Weather and road conditions permitting, we’re headed for Angeles Crest Highway (known the world over as “The Crest”) and Newcomb’s to take in the exotic bikes always present at that iconic location and to have lunch. We’re leaving the CSC plant in Azusa at 8:30 a.m. (we’ll have a pot of coffee going and I think I can talk the Boss into stopping at The Donut Man on his way in). The Crest is one of So Cal’s great rides, and we’d sure like to see you there!
You don’t have to be on a CSC motorcycle to ride with us (in fact, we encourage you stop by if you’re on another bike…it will be a good opportunity to see what all the excitement is about, check us out, and see the RX3, the RC3, and the TT250). You don’t have to RSVP, but if you want to, drop us a line at info@cscmotorcycles.com.
I’ll call ahead, and if The Crest is icy, we’ll divert instead to our Glendora Ridge Road run…it’s another great ride. Either way, join us and you’re in for some of the best riding in southern California!
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And here we are…off to the start of 2017. Wow, time sure does fly.
It’s cold and damp out here in southern California on this second day of the New Year. I’m kicking back with a hot cup of coffee and I’m catching up on things. I just read about the 450cc Zongshen Dakar bikes finishing the first stage of that event (you can see how they fared here). It will be exciting to see how the 450 Zongshen race bikes finish each stage. What Zongshen is doing here is gutsy. The Big Z is introducing a new engine in a new bike in one of the world’s toughest competitive events, with the results out there for all to see.
The Zongshen 450cc Dakar Rally bike.
That brings me to the next topic: The RX4. We’ve had mixed emotions about publicizing the RX4 for a number of reasons, the most dominant of which is product cannibalization. Any time a new product is introduced, it will cannibalize sales of the existing product (in our case, the RX3). We think that hasn’t happened to us. RX3 sales were great last year. But pushing the RX4 at you well before it is available is still a concern.
The RX4…don’t look for it any sooner than 2018, and don’t hold off pulling the trigger on an RX3 waiting for this bike.
The earliest we’ll see the RX4 here in the US is no sooner than January 2018, and I personally doubt it will happen that soon. For starters, the RX4 design has not been finalized by Zongshen (the RX4 is not yet available anywhere in the world), nor have we defined our North American configuration with Zongshen. Zongshen tells us the RX4 design will be finalized in the second quarter of 2017, but I’ve spent my entire professional life around engineering development efforts in a variety of industries and I can tell you that the word most frequently coupled with “schedule” is “slip” (as in “schedule slip”). After the RX4 design is finalized, we have to send a product description to the EPA and request permission to bring sample RX4s in for testing (there goes another month to get the request approved). After we get permission from the EPA to bring the samples in, we have to get 3 or 4 bikes shipped to us so we can begin the testing process. You can figure on 6 weeks of transit time, and anywhere from 3 days to 3 months for the bikes to sit in Customs. That’s another 2 to 4 months. Then we get to shell out something north of $60K for the emissions testing and DOT evaluations (figure another 1 to 2 months), and then there’s the delay as EPA, CARB, and the DOT ponder the test results (and that can take another 1 to 3 months). Once we order the bikes, it’s another month to produce them, and then another 6 weeks for them to make the trip down the Yangzte and across the Pacific, and then once again there’s the time to get though Customs. And, to compound the challenge, the times I’m sketching out here assume everything goes smoothly and there are no problems or required design changes. You get the idea. This isn’t something that happens quickly.
The above RX4 concerns notwithstanding, we’ve been blessed. The RX3 continues to sell well, and our TT250 has done extremely well. It really is amazing. In a down year for the motorcycle industry (an industry that has been obsessed for more than five decades with ever-larger and increasingly-expensive bikes), we’ve done well with 250cc singles priced appropriately. A big part of our shared success has been the stellar nature of both the RX3 and the TT250, the extreme value both products bring to the market, our unique path to market (no dealers, free maintenance tutorials, free service manuals, our adventure rides, and our customer support), and the enlightened nature of our customers. Yep, our customers….folks like you. Folks who aren’t afraid to pick up a wrench, folks who make their own decisions, and folks who spend more time on the road then they do on Internet forums. We’re on to something here. You can see it in our results, and you can see it in the fact that no fewer than four other manufacturers are now copying us by planning to bring small ADV bikes to the US market. Like I said earlier, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
Letting the good times roll…lobster burritos at Mama Espinoza’s on the 2016 CSC Baja Run!
2017 is going to be a banner year. We’ve got new RX3s and TT250s inbound. The new 2017 TT250s will have tachs and digital speedos (and the price will stay at $2195). The RZ3 (the naked RC3) evaluation bikes are in port and we’ll sell a ton of those. We’re going racing with Roland Wheeler and the RC3. We’ll have weekend rides every month (the first one is this Saturday), and we’re doing rides up the Pacific Coast Highway, deep into Baja, across the US to the east coast, and I may even get to ride in Africa this year. Stay tuned, folks…it’s going to be a fun year!
