ODES 400cc UTV Review?

Canada_CT230 · Mar 7, 2012

Anybody own one of these?

$6,995 vs $13,900 for a name brand UTV is a huge difference to me. I will only be using it on our flat 17 acre property as a way to travel to all corners quickly. No heavy 4x4ing. Maybe to pull a dump lawn cart and an core aerator.

I have read some good reviews and watched YouTube videos of the machine. Seems to be heavy/well built and they also addressed some design flaws and corrected them while cloning the Rhino UTV.

I have a local dealer and parts supply. I doubt I'd need any...I have a 1978 dual purpose dirt bike and it hasn't needed anything other than oil/filters and rubber and a clutch cable in all the years I've owned it.

amirm · Mar 8, 2012

I found this one review which is pretty negative if it is the same machine: Odes 400 UTV - TrackShare.com

Canada_CT230 · Mar 9, 2012

Well, I don't know what to believe. Two posts down is a Honda UTV that won't idle right. I've read bad reviews on a brand new Polaris UTV. All these things use China made parts or are made in China and branded 'Brand Names'.

I will look at one in the flesh and see the build quality. I went to the Polaris dealer in town today and the closest thing is $10,000 and does not have a winch or roof/doors on it. The ODES does and is $3000 less.

amirm · Mar 9, 2012

When major American companies set up shop in China, they usually put westerners there in charge of quality and overall process. It is not like local Chinese companies producing something there.

I used to work for Sony. We were going to build a computer and needed a power supply. The procurement group put us in touch with a company that produced them in China. I met with that company and asked how much their power supplies were. I am making up these numbers but they said they start at $30 but that they made a higher quality version for IBM at $40. They said they used better parts to get higher reliability. I said that sounds good and I will go with that. He says Sony procurement would not allow it and that I had to buy the $50 unit. I asked how it could be that Sony's standard was higher than IBM's. He said it wasn't and the units were identical. I asked why the difference? He said Sony required such low failure rate that they had to burn them in overnight and weed out the failures and that pushed the price up!

As another example, for that same computer we contacted a major Japanese company to buy keyboards. The price and I am making this up again, was $20. We contact a Chinese company and the price is $10. We are all excited to save that money. Then the Chinese company says there is no warranty and that they would just ship us another 10% and we would have to use them as spares! Suffice it to say, we went with the Japanese company

.

So clearly there are large variations with Chinese manufactured parts.

Closer to the topic, when we bought our property, the previous owner left us a Chinese no-name quad. The thing would die once in a while. We could not find any schematic. After much work, we figured that out and fixed it. Five minutes later the transmission cracks and the thing becomes a pile of metal because no one sells the parts for it. Hence the reason I am in the market for a side-by-side

.

Now, the unit you are talking about may be better supported. But unless there is a big difference in cost, and $3K is not in my book, it is not worth taking a risk unless the reports are more positive.

Canada_CT230 · Mar 9, 2012

A little more research show that Hisun (another clone w/ good support & design) actually makes UTV assemblies/sub assemblies and possibly the whole UTV for Yamaha.

amirm · Mar 10, 2012

The quad we had was a clone of Yamaha too when it came to engine and such. Online reports said they had taken the design from a factory that used to produce Yamaha motorcycles. Not sure if true but does jive with what you are saying about this UTV. While many parts were close to Yamaha, not all were which made it very challenging from parts situation.

KentT · Mar 11, 2012

Canada_CT230 said:
A little more research show that Hisun (another clone w/ good support & design) actually makes UTV assemblies/sub assemblies and possibly the whole UTV for Yamaha.

Rhinos are made in Newnan Georgia in the good old USA. They use engines and transmissions that are imported, but the frame is manufactured and the machine is assembled here: Yamaha Motor Manufacturing Corporation

IMO, if you're looking for an off-brand to save money, you may want to look at the Kymco machine, made in Taiwan instead of China. Much higher build quality, and they have a sound, growing dealer network:

http://www.kymcousa.com/showroom/utvs/uxv500/index.html

deerehunter/operator · Mar 15, 2012

I only paid about 400-500 more than that for my 2011 Polaris ranger 400HO. It might be worth checking prices at some other name brand carrying dealerships before dropping that kind of coin on a clone.