Cub 2.0 - Introduction

It's been over two years since the last post, wherein we discussed a few little creature comforts which I'd added to Cub (like a brake light). It's been about that long since I did anything worth mentioning with her, actually... I rode around a little bit at the end of last summer, but lost my swingarm nut and nearly died... and bought a plane in the intervening time anyway, which took up a bunch of time and money... and this year has been essentially one long business trip, so I haven't even seen my poor Honda in months. Or my wife, for that matter.

I've had some time to think about it a bit, though, and I've come to some important realizations:

1. I love motorcycles, and it's a real shame I don't have one reliable enough for regular use.
2. Cub is a really special bike- fun, simple, and full of character.
3. The engine is small, but will keep on ticking with shockingly sloppy repairs.
4. That said, her electrical system sucks, which is causing the reliability problems I alluded to in item 1.
5. A bike like that deserves to be ridden everywhere.

I do love my Cub, and it would be really nice to be able to justify taking the time to clean her up enough to install that beautiful new seat my brother-in-law gave us as a wedding gift (so that Audrey can ride her around as well). But here's the question: do I really want to spend the time and energy to properly repair a half-century-old engine that can do... maybe the speed limit on a 35 mph road? Not really.

Enter Lifan. There are swarms and swarms of Cubs and Passports in various shapes and sizes all over the place, and Lifan has a whole line of theoretically drop-in replacement engines for them. The displacements vary, of course. There's a 49cc, like the stock motor... and that's nice, but I still keep coming back to my same problem of not having enough power to keep up with traffic on the roads just outside the city limits. 

I'd rather put their 90cc engine in instead. For one thing, it's about the same cost as a 49cc. For another, the 90cc Passports were awesome bikes. For a third, 90cc is a respectable size for a city commuter/occasional Home Depot runner with a single rider, and has enough power to take a second person to the coffee shop without too much smoke. Mileage shouldn't be too bad, either- 90cc is still going to be way north of 60mpg, and the benefits in terms of oil consumption and leakage would be definitely worth considering.

So Cub gets a new engine. We get a more reliable, more capable motorcycle. The garage gets cleaned out once I don't need to keep a box full of spare parts around just-in-case.

-The Proprietor