I am very close to buying an ATV/UTV and The CFMoto looks very appealing. Anyone have any first had takes on them?

Mark

 

Wow! Nothing at all from anyone? Seems like they have a decent following in Canada and Europe. I have read some really positive feedback, and a few horror stories. Seems like the really bad stories are mostly 2nd hand accounts.

Just looking for some honest first hand accounts on how they have performed.

I am really not interested in hard trail riding or mods/upgrades, so the lack of aftermarket stuff does not bother me. I just want a decent mule for riding around my property thats low maintenance and wont cost me a fortune to buy and service.

 

Caveeagle, what is your projected budget? Sport, ute, 4x4? I have never owned nor even seen a CFMOTO in the wild. They seem to be a bigger manufacturer, they definitely are spending advertising money in the rags. Still I would hesitate to put the words low cost and low maintenance with anything out of mainland China just yet. Some get lucky, some don't. Decades of personal experience has shown you are generally better off buying a 10 to 20 year old Japanese quad.

 

I would like to know this too. I can't find much at all on them. I did come across a site where someone said they took one through water, and it got in the electrical connections. That concerns me.


They look good, and they include a lot of features that's not found standard on anything else. To me, though, the price is not low enough to make me want to buy one over a brand I know.


The dealer that I bought my Outlander from now sells them, but I have not been by to look at any first hand. I first saw one last year when I was in the car at a gas station, and a guy pulled up with one on a trailer. I immediately pulled out my phone to look up any info. The strange thing is the one I saw was a camo 300, but I have not found ANY mention of a CFMOTO 300 any where. I know that it was a 300 though because it was right beside me, and it was smaller in size.

 

Not an easy question to answer. I have around 10-11k that I could spend on this, but don't really want to spend more than 8/9k on a new unit.

Leaning towards a 4x4 ATV, although I can see advantage of a SxS.

Only reason I am even considering this, is we walked into the Arctic Cat dealer thats 10 mins away from me. They seemed to have a nice selection on hand, and they actually looked really nice. I saw NOTHING that looked cheap about them. (to my eye)

I think that's a little unfair in this case. I have done a fair amount of research on this over the last couple days. I would not lump CFM into the same bucket as hisun and a couple of the other chinese 'no-name' clone brands. They seem to have a developped dealer network in Canada and europe. And, although there some outward appearance commonalities, It seems like these units are really unique creations. Shoot, look at the alum A-arms on the 800 ATV. Those suckers are beefy and way stronger looking than anything else I have seen.

Understand your point. I just have found the pricing on used ATV/UTVs to be pretty high. And the few that I have seen in person all need >$1,500-$2,000 worth of repairs, plus the issue of unknown issues that might crop up.

Seems like buying a used ATV is a little more risky than getting a used car or motorcycle. Folks tend to beat up their toys, right?

Don't get me wrong.. I am still very hesitant on this. My questions are just a little different than most, and I don't seem to be getting answers.

Here are a few that come to mind..
-How is the dealer network doing? Growing/declining?
-Can I get parts?
-How many have been sold?
-Anything chronically wrong with the motors or trannys or components?
-Is the aftermarket getting on board? I see a Two Brothers exhaust.. but what else
-How much are people paying for them new?

 

Dirt Trax Television seems to like them. I value their opinion. I have a CF Moto relatively near me over near St Louis. Their prices on new units are a little less than something like a Yamaha or Polaris but not really significantly less. The z-force side by side looks pretty nice though. Its very similar to a Polaris rzr but costs quite a bit less. Heres a couple of their videos about cf moto. and They look to be quality machines but yes I have never seen anyone who has one so reliability is a bit of an unknown. They were including a free 5 year warranty with some of their models so it seems that they have confidence in their machine at least.

 

If the dealer doesn't keep parts on hand it may take a long time to get them from China. I would ask the dealer about this. Personally I would spend a little more and get something made in North America or Japan. If you do buy one I'd like to see how it holds up for you since I've never heard of them.

 

A friend of mine in Montana has one of the CF Moto side by sides, about 10 years old, bought used. I believe it's 600cc and is a dead ringer for a Razor. He had a few problems with it that were due to poor assembly and a previous owner who was mechanically challenged. Wheel alignment was WAY OFF so front tires wore out in a couple hundred miles. Master cylinder was clogged which prevented the brakes from releasing completely. Air filter came loose from the carb and it was driven through hundreds of miles in dusty conditions, but it still runs and doesn't use oil.

I own several Chinese motorcycles and a quad and IMO they're a great value if you're mechanically inclined. Those who don't know a carb from a CDI should probably steer clear.

 

All the new models I have looked at are EFI. Their ATV/UTV claim to Delphi EFI and fuel pumps and their motorcycle uses a DUCATI EFI system. Ducs are pretty high end Italian bikes, so it does not seem like they are going for the cheapest components.

Are CVT tranny's the norm? I have worked on several Saturns and the GM CVT experiment was an outright failure. So, that has me a little wary.

 

99% of utility ATVs and many SxS, maybe all of them, are CVTs. Most people don't have any problems with them.