One of our recent RX3 buyers bought his new CSC motorcycle for the specific purpose of joining our next Baja ride. When I heard about that, I started thinking about the feedback we’ve had on our Baja adventures. On our first CSC Baja tour, one of the guys who rode with us told me it was his first adventure ride, it was the best vacation he ever had, and the tour significantly enhanced his CSC ownership experience. Then he added a comment that I enjoyed hearing even more: “I’ve spent way more money on other vacations, not had as much fun, and I didn’t get a free motorcycle out of the deal.”
I thought that was pretty cool. Don’t get me wrong…we’re not giving away free motorcycles. We are, though, giving away free Baja tours. Buy a motorcycle from us and you’re automatically invited on our Baja tours. We charge nothing for the tour. You have to pay your own expenses (hotels, meals, fuel, and Mexican insurance, which typically works out to a little less than a hundred bucks a day), but we don’t charge anything for what folks tell us is the best ride they’ve ever experienced.
In preparing for 2017 Spring Break CSC Baja Tour I started thinking about riders I’ve seen in Baja. Most folks I see down there ride in commercial tour groups. You don’t have to do that (you can ride Baja on your own and I frequently do), but my observation has been that most people ride Baja as part of a tour. How much, I wondered to myself, are the tour companies getting for these rides? I googled “Baja motorcycle tours” this morning and here’s what I found:
The above summary is interesting. Like I said, we don’t charge anything for our Baja rides (the $400 and $800 I show above are expenses you pay for gas, hotels, etc.). For us, the tours are fun and a key part of our CSC philosophy. We’re not just providing world-class adventure motorcycles; we’re helping you get into adventure riding. To our knowledge, we’re the only company doing this. And it almost goes without saying (but I’ll say it anyway): With any of the above tours (other than ours) when the ride is over you don’t have a motorcycle. With ours, you get to keep your RX3 or TT250!
So here’s the message: We want to be your ticket to adventure riding, and we want your magic carpet to be a new RX3 or TT250. There’s no better way to get in the game. Give us a call and come ride Baja with us!
I noticed a thread on one of the Internet forums the other day about the need to immediately drain and replace the oil on a new CSC motorcycle when you take delivery. It’s not necessary.
In the early days when we first started importing RX3 motorcycles, we drained and replaced the oil the RX3s shipped with from China as part of the setup process. We stopped doing that when I toured the production line in Chongqing with a specific focus on their engine installation area. Zongshen puts 10W-30 Shell oil in every new motorcycle as part of the production process (and that’s a high quality motor oil). What you’ll see on the Internet are the self-proclaimed experts who talk about the Chinese using “fish oil” in new bikes (along with other inane comments). I can’t speak for what other Chinese manufacturers do (nor can I speak for what other Japanese, Italian, German, Austrian, or US manufacturers do), but I can tell you that I’ve spent a lot of time in Chongqing and I saw no evidence of fish oil on the Zongshen manufacturing campus. No fish bones, no fish heads, no fish smell, no….well, you get the idea. There’s nothing fishy on the Zongshen manufacturing campus, folks.
If you want to replace the oil in your new motorcycle, we’re more than happy to sell you oil, but you don’t need to replace your engine oil until the first scheduled maintenance. Our guidance is to check your oil level before every ride, and replace the oil in accordance with our Service Manual and our online maintenance tutorials.
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The featured “Destinations” piece in Motorcycle Classics this month is Hells Canyon National Recreation Area, and you can read all about it here. It’s a cool place and it was one of our stops on the 5000-mile Western America Adventure Ride. That was a grand ride, and I was able to write three or four magazine articles based on various spots we visited on that epic adventure. Motorcycle Classics is a great magazine. If you enjoy reading about vintage bikes and seeing wonderful photos, there’s no better publication.
7 January is the day of our first CSC ride of 2017, and it’s going to be a run up to Newcomb’s Ranch on the Angeles Crest Highway!
Old, new, slow, fast….you’ll see all kinds of moto exotica at Newcomb’s Ranch on the world-famous Angeles Crest Highway!
The “Crest” is one of my favorite rides. We’ll leave from the CSC plant at 8:30 (we’ll have a pot of coffee brewing when you arrive), take an easy roll west on the 210 freeway, and pick up world-famous Angeles Crest Highway near Glendale. Angeles Crest Highway is a great ride through the Angeles Forest to one of the world’s all time classic motorcycle destinations. You can read about it a bit more here. We’ll have a great time and I guarantee you’ll love it. One other tidbit…at each one of our monthly CSC company rides, we’ll have a surprise item on sale for those who ride with us, so don’t let this opportunity get away.
Let us know (info@cscmotorcycles.com) if you’re planning on riding with us. We’d love to see you!
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Wow, as I think back over the last 12 months, I’m thinking that it sure was a lot of fun!
Hey, best wishes for the holidays from the crew here at CSC! And as a special feature, let’s consider some of the high points from December 2015 to December 2016!
