kymco,s best scooter yet

i,ve been riding twist and go scooters for a number of years now and although i,m a keen biker too, i find on longer journeys i prefer the scooter because it offers better comfort, storage, and weather protection much cheaper than a motorcycle. scooters are more user friendly too. my previous two sc...ooters were both burgman 400s from suzuki. i,ve covered over 41000miles on these excellent machines and would have opted for a third burger untill i noticed the latest price, a staggering £5500. it was at this point i decided to try and find a cheaper alternative. this search eventually led to kymco,s stable and the very popular and much sought after downtown 300i. (there,s a waiting list for these where i live in scotland).

my first impressions of this scooter were based on reviews by journalists and studying all the pictures i could find. ok so it had a top speed of 90mph, could average around 70mpg,(british imperial gallon), and looked pretty impressive too. and it cost just over £4000, nice, i could live with that. however two areas concerned me. firstly would it be as comfortable as the burgman and how much space was under the seat. i was able to get answers to these questions when finally one arrived in a dealership 100 miles from my home but i needed to be quick because these scoots were disappearing as soon as they arrived in the uk.

so i headed down to rideon motorcycles in glasgow, nice friendly bunch too, family run business, great stuff. i could hardly contain my excitement as i finally got the chance to see the downtown in the flesh. boy oh boy this is one good looking scooter and well put together as well. most definately on a par with the japs, in fact i would go as far as saying better with plenty of thought to detail. the under seat storage isn,t as spacious as the burgman and the leg room is not as much but i can say that as i,ve racked up the miles on the downtown(yes i bought it)i,ve grown accustom to the different seating position. since the downtown comes with rear rack as standard i solved my storage deficit by fitting a quick release top-box so all in all i,m not complaining. perhaps it would be nice if this scooter had an ajustable seat as is found on the burgman, hopefully kymco might address this in the future.

but how does this scooter perform you may wonder. well wonder no more because this has to be the downtown,s trump card. although not as powerful as the burger, and so it has a slower top speed losing about 7mph. it most definately accelerates quicker than the burgman in fact it becomes almost an irrisistable habit to take off from traffic lights with a fistfull of throttle then grin in delight as you check your mirrors and see you have left all and sundry far from your wake. makes me feel like a rebellious teenager all over again. the downtown handles well especially in the twisties where you can flip this scoot from side to side without a care. the burgman was good but the kymco is better because it is sharper, and steers quicker.

another thing i absolutely love about the downtown is the lights. the front of the scooter looks very assertive, futuristic perhaps, definately in a class of its own. with it,s cluster of led running lights and powerful twin headlights not one on one off set-ups so common on modern bikes today you are bound t get noticed. the dash too lights up superbly and a nice touch is the bright red leds in the middle of the speedo and rev counter needles.

all in all i love this scooter. it,s a good all rounder and can fit in anywhere really, a quick run downtown for a few messages or a weekend away from it all, this has to be the best scooter out there at the moment. you get a lot of scooter for your money, you should easily see returns of over 70 mpg with mixed riding, best i,ve done so far is 88mpg. kymco have excelled themselves with this scooter and sales of this machine confirm not only it,s popularity but it,s rightful place at the top of the league. it recently was awarded best runner up in mcn,s scooter ratings. well done kymco. Read Full Review