With only a short winter month to go and a different workplace in the air.

Well I'm thinking about putting the 08 Touring 800 into full service as a daily ride to and from work, 18 miles in total.
As it's mostly tarmac and quads are road legal over here, some decent road tyres would be needed.

Found 3 types of roadies at the local ATV tyre shop.
Kenda Speedracer
Kenda Roadgo "dual sport"
Maxxis Spearz

Now for the big question?

Am I going to get decent MPG out of the thing OR should I just buy a 125cc moped for the daily commute and keep the ATV for the rough stuff??

 

Just my old opinion,I don't care what kind of tires you put on it,NO WAY it's going to get at least 75-90 miles per gallon that the moped will get! Even if the 18 mile drive is down hill both ways! Don't know about over there ,but you could buy a cheap Chinese 125 probably for the price of the tires.(Don't know if it would last the month you need it for though?At least the one I've encountered Just options to think about. Others will come along and give you their OPT

 

Walked into the motorcycle dealership saturday afternoon.
And much to my amazement, even state of the art modern day bikes really struggle to get the same mpg as my frugal diesel BMW?

These things weigh only 1/6 of my car and use the same amount of fuel. And they are designed as road vehicles??
Now on the other hand if you want to get that much horsepower out of such a small engine size, you do need to pour in some fuel.

No Chinese brand for me, please spare me the missery!
Decent brands have gone the oriental way more than enough for my personal liking.

So I guess, I'm going to have to start a beans every day diet, if I want to improve the mpg of my ATV to compete with that moped!?!?

On a more serious note, what could be expected from my beloved "doesn't fall on its side at the lights quadricycle" ??
Allthough I like mopeds, often I end up in a ditch.
The wife says I really need trainings wheels

 

Wise man I guess on passing up the Chinese! Vespa is the best,but expensive! My son's Suzuki SV1000 doesn't get that great a gas mileage,but my old 750 Nighthawk gets 45mpgHad plenty complaints when the first efis came out about guzzling gas,some on the 500 efi claimed they were only getting 10-12 mpg( in rough ground) Others exaggerated to where I know they were lying! Some even traded back to carb atvs!Just take all the mileage claims that anyone gives you here on the forum or anywhere else and to be on the safe side,divide the total by half! OPT

 

800 will make about 15 mpg if your lucky

 

The last two bikes I've had got decent mileage. Just over 42mpg on my 750 and right at 40 on my 1500. Probably could have gotten better mileage, but they both did suffer from QDE*. But I can't really blame the makers for that.















*Quite Doing Eighty

 

On our trails I'm getting something like 19 mpg with the 800 touring.
Just me alone and stock tyres. Mostly don't need 4x4 and in turf mode.
But then again most of the trails around here are very easy going.

Would like to squeeze some more out of it running dedicated road tyres on the tarmac during the short commutes.

 

Your post say's 18 miles in total even if that was one way that's not many miles . I rode 4200 miles this summer every ride is 75 to over 100 miles long and I'll average 300 miles a week plus . 18 miles is like riding around the block . Go for it and as for tire info I'm running ITP Terracross have over 10,000 miles on them and there still going strong . My nearest gas station is 30 miles one way I love going for gas

 

ATVs are not cheap and only have a limited short hour/Mileage lifespans vs a car or truck and do not get very good gas mileage when pushed to higher road speeds.

Let a Mini van get you to work, they get better gas milage at 60mph and are not at the end of there life at 10,000 miles like a ATV is and cost less if bought used.

My 2001 ATV has 3700 miles on it and runs great, It would be long gone into the junk yard if I used it for boring commuting purposes years ago.

 

Your atv won't even come close to the mileage that you can get with a small bike. The best that I have done on my 09' 800 Sportsman Touring was on an old railroad converted for quad use. The trail was almost completely flat and very straight. (Also, the surface was fine shale.) My miles per gallon was about 22 miles per gallon. However, it was all smooth steady riding at about 30 miles per hour.

Normally when I ride I only get between 12 - 15 mpg's, but I ride terrain that is slow and challenging most of the time.

How much is a gallon of gasoline in Belgium?