Modern Buddy

Worth the extra money and lots of speed!

Been riding the 170i for 8 months now and have 4000 miles on the odometer. I grew up riding bicycles on the streets so I am not your typical scooter rider I have since found out from local rides and open club meet rides.
My first vist to the Genuine website they had the 170i featured in the Zephyer Silver and I said I will own that for my next scooter.
I currently was ridding a 1985 elite 150 in red that I had traded a car engine for. Great Japanese scooter that gave me no issues that I sold with 10k miles on it.

Being a mechanic I had to tinker with things but let me get into the good things and the bad things.

Good things
* Its fuel injected so it starts up everytime.
* Does indeed get 90+mpg best so far was 95.5mpg.
* The side stand and center stand easy to use.
* Headlight is large and bright in stock form.
* Has a decent top speed of 70-75bmph.
* Has good acceleration and can do a wheelie.
* Corners and manuvers well in tight area.
* Has a 12v plug to charge your phone.

Bad things
* A abusive ride when new but gets better after 1500 miles
* Has a even smaller gas tank than the other buddys at 5.7 liters (1.5 gallons)
* Those ugly turn signals under the handlebars.
* CVT belt slapping on the case.
* Not enought room for my feet.
* Not passenger Friendly unless you both are 125lbs.
* Narrow windshield with lots of air flow on my legs. Great for summer not for winter.
* If the battery is low the scooter will turn over but not start.

Mods and info I have done and come to know.

* Prima Pipe! When installing the spacers you get they need to be opposite of the instructions. Stock pipe was 3/4 inch tubing and prima is 1 inch. Has had no issues with fuel mixture.

* NCY super transmission kit! Love it and made a big difference. You have to re-use your contra spring and
I stayed with stock rollers. This kit benefitted with the Prima pipe. I found the 10g rollers with the kit
to be to high reving and a 11.5g mixture worked best. 13g stock rollers should net best mpg.

* Contra spring is short like 80 to 100mm and the ones I have ended up with are in the 150mm range.

* Stock roller weights are 13 grams.

* Stock belt size is 743-20-28 Gates belt I purchased was the "Kevlar" 743-20-30 had no problems yet.

Thanks for reading.

<a href="http://www.fuelly.com/driver/Monnoracing/buddy-170" target="_blank"><img src="http://badges.fuelly.com/images/sig-us/138921.png" width="500" height="63" alt="Fuelly" title="Share and compare MPG at Fuelly" border="0"/></a>

Most I have ever put in my Buddy 150 is 1.3 gallons and that was after I ran it out of gas. I would love to get 1.5 gallons.

monnoracing wrote:I grew up riding bicycles on the streets so I am not your typical scooter rider I have since found out from local rides and open club meet rides.

Same here, I came from a bike- it was my sole form of transportation. I hadn't ridden a scooter before I bought my Buddy, but it was surprising to me how many skills I learned from bike-riding that translated to scooter-riding.

* A abusive ride when new but gets better after 1500 miles

by this, are you referring to the suspension?

* Has a even smaller gas tank than the other buddys at 5.7 liters (1.5 gallons)

How did you get this info? It doesn't seem to be available anywhere on the internet, and I don't remember seeing it in the manual

Mods and info I have done and come to know.

Sweet! It's still a relatively new machine and I've heard of so few people attempting any mods on it. While I'm perfectly happy with it as is, it's nice to know I have options if I ever do decide to "upgrade" so to speak.

bgwss wrote:Most I have ever put in my Buddy 150 is 1.3 gallons and that was after I ran it out of gas. I would love to get 1.5 gallons.

Me too. Most I've ever been able to get into my 170i's fuel tank with the needle at the bottom of the red zone was 1.035 gals.

Bill in Seattle but wintering in AZ
'12 170i Italia "The Olive Pit"

monnoracing wrote:Worth the extra money and lots of speed!

Been riding the 170i for 8 months now and have 4000 miles on the odometer. Being a mechanic I had to tinker with things but let me get into the good things and the bad things.

Good things
* Its fuel injected so it starts up everytime.
* Does indeed get 90+mpg best so far was 95.5mpg.
* The side stand and center stand easy to use.
* Headlight is large and bright in stock form.
* Has a decent top speed of 70-75bmph.
* Has good acceleration and can do a wheelie.
* Corners and manuvers well in tight area.
* Has a 12v plug to charge your phone.

Bad things
* A abusive ride when new but gets better after 1500 miles
* Has a even smaller gas tank than the other buddys at 5.7 liters (1.5 gallons)
* Those ugly turn signals under the handlebars.
* CVT belt slapping on the case.
* Not enought room for my feet.
* Not passenger Friendly unless you both are 125lbs.
* Narrow windshield with lots of air flow on my legs. Great for summer not for winter.
* If the battery is low the scooter will turn over but not start.

Mods and info I have done and come to know.

* Prima Pipe! When installing the spacers you get they need to be opposite of the instructions. Stock pipe was 3/4 inch tubing and prima is 1 inch. Has had no issues with fuel mixture.

* NCY super transmission kit! Love it and made a big difference. You have to re-use your contra spring and
I stayed with stock rollers. This kit benefitted with the Prima pipe. I found the 10g rollers with the kit
to be to high reving and a 11.5g mixture worked best. 13g stock rollers should net best mpg.

Thanks for reading.

