drop the Kymco line or loose their franchise. My Kymco dealer tried for years to get the franchise but the Kymco people do not want their dealers closer then 100 miles apart, So when the defiance dealer was forced by Polaris to discontinue his Kymco line, my current dealer was able to pick it up. Many Kymco dealers are listed in an older phone book but when I called them this was the story I was given, they all liked the Kymco brand and had no problem selling them but Polaris and some other mfgs would not allow the competition in the same dealership. I am just glad that we have so many different machines to choose from, they may be all the same but yet each one is different.

 

Back in 87 when my shop took on the Polaris line Polaris made an effort to have franchises to single line dealers like ourselves and not to multi line dealers that would use Polaris models as a step child against their main bread and butter line. We also had "verbal" guarantees that dealers would be no closer than 75-100 miles apart also. All went well for a few years until we found out a multi line dealer south of us had also taken Polaris on. We along with several other dealers tried to fight it to no avail. It didn't take Polaris long to be right up there with the Big Four as far as sales and that's when things really started changing and getting more competitive.I can see it from one side and also the other as far as new brands trying to get into the main stream of things and it's hard. Kymco was the one that seemed to stick it out,they didn't fade away like many others did and you're beginning to see more and more places taking them on. First one in our area that did was a Yamaha dealer and didn't have too much luck the first few years,but now last I heard was having good success with this line. A lot of this depends on location also,the larger the area,the more diversified you can get. That is if you're not restricted by one of the Big Five as to what you can carry.

 

I do have a Polaris dealer about 30 miles from me that also sells Kymco. They do have the scooters as you mentioned but they also carry atvs and utvs. The other 2 dealers that carry Kymco in my immediately area, about 60 and 75 miles away respectively, only carry the scooters. I guess they are more than 100 miles from each other, just all fall within 100 miles from me. But within that 100 mile radius there are 7 Polaris dealers I believe. Its just hard to compete with Polaris for sales volume when they are everywhere.