It was against this scenario that I chose a new machine. Let me point out that I commute 40 miles a day, much of it along dual carriageways. I wanted a bike up to 125cc, larger machines would encourage too much speed and poor economy and I wanted a new machine. Not another cast off. I had learnt from bitter experience that when you commute a fair distance and punctuality is important, an old nail is just false economy.
Scooterettes are out, as I’m not that much of an old codger and as I didn’t want a two stroke, which (with a price limit of a grand) left just the CG125. With the great fall in bike sales and general recession I thought I’d have no trouble getting rid of my 900 notes, but things were not that simple.
The main Honda franchise had none in stock as did the local discounter. I finally tracked a shop down that had three in stock, but the teenage salesman while well trained in paper filling, knew no technical details, had no leaflets, didn’t ride bikes himself and almost poisoned me when I finally extracted a cup of coffee out of him. Despite this, I bought a bike from them.
I wasn’t encouraged when he couldn’t locate the toolkit when I went to pick up the bike. He tore the side panel off and couldn't get it back on and suggested it might be under the seat but didn’t know how to remove it. I helped him to refit the panel and took the tools on trust as I was in a hurry to get back to work.
My first impression of the bike was noise and a lot of vibes. As the first few hundred miles went by, the noise became worse and the vibes faded into the background. The handling and brakes were better than expected, giving a reassuring ride. The lighting appeared pathetic. During running in I managed a best of 128mpg - acceptable, but only just. Towards the 500 mile mark an odd chafing sound and a misfire set in at high revs. The former was traced to two inches slack in the chain.
At the first service I mentioned these faults. When I got the bike back, the misfire was fixed, but before I arrived home I was conscious of the chafing. The chain had not been re-tensioned, neither had it been oiled. I gave it the full treatment myself. That night I made another discovery, the headlamp had been adjusted so that it illuminated the front wheel rather than the road, what I’d earlier mistaken for the low beam was in fact a blotch of scatter. Once adjusted, it was a vast improvement over the GP100’s 6V item.
Come the 1500 mile service, I slackened off the chain to 3 inches of healthy slop, readjusted the headlamp to illuminate the front wheel and just to enter into the spirit of things I lowered the rear tyre pressure to 15psi, then cruised gently back to the dealer. This service wasn’t free, it cost over £25. Now, I don’t claim to be any kind of maintenance wizard, but for the hour and a half of labour which that must represent I could have been well on the way to completely dismantling the bike. I am talking about a new, clean, simple, single pot lightweight machine. I can’t tell you what they did in this time, but they certainly did not lubricate and adjust chain, check the headlamp or tyre pressures.
But they had done something, though. And I discovered that when I hurried off into the traffic and was suddenly confronted by a Luton box van. They had adjusted the brakes. In fitting the windscreen it had been necessary to reroute the front brake cable, during the 1500 mile, er, service, some nob had tightened all the free play out of the cable. The result was that if the lever was pulled gradually, as under normal circumstances, it worked though not very well. But when heaved on for dear life it just jammed. Miraculously, the aluminium wall subsided and life went on. They had also adjusted the rear brake so that it came on before the stop lamp.
Did I go back to the dealer? No, for the simple reason that if I had done someone would have got smacked. When I handed over my cheque at the 1500 mile service, I asked when the next service was due - at 4000 miles. I asked if that was every 1500 miles and was told yes (surely not right - Ed). As I cover that much ground every month, it meant they were expecting to sting me for £300 a year to keep my warranty. I decided that I would not be going back, for that kind of money you could blow a the engine.
God knows what was going on in that workshop. Maybe bikes were treated according to value, maybe simple machines were set aside for YTS practice, but the plain fact is that within 1500 miles the bike passed inspection there three times and was still handed back in a condition which would have merited an MOT failure. And if that’s service you can stuff it.
Back to the bike. I’m inclined to suspect that sales staff aren’t the only people in the trade who don’t know what they're doing. The CG125 is supposed to be a commuter, an all weather hack. Sensibly, it has a fully enclosed chain, but it’s a tacky sculpture of steel strips and spot welding - a real rust trap. The fit and finish, the thickness of the paint, would have even Italians falling about. This might be due to the fact that the bike is not made in Japan. Nope, it hails from Brazil, of all places, so perhaps a bit of the old Latin quality control is creeping in. I covered the thing in grease within days of purchase but already paint is coming off and that’s just summer riding.
So, it has a chainguard, but why doesn’t it have gaiters on the forks and shocks, QD wheels, locking petrol cap, plastic front guard and a rear guard that stops all the dirt going through the gap between guard and swinging arm? It does have a neat rear light moulded into the mudguard, a plastic seat base (the seat itself is only good for 20 miles of riding) and a useful grab-rail that can second as a pannier frame. Heated hand grips would also be very nice, the ones I fitted can’t be used at the same time as the lights without draining the battery.
Some of the chrome rusted very quickly the exhaust and the headlamp brackets being the worst. The silencer has to be removed to take out the back wheel spindle! The propstand hangs out a heck of a long way and has. been uniquely designed to trap the left foot under it and the road when dabbling down a foot in traffic - bloody painful, to say nothing of the effect on stability. It also scrapes far too easily in left handers.
The machine may sound a bit of a lemon, but apart from a few skinned heels, it has proved very competent at getting through the traffic. Nothing is better than adequate, but the result’s better than the sum of the parts. High, wide bars are useful for flicking through gaps, the mirrors actually show what’s behind you and the thing always feels stable and reassuring. It starts easily (though you’ve got to watch the accelerator pump!). And that’s about it.
10000 miles coming up at the time of writing. The rear light bulb failed at 5000 miles, but otherwise I just put in petrol, change the oil, and rummage amongst the tappets from time to time. It averages 105mpg. Would I recommend it? Well, no, because 20 years ago when the Japs were just getting into their stride there were bikes available from Honda, like the S90, that were more practical, more economical and just as fast and reliable as the CG125 - and cost a lot less in relation to car prices as well.
Honda have just not kept faith with the riders of small machines, which, after all, provided them with the money to produce their highly sophisticated bikes for an ever shrinking minority market. The CG125 owner of 1988 is offered essentially the same product of 20 years ago; whereas cars have shown great progress in terms of both functionality and appearance, motorcycles have shown no such improvement and are often a step backwards. The CG costs £900, comes from a third world country with low wages and grants for large companies to set up factories. Add to this, the sloppy, couldn’t care less attitudes and incompetence of dealers and there’s no wonder the market is in such a mess. Motorists simply would not tolerate these things.
E. W. Soames