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There’s no reason to own one of these
I’d rather get a Suzuki, Kawi, or Beta 450 for that price.
That’s a difficult price point. I’m positive that I could find a clean, 2020 or newer, used 450 with around 50 hours on it for the same OTD amount. Feels like used would be less risk and better performance than a new Kove?
It all depends I guess. Some people aren’t comfortable buying used.
They have brought to market a price point bike people have been asking for for years. We’ll see if the market actually wants it or if that was just BS.
they aren’t for the most serious racer but for a lot of people I bet they’d be just fine. Their rally bike seems to be a good machine as well fwiw.
Some people will just never get past the fact its Chinese.
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You can get new KX450s for cheaper. Seems insane to get a new untested brand when you have options like that available
I think they missed the mark on the price. 5-6k, then I could see them grabbing newer riders, or even vet riders that just want a bike to ride around on with their kids
But at 8k, as others have said, nah I’ll get a kawi/suzuki
Yeah it'll be a tough sell at that price but it being msrp I'm sure you'll be able to get them cheaper . The 250 is 6g I believe. Dirt Bike magazine has done 1st impressions on both bikes and they say they're pretty good . At least they don't seem to be carbon copies of any other bike . Maybe Prado should try one .
Yep a lot of people do think that way. That’s getting the Kawi/suzuki at discounts because they are leftovers etc. the same thing could happen to these so the 5-6k price point might happen. If you buy a brand new kx when they are first released you are paying a premium.
maybe we don’t need cheaper bikes after all. ?
Kove putting downward price pressure on the likes of Kawi and Suzuki isn't going to keep me up at night.
I didn’t ride it but did watch it a few times with a few fast locals on it. They didn’t seem to have any problems with it.
Pretty cool they offered up the bike to ride.
Like others have shared I would just get a left over 24-25 Kawi.
You sure about 43mm fork? No way that thing is still in production. Even the 46mm open chamber was last seen on yz/yzf 20 years ago.
On the italian video it looks like regular 48mm twin chamber.
Vid from yesterday I just ran across
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOEMgp7gaPm/?igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==
I doubt that as well. Kove (and GPX) use 48's and 49's on all of their other full size bikes.
No im not positive. I haven’t seen in person just going off what I saw in writing. I agree the 43mm would seem strange. Could just be an error though. From the dirt bike mag website:
It's a 43mm AOS.
The open chamber 43mm are still in production too. KLX300s (among lots of others) come equipped with them
They will move up in my personal estimation after 1-2 years of reports of these being as solid as a brick shithouse.
Until then I will avoid like the plague.
Just one opinion.
This is a good thing.
However, the price point bike I’d like to see isn’t a cheaper version of a full performance race bike, the demand for 100% performance is really high in the race bike market and it’s not likely that Kove will be able to compete at that level. (Maybe I’m wrong about that, finishing Dakar is impressive..)
The price point bike that’s still missing in the market is the high performance, simple performance/play bike. Something like the Kove chassis with an air cooled 30-35hp engine that’s easy to maintain and super durable, OC forks, and a $5500 OTD price tag. The modern Hodaka 100 that makes it reachable for entry into the sport, so people can get dirt bike and go riding on a reliable bike long enough to get hooked. No jacked up ergonomics, no squishy suspension, no finicky maintenance. Make the same basic bike for many years so the aftermarket can grow. Something like the Honda XR line was in the 90s when the air cooled XRs were winning Baja races, but they were also cruising around the desert on trial rides
These exist but I'd rather just spend a little more on klx300. I see $10,000 Chinese golf carts and utvs for sale at Lowe's and wonder if people actually buy those things.
Pit Row
The Chinese already build tons of XR-like air-cooled cheap bikes with upgraded suspension/brakes/ergos. That's their main market, and they've gotten good enough at it that the Japanese have effectively abandoned that space. Some are literal XRs produced with XR tooling (bikes with Zonshen engines). And several makes are really reliable.
Plenty of them have good open cartridge forks. They have been building decent forks for a decade now. Same with parts interchange: it's almost universal now between brands, because Chinese manufacturers are more dedicated to platform engineering than the Japanese ever even attempted. You can get incredibly shitty to incredibly great bolt-on stuff for most of their bikes.
That's all typical Chinese shit, what you're asking for. In fact, it is their main target dirtbike market. There's tons of it: go get yourself an Asiawing, an SSR, or a GPX.
The aberration here with Kove is that they are making something engineered instead of parts-binned, somewhat racey and non-XR like. There's dozens of what you ask for, if you actually want one. It is the Kove that is the speciality.
The 250 has been out for at least 2 years now. So that info is probably out there if you go looking for it.
Theres no reason to own any dirt bike really, but here we all are.
Well yeah, but for me, there’s so many good bikes cheaper right now. There’s a lot of buyer remorse with dirt bikes. So you end up having 1-2 yo bikes for (roughly 2/3 to) half of the cost of a new one; probably less than the Kove MX450 at $7699.
Now, when they get an SX/MX/MXGP team(s) going, then they might show some promise.
I can fully get behind this. I know theyve done pretty well in the rally classes. Id like to see some MX teams.
It sounds good. The rider in this looks really good
Sounds just like my wife with her burner account
Mr Kove might get a dose of disappointment come end of the year when Mr green bike drops the bottom out of OTD price with 1.95 percent interest. Cause them Green bikes ain’t half bad for the average rider young or old!
The same logic applies to a kove.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wZrOXhWVNCY&pp=ygUdMjAyNSBjaGFybG90dGUgc3VwZXJtb3RvY3Jvc3M%3D
Sounds quite capable. Also sounds like it has a few things to work out, but a good first effort. It will be interesting if they try to field a pro team at some point.
I rode both of them. The biggest POS I have ever ridden. And I am not against chinese bikes, but they were terrible. The water cooled version was close to decent, but I would rather have a KLX 300 every day of the week.
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