<a href="http://www.fuelly.com/driver/Monnoracing/buddy-170" target="_blank"><img src="http://badges.fuelly.com/images/sig-us/138921.png" width="500" height="63" alt="Fuelly" title="Share and compare MPG at Fuelly" border="0"/></a>

Is 70 - 75 bmph after you did the above mods? And, are you going by the speedo which is notoriously optimistic?

Bill in Seattle but wintering in AZ
'12 170i Italia "The Olive Pit"

He did say 'bmph' rather than 'mph'.

skipper20 wrote:. Most I've ever been able to get into my 170i's fuel tank with the needle at the bottom of the red zone was 1.035 gals.

The most I've ever put in was 1.27 gallons, and I could look into the tank and see that there was little in there. But I've never run out of gas to perform the only definitive test.

1.3mumble gallons is the most gas I've put in my Buddy 50, after running out.

I bought a Buddy 170i this month. I've put about 400 miles on it so far. My friend also purchased a Buddy 120 a week before me.

My scooter is quicker off the line due to the FI, however it certainly lacks the mid range power that her's has. At a stop I accelerate a little quicker, but with a role on she's noticeably quicker than me. The two of us on her scooter can get an indicated 60 MPH, I have trouble doing that on mine when's it's just me. Her mid range power is better than mine when we're both on hers.

Oh well.. not sure where that extra $600 I spent went.

jbowen7 wrote:I bought a Buddy 170i this month. I've put about 400 miles on it so far. My friend also purchased a Buddy 120 a week before me.

My scooter is quicker off the line due to the FI, however it certainly lacks the mid range power that her's has. At a stop I accelerate a little quicker, but with a role on she's noticeably quicker than me. The two of us on her scooter can get an indicated 60 MPH, I have trouble doing that on mine when's it's just me. Her mid range power is better than mine when we're both on hers.

Oh well.. not sure where that extra $600 I spent went.

Your scooter is not broken in yet. You won't get to enjoy its full power potential until 1500+ miles (assuming you break it in correctly and perform all required maintenance along the way). Every scooter will vary in performance during its break in period. Just be patient, break it in properly, and have fun.

Also worth noting, the 125, 150, and 170 will all have roughly the same top end speed due to the shared gearing of the scooters. What will vary is how each are able to sustain that speed, with the larger displacement scooters winning out.

The 5.7 liter gas tank is in my manual and says the rest are 6.1 liters. I too have only put in 1.2 gallons. Completely stock I would cruise on the highway around 72bmph and max I have seen was 78bmph. Since the Ncy cvt kit With the 3 gram drop in roller weight I would hit the same speed of 72. I did see a drop in mpg with the 10g weights. I have race a 150 with dr pulley variator 12g sliders and prima pipe that a local bike shop employee has. My mid range was not like his but I would catch him on the top end. That was before the prima pipe and that helped alot. Since the pipe I have only tried one top speed run in the same location as the 78 and had a little head wind and was able to get 75. I think that answered most the questions. I hope to soon have the FI tuning setup and play with it.

* A abusive ride when new but gets better after 1500 miles

by this, are you referring to the suspension?

Yes I am the rear shock I can now feel loading and unloading with the throttle.

PeteH wrote:He did say 'bmph' rather than 'mph'.

Dumb question of the week: what does the "b" in bmph stand for?

Bill in Seattle but wintering in AZ
'12 170i Italia "The Olive Pit"

buddy miles per hour

An alternate unit of measure used because the Buddy speedo reads around 10% optimistic. Ergo, 60 true mph is around 66 bmph on the speedo.

Any more 'optimistic' and we'll just treat them as kph.

Looked at the manual and it says 50 125 and 150 have a 6.3l fuel tank and the 170 has a 5.7l

Skootz Kabootz wrote:

jbowen7 wrote:I bought a Buddy 170i this month. I've put about 400 miles on it so far. My friend also purchased a Buddy 120 a week before me.

My scooter is quicker off the line due to the FI, however it certainly lacks the mid range power that her's has. At a stop I accelerate a little quicker, but with a role on she's noticeably quicker than me. The two of us on her scooter can get an indicated 60 MPH, I have trouble doing that on mine when's it's just me. Her mid range power is better than mine when we're both on hers.

Oh well.. not sure where that extra $600 I spent went.

Your scooter is not broken in yet. You won't get to enjoy its full power potential until 1500+ miles (assuming you break it in correctly and perform all required maintenance along the way). Every scooter will vary in performance during its break in period. Just be patient, break it in properly, and have fun.

Also worth noting, the 125, 150, and 170 will all have roughly the same top end speed due to the shared gearing of the scooters. What will vary is how each are able to sustain that speed, with the larger displacement scooters winning out.

I think you missed where the 125 was only a week newer than the 170i.

jbowen7 wrote:I bought a Buddy 170i this month. I've put about 400 miles on it so far. My friend also purchased a Buddy 120 a week before me.

My scooter is quicker off the line due to the FI, however it certainly lacks the mid range power that her's has. At a stop I accelerate a little quicker, but with a role on she's noticeably quicker than me. The two of us on her scooter can get an indicated 60 MPH, I have trouble doing that on mine when's it's just me. Her mid range power is better than mine when we're both on hers.

Oh well.. not sure where that extra $600 I spent went.

Is there a large weight difference between the two riders? My girlfriend is quicker off the line and even faster through the mid range than I am - we're both on Buddy 125s. Hers is a couple of years newer than mine with about half the millage, but the results are the same when we trade bikes.