Thread: Quad Advice

Originally Posted by Ingrid 51

As am I, but being very cautious. I’ve expressed interest in three machines in the 350 - 500 cc range. Two vendors said they would get back to me, but didn’t. Third advertised (fb mkt place) a mint unit and wanted $$ sent before I saw it. Reg flags appeared when I noticed USA plated vehicles in the background.

Yep i would alway be cautious on scam book! Hard to find a machine the owner actually knows what it has been used for!

Originally Posted by Ingrid 51

As am I, but being very cautious. I’ve expressed interest in three machines in the 350 - 500 cc range. Two vendors said they would get back to me, but didn’t. Third advertised (fb mkt place) a mint unit and wanted $$ sent before I saw it. Reg flags appeared when I noticed USA plated vehicles in the background.

Very common scam on FB, you can spot the frauds because near new quads selling for bugger all. The old saying if it seems too good to be true then it probably is

Originally Posted by kingscoatkiwi

Not wanting to hijack roadtrippers thread but anybody got a cf moto and what are your thoughts

Late reply and a big hijack post myself, but...

I bought a new CF Moto X520 in early 2020, $6.9k at the time - bought purely because it was cheap and no powersteering, all the bells and whistles, indicators, USB power, locking rear diff, mirrors, good capacity.
The equivalents for size and features were I'm pretty sure like $16/18k. Honda/Suzuki.

Used lightly on the farm for a bit, then 3 years in Mackenzie country bouncing around the riverbeds and crawling up and down the hills.
Took it through the tasman with water over the wheels many times and had it on inclines I wouldn't even feel like walking.
Thousands of hours sitting idle in the winter to keep my arse warm and the handle bar heaters from draining the battery.

The only time it let me down I had the ignition on and bar heaters/lights running for however many days and it needed a jump to get started.


In the first year down south I changed the factory belt out, aftermarket one wasn't great so I swapped back to the factory one again after a few months and its still going strong, wear looks ok.
I've changed all the oils and filter only twice, and it was early on, not much done last couple years.

Been extremely slack on maintenance and it's still going like a champion.
I will cut it off and start it up dozens of times a night with the kill switch at any manner or revs or speed, starter sounds mint still, and never needed to top up coolant, brake fluid, pads, etc.

I owe it a visit to a proper mechanic though... no doubt there's a laundry list of things which could be fixed.

When I was bothering to open it up and keep it tidy, it was extremely easy to work on. CF Moto themselves have a full video library for mechanics on youtube, so you can do it all yourself easy as.


Negatives :

It would run away if you didn't ride the throttle or brakes (or both) on the downhills, typical CVT thing. I can comfortably ride the throttle down some serious inclines in low, but not in high.

Exhaust runs real hot, absolutely awesome in winter when its -10 to have a furnance under your arse and on your legs, but in summer its not so nice. We're talking poached egg temperatures on the seat.
- I've had a wrap kit for the exhaust on the shelf for 4 years, see : slack on maintenance.

The constant stop/start of shooting has caused one of the clutch exterior shrouds, or whatever its called, to start round out the hexagonal cutout, not yet enough to negatively affect its use.

The plastic underbody protection got annihilated by bouncing off river rocks, but that's not the quads fault.

It's not a lightweight machine, probably 350kg with quad bar, rests, boxes, fuel.


----

I'm under the impression that they've done alot to improve the super hot exhausts with recent models (they claim like 40% less heat to the rider?), which is pretty much the only real complaint I would have about the quad.
I find most people with a negative opinion owned one prior to the model I bought or have zero experience at all. Having it on the trailer 4/5 days a week alot of random people at the fuel pump would come up to me and ask what brand/model it was and say it looked the job after I told them it was a lovely piece of chinese machinery.


They're super popular in some parts of the states, with mechanics/users there producing great youtube content absolutely thrashing the heck out of theirs.


If this one dies I'll have no problem buying a new model. And honestly I'm kind of neglecting it because I do want to upgrade to a newer CF Moto and the thing breaking would be a convenient excuse.

I wouldn't touch a secondhand older model CF Moto 'with a barge pole' though.

I talk with a lot of dairy farmers that have CF Moto four wheelers for a cheap second tow bike and a large majority are surprised at how much abuse they can take and quality compared to a bike double or triple the price

There are 2 of them on a farm I’m a director of. They are fine. Warranty has fixed a couple of glitches with the SBS. No more expensive to run than a Cam Am. 400 quad is fairly new and is fine. Shit tyres on it though. Quad hard to fault. But even the agent doesn’t recommend them for constant hard slog.