I've been looking around in the states, and on ebay for a bike out there (I'm from the UK) and i've stumbled across the X-keleton Beast. Does anyone have any experience with this bike? I found the X-keleton website - but it was all flashy with barely anything about the bike! The only place I've seen these to buy is on ebay...always under 2000, usually under 1500

thoughts?

Thanks, Joe

Go to www.thumpertalk.com Register with them and put in search and Jetmoto. Two prominent threads have been started about similar Chinese-made bikes, the jetmoto thread, and Yamoto thread. A few of the respondents own the Roketa brand bikes, which seem to be the same manufacturer as the X-keleton. They seem to offer more troubles than the other GY-series bikes offered by other Chinese-made brands. Zongshen, Lifan, Jetmoto, and a few others seem to offer a slightly better similar product for around the same money. Most companies use the Lifan engines. I would try the Lifan GY-200-5. You can see the specs at www.americanlifan.com A company called www.evosales.com will sell you one for $1399 shipped to your house. you don't say what state you are in, but you will generally have a more difficult time registering these bikes in California, and most of the companies will not ship a bike to a California address. Look at yahoo groups: ChinaBikes (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ChinaBikes/ ); Jetmotogroup ( http://autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/jetmotogroup/ )for more info. Assume your bike is a Roketa branded bike and read up on those. Don't expect too much out of these bikes, but they should get you around shorter distances with no problems. Read the posts about which front and rear sprockets to change to to get better top speed out of them.

I forgot to mention, go to www.roketa.com for information about the Roketa, and the specs should be the same for the X-Keleton. There is a place selling the Roketas, shipped to your house, for $999 for the rear drum brake model, and $1099 for the rear disk model. You would have to dig through the Jetmoto thread and the Yamoto thread on www.thumpertalk.com to get the retailer's site name if you wanted one, as I can't find the link myself. You could try thumpertalk, search for X-Keleton and Roketa as well to see if someone began a thread about these bikes. Again, based on actual owners postings, the Roketa is not a bad bike, but seems to have more troubles than the other Chinese bikes when it comes to fit and finish and electrical issues, but the engine is extremely reliable as it is a Lifan 200cc unit.

Sorry for the late reply, I went with a Honda XR 250r in the end, it seems that the year i got (1990) also puts out 30 horses. Which is a bit more than the 19-24 for later models (it seems)

I think you'll have a good bike there. I am getting one of the Chinese enduros as an evaluation to see the good and bad points. The 200cc engine size is definitely a limiting factor, especially on the US open roads. On my Yahoo group, Jetmotogroup, there is a gentleman from the UK who owns a Hongdou 200cc enduro as his only vehicle, and seems pleased with it so far on the British roads.

Member 'toowheels' from Vancouver, B.C. just rode near here last week on his KLR 650 (not sure if it's the same model name in the UK). He broke down due to a bad stator, and had to spend over $700 dollars US to fix it. He was just near the US/Mexican border, and was lucky that it didn't happen south of the border! He just emailed me from San Felipe, and is doing ok. I suggested to you to get hold of him for the time when you get near the west coast and he should be able to give you British Columbia advice, if not ride with you when you are his way. He's not through with this trip right now as he will be in Baja, Mexico for a few weeks before heading back through here, but I am pretty sure he will be home by the time you ride that way. But I also wanted you to be aware that mechanical things can go wrong, so carry extra $$ or credit card for such unforseen events, especially as your bike is 16 years old. Have a good ride!!

t his is a two-fold beware: stay away from the ebay Beast X-keleton. Don't know if it's good or bad, but the seller wouldn't let me take it around the block until I'd paid for it--I had cash--and the bike already had 140 miles. Worse, I drove 180 miles to get there near Orlando. More worse he still wanted to charge me freight $250 and a setup fee. FINALLY his ebay rating was 97 percent, I dinged him and sent that to ebay, this morning his ebay rating was 100%!!!!! His ID changed by three digits added on.
Moral of the story: buy only what you can pick up or have no qualms about.
I drive an NX650, was looking to downsize ofallthings, but felt strongly about this scammer that after google picked up your site, I figured you should get the alert.

Little Joe is going with an older Honda enduro. I wouldn't write off all ebay dealers, but I would definitely go with the open minded ones...the ones that say that you can save on the shipping charges if you pick it up yourself, or offer their products locally in addition to ebay...in other words, you can test ride it first.

I personally am going with a Jetmoto enduro because I know people have ordered from the company directly, and were pleased with the product. (Plus the price is only $1450 shipped to my house which is less than a down payment on a big brand bike). My riding needs right now are such that I don't have to commit to a huge thumper that has been race proven in Paris-Dakar, but that may change in a few years.

Let me how it goes with your bike simon, I'm interested, I think i may buy one when i get back to the uk since they seem like a good deal (if they are well built)

Joe

Joe,

Link to my group, Jetmotogroup. Join if you feel like it, as there is (or should be) no catch, and I have not had to deal with any Yahoo spam as of yet. One of the members is from the UK, and owns a Hongdou 200cc enduro, which is a Lifan branded bike. I think he spent 800 pounds (sterling) for the bike, and uses it as his sole transportation, and is very pleased with it so far. The only trouble he reported is that the exhaust rusted up on him, and had to be replaced. I am not sure if that is true of the "higher-end" bikes as well, being as the climate is much wetter, but I can imagine one that costs 800 quid brand new is going to have some compromises. It seems, looking at the UK Ebay, that shipping and registration of these bikes is a much easier endeavor, too. I'll keep you posted, and link up to my group to see photos, etc.

http://autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/jetmotogroup/