I'm starting to believe you get what you pay for when it comes to China bikes. This thing costs about enough to buy 2 Hawks, but..

It came with quality oil in the crankcase, the valves were properly adjusted, the carb didn't require any tuning, cold it fires right up and idles at 1100rpm and the choke is automatic. I checked the disk brake caliper mounting bolts and they already had loctite on them. And the digital speedo is spot on, GPS confirmed.

I've literally had to do nothing to the bike, other than mounting the rear tires and fenders and trunk and mirrors it comes plug and play. But I've researched other Ice Bear products and while being a bit more expensive you get better quality. Even the freaking headlights come perfectly adjusted.

Just a couple of pics from our ride last Thursday. After about 4 hours the variator started chattering/shuddering on low speed acceleration, because the cheap China belt was coming apart. But I got a good kevlar belt to put on it today after I clean up the inside of the CVT.

Damn site still won't upload pics.. >:(

I have pretty much given up on uploading pics and resorted to just posting pics by img links.
[Img]link[/img]

Gates belts are pretty much the standard when it comes to scooters. I think that is what TGB puts in theirs from stock. My 150cc TGB had about 18,000 miles when I had to change out the belt. The 50cc TGB 2T I used for my side job/adventure riding around Hollywood, Cal. last year just ran and ran. I cannot recall how many miles it had on it, but it was something like 10k. I don't think anyone did much to it other than put in gas and add 2T oil periodically.

Yessir, I bought a Gates Premium Powerline belt infused with Aramid (kevlar is a patented brand name and can only be used under license). I installed it yesterday and went for a ride. The only time my variator chattered (twice) was under hard acceleration from a dead stop. A stage 1 racing CVT kit is $249 + tax so that's next on the list. A stage 2 kit with Revena clutch is $538, but that's a little too rich for my blood. :tup:

Losing my GY6 CVT virginity
 

Well today I put the $210 NCY Performance CVT kit on the Trike and learned a few things. The chattering was caused by flat spots on the roller weights that barely had 300 miles on them (china junk that should have lasted 3k miles).

This was a very tedious task, ever done a steering head bearing replacement? Now imagine over 100 and some ball bearings that are less than 1mm in diameter and trying to load them in the clutch spring carrier one by one and the only thing holding them in place is a thin layer of grease.

Well I got the performance kit all together and it worked flawlessly, except now it takes half throttle to get it moving. This is because the kit I ordered was for a scooter and not a Trike so it has 10 gram roller weights, and the Trike came with 14 gram weights. So now it's a tractor when it comes to climbing hills but I hate giving it that much throttle to take off.

Next dilemma, everyone says wedges are better than roller weights, but is a 14 gram wedge the same as a 14 gram roller weight? I love learning new things but this has been a trial by fire experience.

The wedges, or sliders, are supposed to allow the cvt to give you a slightly lower (higher?) gear ratio, resulting in some increase in top speed. They dont claim to help on the lower end of the rpm range.
-I have read threads where the wedges are effective, and threads where they were not.
-I think it comes down to how well you tune your individual scoot to to compliment the wedges.

And the learning curve continues
 

Thanks to my friends at GY6 Performance and the fella that owns Parts For Scooters I now have a better understanding of what's going on. The performance clutch I installed came with red 2000rpm springs for hard launch racing, and being that the variator turns half the rpm of the engine (more or less) that's why I have to hit 4000rpm to get moving. So I have blue 1000rpm springs on the way that will bring it down to 2000rpm to get moving (similar to stock).

On to the variator. Both it and the new clutch bell housing are significantly lighter than stock and it has steeper ramps for quicker acceleration/engagement. The weights also affect top end speed at a given rpm (I lost 7mph but now it climbs hills like a tractor even with a passenger).

The kit came with 10gram roller weights and stock was 14gram, so the next conclusion is to order 14gram weights to regain my top speed, right? Not necessarily, due to the steeper ramps this will likely result in full variator engagement at a lower engine rpm and hurt my acceleration. Which means I'll probably be better off with 12 or 13gram roller weights. So it comes down to trial and error which should be fun because there's 10 bolts holding the cover on, and because it contributes to structural strength you can't run it with the cover off.

Oh well, gotta get it right I suppose. :tup:

profile and balance of the weight has a lot to do engagement behavior too. ramp profile, tip vs root weight make for a lot of decisions lol.

I need to look into some of these mods for my daughters UTV. With the taller tires it lost some low end grunt. Sprocket change is out of the question as they are both at the max i can go for lower gear ratio.

I'm pretty sure you can get away with just buying lighter roller weights ($20-$30). Weigh one of them and then go about 2 grams lighter. Or just take out every other one and see if that's too low.

I'll have to look into it. I own two GY6's. One is on a 6 years old ATV and the other 4 years old UTV. I never had to do anything with them but change the oil and brake pads so never taken one apart. lol The 4 wheeler runs like a scald ape and the UTV takes a little longer to get up to top speed with the bigger tires. I'll have to do my homework and fine tune the CVT for the bigger tires.

Before doing anything, join this forum: https://49ccscoot.proboards.com/

Don't let the name fool you--all size engines are discussed and ALL brands are discussed. My guess the forum was set up to sort out the numerous Chinese scooters out there because so many people didn't understand one needs to properly maintain them. We are not quite as scooter 'hip' as they are on the scooter group.

Well besides the blue 1000rpm clutch springs, I ordered 13gram Dr Pulley slider wedges. Alot of guys on GY6 Performance have my exact same NCY CVT setup and for my weight recommended them to get to 60mph+.

I spent a few hours on the bike this afternoon and I gotta say even though I don't care for the 4000rpm stall speed and lower ratio, I don't hate it. It reminds me of my old Malibu SS. When it does launch it's with a quickness (not common for a 150cc scooter) and accelerating on steep hills is an entirely new experience on this bike. But wound for sound I could only achieve 53mph whereas the stock setup would hit 59mph on the same straight stretch.