Why no cheap Chinese knock off Snowmobiles?

[lilduke]

Its probably a good thing, as there is already enough cheap USA built Polaris's scattered around
the mountain; blown up, burnt and abandoned.

But why haven't the Chinese took advantage of the sledding market with a cheap
reverse engineered knock off Viper or something?

Someone needs to talk to Jinping about this.

 

[tex78]

They don't know what snow is lol

Sleds and rice Patty's don't mix well lol

 

[lilduke]

They don't know what snow is lol

Sleds and rice Patty's don't mix well lol

They have some big mountains over there man. Imagine ripping up the himalayas with 30lbs of boost!

Maybe the just figure PoPo has that market covered? haha

 

[tex78]

Oh I know they got mountains, but snow line and trying to get to it is what I meant

 

[Bnorth]

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[ferniesnow]

I would assume that the snow in Japan is similar to the snow in China. I don't think those cheap Chinese knock-offs would cut it! I was looking for a video from Japan that was posted here last year and those dudes amazed us. This is one from Japan and a 300cc isn't going to go in this snow!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exJH00QnMNo

 

[lilduke]

Oh I know they got mountains, but snow line and trying to get to it is what I meant

Oh id find a way,, might just have to bag on the old mitsubishi a little harder to get to the goods.

The 300 looks cool, but they need to make a full on North Korean mountain sled with 800cc R-tec 2stroke with some g-motion skids.

 

[ferniesnow]

Here is the video I was initially looking for. Again, not China but is there that much difference between China and Japan with regards to snow conditions? I don't think these guys would want a cheap Chinese knock off. They seem to have a lot of fun with the North American models.....


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXQE3E2A8zk

 

[lilduke]

Im not suggesting the Chinese should ride the knock offs, they should import them to North America and sell them at
Walmart or something.

 

[ferniesnow]

Im not suggesting the Chinese should ride the knock offs, they should import them to North America and sell them at
Walmart or something.

I fully understand and now that you brought this up, I am also surprised that they don't.

 

[ABMax24]

Ching chong meow.

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If you read the specs on that 300cc one it is actually 150cc and makes 6.3kw or less than 10 hp. It also lists fuel as gas/diesel, which is a premix i've never used before lol. I could see it as a kids sled.

But in all seriousness the Chinese make their money by selling millions of units at pennies of profit per unit, I just don't see them selling enough sleds to be worth it, never mind them trying to make a motor with close to comparible power and reliability to what we already have (look at the issues polaris has and they've been doing it for over half a century already). Or the fact they would never be able to pass safety or emissions standards without serious help from people already in the business.

 

[lilduke]

If you read the specs on that 300cc one it is actually 150cc and makes 6.3kw or less than 10 hp. It also lists fuel as gas/diesel, which is a premix i've never used before lol. I could see it as a kids sled.

But in all seriousness the Chinese make their money by selling millions of units at pennies of profit per unit, I just don't see them selling enough sleds to be worth it, never mind them trying to make a motor with close to comparible power and reliability to what we already have (look at the issues polaris has and they've been doing it for over half a century already). Or the fact they would never be able to pass safety or emissions standards without serious help from people already in the business.

Good points. They are doing it in the side by side/quad world though. Don't think a sled would be any harder to do?

And they aren't really supposed to be reliable, just cheap. Maybe 7500$ for a new Changfeng Cobra 800r

 

[lilduke]

Keep in mind they would be stealing the technology from BRP,popo ext.

They would be just reverse engineering it and building a crappier version.

Not as hard to do as lets say develop the new Axy's from scratch.

 

[ABMax24]

Good points. They are doing it in the side by side/quad world though. Don't think a sled would be any harder to do?

And they aren't really supposed to be reliable, just cheap. Maybe 7500$ for a new Changfeng Cobra 800r

Maybe they are still coming? But only the northern states and Canada buy Sleds, all of North America buy SxS's, and if a quad has half the power of its domestic cousin it still goes, a sled not so much, ever try to ride a sled out in 3ft of powder on one cylinder?

 

[ABMax24]

Keep in mind they would be stealing the technology from BRP,popo ext.

They would be just reverse engineering it and building a crappier version.

Not as hard to do as lets say develop the new Axy's from scratch.

But the 2 stroke sled market is fairly unique, there isn't many other high powered lightweight 2-strokes out there that they could reverse engineer, they would have to copy existing engine technology and without significant design work they would very quickly begin to infringe on one of the big 3's patents. Where as it's relatively simple to build a small single cylinder four stroke engine for a knock off quad.

 

[lilduke]

ever try to ride a sled out in 3ft of powder on one cylinder?

Yes.


I Bet Polaris would sell them some patents on the Dragon, or maybe even the Pro.

I Think they actually bought some patents from Yamaha and thats how they get away with thier knock off Rhino. Its basically identical.

 

[lilduke]

The patents got to be up on the old 670? The Chinese could make use of that in their mountain sled line up haha

 

[Steve D]

Ya know, some of us made due pretty good for years on 30-60hp. Finding a good sled for kids to learn on is getting more difficult all the time. I'd love to see the chineeze step up to that plate and build the 250 tundras/bravos and 340 indy lites of the next generation since the big four can't seem to be bothered.

 

[Modman]

But in all seriousness the Chinese make their money by selling millions of units at pennies of profit per unit, I just don't see them selling enough sleds to be worth it, nevermind them trying to make a motor with close to comparible power and reliability to what we already have (look at the issues polaris has and they've been doing it for over half a century already). Or the fact they would never be able to pass safety or emissions standards without serious help from people already in the business.

You're right, the business model doesn't fit with the standard idea of mass production. The profit on electronics isn't crazy small though when you consider it costs between $173 -$183 to build an iphone, and they sell for $600+. I would think sleds would run $25-30K if they wanted that kind of mark up. Total western north American sales last year were in the order of something like 125-150,000 units from what I remember. People probably bought more iphone 6's in the first hour they were out than all the sleds sold in NA in 1 year. They also consider the domestic market a lot more than most anticipate, considering they have one of the largest global populations, selling something to just 20% of their existing population of 1.36 Billion people, means they are selling 272,200,000 units of whatever they produce domestically (lets say iphones). To put this in perspective, based on 2014 population stats, that means every person in Canada would have to buy 7.66 iphones (so 8), just to meet the same demand of only 20% of the Chinese population alone.

nevermind them trying to make a motor with close to comparible power and reliability to what we already have (look at the issues polaris has and they've been doing it for over half a century already). Or the fact they would never be able to pass safety or emissions standards without serious help from people already in the business.

Well... if you consider when Fuji was making motors for Poo, they did just that. It was only when Poo started with their "liberty" line that it wasn't as good as before IMO. Suzuki made engines for AC for something like 35 yrs. They can do it but I'm guessing their domestic market is simply not the same. Their economy doesn't really support recreational sports, not as much of the population has a lot of disposable income for a $15K sled and over priced fuel, and no places to store and transport these kinds of toys.

 

[Skegmeister]

Nice work on velvet hammer brand bashin'... LOL
Not one peep out of the PoPo fans... yet. I guess our ego's have been beat down so bad from the '08 - '15 800 engine troubles, we have nothing left except... the Axys. Hail Mary!!
Cheap does not always buy reliability. My experience with Chinese quads, was that you need to be a bit of a mechanic to keep them running. We tended not to take them on long trips in rough back country.
I would feel the same about mountain sleds.