Reaching all the way back to December of last year, a few of my favorite photos from the Colombia expedition…
With Juan and Carlos below the Volcan Nevado del Ruiz
Twisties in the Andes Mountains
In January of this past year, Joe Gresh’s story about our 5000-mile Western America Adventure Ride hit the stands in Motorcyclist magazine. Here’s the photo of Utah’s Highway 12 that formed the backdrop for this great article…
Utah’s Highway 12…as close as anyone gets to Heaven without a one-way ticket!
In February, we were busy evaluating our new TT250 model. Here’s a favorite shot of one of the four prototypes we brought in for testing…
The TT250 has been a riotously successful motorcycle, and it my “go to” bike when I want to get my knees in the breeze.
That brings us to March of last year, with our outstanding 2nd Annual Baja Run. Wow, that was fun, with some of the best whale watching I’ve ever experienced in Baja! The best way to get an overview of that awesome adventure ride is to check out our YouTube video…
April 2016 saw lots of good things happening. We were super busy that month, but I never work get in the way of a ride on my RX3 on Glendora Ridge Road!
The mighty RX3 up on Glendora Ridge Road!
May….what happened in May? Oh yeah….that’s the month Rider magazine published their road test on the RX3!
Rider magazine testing a silver RX3. This was the first year we brought in silver RX3s. I think it’s one of the best colors ever on these great motorcycles.
That brings us to June, July, and a bit of August, and those months were all about the grandest adventure ever…our 6,000-mile ride across China. That was an epic ride (one that I will never stop thinking about).
A Zongshen advertising poster…Zongshen publicized the ride widely…so much so that Gresh and I were celebrities in China!
Electric scooters in Beijing…you’ll want to pay attention to developments in this area!
The Shaolin Temple…the birthplace of Kung Fu.
The celebratory, end-of-ride dinner in Qingdao…I sure miss these guys!
There are two epic videos out on the China ride…one from Joe Gresh, and the other from Zongshen…
That brings us to September and a big event that month…the Horizons Unlimited rally in Mariposa where I saw my good buddy Rob (who may ride with us on the Baja run next year)…
Iron Butt Rob and his RX3
October saw our TT250 ride to San Felipe with a great bunch of guys…Willie, Greg, Abe, Mike, Matt, Dan 1, Dan 2…it was a grand ride on a great motorcycle!
The Rumarosa Grade on the way to San Felipe from Tecate. Dramatic riding, to be sure!
We have a short video on that ride, too…
And that brings us to November, just last month…and the big news last month was that we’re going racing with Roland Wheeler on an RC3!
Roland and his ride…a sleek blue RC3…watch for more on this activity in future CSC blogs!
The RC3 is a great bike…here’s my video on it…
And here we are, one year later, in December 2016! We’ve seen and heard about the introduction of several 250-class ADV bikes from the big boys, and we recently posted a blog about that titled “The Sincerest Form of Flattery.” The results were predictable, with a handful of keyboard commando miscreants deeply troubled by our daring to point out that others were copying us. Motorcyclist’s Joe Gresh said it best…we’ve “nudged the giant” (referring to BMW’s plans for a 310cc ADV bike). I like that.
Nudging the giant? It’s what we do best, folks!
I’m in northern California again this week, celebrating the holidays with my family and our new granddaughter. It’s been a banner year, and I’m excited about what’s coming up next year. We already have folks signed up for our PCH ride and our next Baja foray. It’s going to be fun!
I’ve been thinking about it…maybe a 3-day ride from the plant up to Carmel, taking in the best part of the Pacific Coast Highway (from Cambria to Carmel). Check out a few of the scenes from my recent run up the coast along this stretch…
That’s the Bixby Bridge in that next-to-last photo, and it’s got a pretty cool story behind it. It was the bridge that completed the route along the Pacific, and it was part of Roosevelt’s effort to lift the US out of the Great Depression (the Bixby Bridge was a real “shovel-ready” project if ever there was one). The cost estimate for the Bixby Bridge was a whopping $203K back in 1930…and those fellows completed it for just $199,861!
The Pacific Coast Highway really is one of America’s crown jewels. My two all time favorite roads in the US are Highway 12 in Utah (from Bryce National Park to Capitol Reef) and the PCH. They’re both great.
I’m thinking maybe a Friday-to-Sunday ride, maybe toward the end of February for a PCH run. Let me know if you’re interested. If we get enough CSC riders I’ll start scheduling it.
Ride safe, my friends. I’m on the road again tomorrow!
One of the execs at CSC just forwarded this to me. It’s the story of a woman who rode around South America on a 150cc Zongshen, and you can read it here. I didn’t even know this online ADV magazine existed (shame on me), but I do now and I’ll be following it!
Well done, Egle, and thanks for sharing your adventure!
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One of the execs at CSC just forwarded this to me. It’s the story of a woman who rode around South America on a 150cc Zongshen, 
SG250 San Gabriel Cafe Racer
TT250 Enduro