Replacement Kevlar belts?

[TXscoot]

after reading the  "cant get a belt" post I got to thinking about keeping one handy. I've heard of Kevlar CVT belts and wanted to know where to buy. what size? part number? this is for my Citycom of course.
Thanks

[Kiwiscoot]

I don't know of a Kevlar belt for the Citycom, but I would not bother. I got 16000kms on my factory belt and it was still within specifications. I'm sure I would've got 20 000kms easily. My riding is about 75-80% city riding too.
From what I understand Kevlar belts can give the transmission a hard time as it does not stretch to cushion shock loads.
Happy scooting.
Kiwiscoot

[TXscoot]

Thanks for the tip

[steve_rolfeca]

+1 on the advice to stay with factory belts.

In all my obsessive reading about scooter tuning (I used to have a 50cc 4T, what can I say?), I've never seen a credible report of performance improvements coming from a Kevlar belt. And there are TONS of reports out there about loss of performance.

Kevlar belts are the answer to a question that nobody is asking. OEM belts on quality scooters don't snap, the edges simply wear down until belt tension is affected. So the extra tensile strength of Kevlar is irrelevant to normal use.

I'm not knowledgeable enough about the engineering specifics to know whether performance loss from aftermarket Kevlar belts comes from inaccurate sizing, or if it's because of the increase in stiffness/loss of shock absorption, but either way, they're not a good deal.

[scosgt]

The problem is that belts on China scoots can scap after 50 miles!
The OEM belts on China scoots often do not last 3000 miles.
Hence, the "Kevlar" market, for people who experience  belts going bad. It is not for performance, it is for longevity. Of course, on the China scoots, you can add a Bando or Gates, but they also may have quality issues with the variators and clutch that causes the belt to get cut up and  break,

I changed the belts on the SYM at 5000 and the KYMCO at 6000 miles, just because I could. But the old belts were perfectly serviceable, and would have gone thousands more miles. I have heard of SYMS going 20k miles on a  belt, although personally I would rather pay the money than get stuck with a busted belt.

BTW, it is a fairly easy do it yourself project, you do need an impact wrench and torque wrench and a "rotor tool" to hold the variator/clutch while tightening. But once you have those tools, you can change your own belt in less than one hour.