There are many reasons I strongly, strongly dislike Chinese scooters. For one, I think they're hideous. Just as China has become famous (infamous?) for churning out ugly, shoddy copies of designer handbags, they have become notorious in the scooter world for mass-manufacturing ugly, reverse-engineered, cheap bikes that sound as bad as they look.

That sound that wakes you from a sound slumber, the one that sounds like a weed whacker with a two-dollar expansion chamber? It's probably a Baja sc50 or a Geely Falcon tearing around your neighborhood.

But I feel it is important to explain to everyone, once and for all, that not all aversions to the Chinese scooter can be chalked up to simple snobbery. It's not just that they are ugly and cheap and noisy. It's also that they are often dangerous, sometimes illegal, and usually peddled by the worst kind of sleazy online dealers.

A lot of people have accused scooter shops of elitism when they refuse to work on Chinese scoots, citing the fact that not everybody can shell out over two grand for a new bike and why should they be blamed for wanting to save a few bucks on gas and on their scooter purchase?

For one thing, taking your Lance Charming (pictured above) to our dealership or to the Yamaha or Honda place would be a little like taking your Kia to the local Mercedes dealership for repairs. Since we're not a Lance dealer (brick-and-mortar Lance dealerships don't exist, by the way), we can't acquire your parts. And don't be fooled by anyone who says otherwise- all scooters are not created equal and the parts from our Taiwanese-made bikes will not just "cross over" to Chinese-made bikes. A Spectra may look like a C-Class, but the Benz ignition coil isn't going to fit.

(A quick note here on why Taiwanese bikes and Chinese bikes are NOT the same: Taiwan is a province of The People's Republic of China, but most government is controlled at the local and city levels. Additionally, Taiwan's economy allows for far, far higher quality workmanship. Taiwan's per capita income was recorded as around $29,000 in 2006, while China's hovered around $2000. Taiwan also enforces copyright laws and China does not. This explains the knock-offs and copycatting the Chinese scooter market is known for.)

Now add to this the fact that most Chinese bikes are not sold through any kind of dealer network and are mostly sold mail-order from the Internet. At least when you bought the Kia, you know you can walk back into the dealership you got it from and chew out the fresh-faced young go-getter you bought it from if it breaks in two weeks. When you buy a vehicle off the Internet, your options are virtually nonexistent for any kind of warranty claims. Sure, they may offer parts availability, but you are likely to be states away from the warehouse, and scooter and motorcycle shops in your town will likely not install them for you.

The basic truth is that Chinese bikes were no more meant to be repaired and maintained than your Chinese toaster, microwave or DVD player. China has made fortunes upon fortunes on the fact that they sell things that function for a short period of time, and when they break, you throw them out. As this page from Pride of Cleveland Scooters explains, most of the parts you can get online for cheap Chinese bikes are going to be the same quality as the ones that will inevitably break in the first place. Why replace bad parts with more bad parts? And while installing the parts, the build quality of Chinese bikes typically guarantees that you will break or damage several body panels and poorly-alloyed metal bits trying to get at the part you are trying to fix.

Chinese manufacturers cut costs at every chance, and this affects not only the quality of the scoot itself but the quality of what comes out of the scooter. Namely, emissions. Several online dealers swear up and down to conform to EPA standards, but emissions standards also vary from state to state. Stories like this one have popped up with increasing frequency since China became a tour de force in the cheap scooter market. Many unwitting customers have spent up to and over $1000 on a scoot that turns out to be illegal to register in their state. 

Going back to our car analogy, it's like this: would anyone, in their right mind, purchase a car that came in a box of bits to be assembled by the purchaser, from a shady online dealer offering some flimsy 30-day warranty and nothing more than parts availability as a "guarantee" of aftersales service?

If you are buying a scooter, you are buying not just a source of transportation but something you quite literally trust your life to as you head out into the fanged maw of Denver traffic every day. And when you're heading down Colfax at 40 mph or so, it's better to be comforted (rather than nervous) about the fact that you nearly always get what you pay for.