First ride: AJS A9 Flight 125

Nippy, sporty-styled, learner-legal commuter scooter

Sitting in between their new budget-priced ‘Vespa -styled’ Sorvio 125 and the retro Modena 125, the A9 Flight 125 is considered by AJS to be “the perfect route into the two wheel world”. But what does it offer that the other two models in the range don’t.

Engine

For a little over £1000 you get a pretty bog-standard, but well established single cylinder 125cc GY6-type engine that performs and handles well.

Styling

The A9 Flight is quite pleasant to look at – in fact its’ styling is reminiscent of a sports-styled commuter scooter, complete with sporty graphics which are complimented by the vibrant blue paintwork and supplemented by a contrasting red paint to mechanical parts like the brake discs and suspension units. The visual styling is complimented by some rather nice LED indicators to the front and rear.

Storage space consists of a lockable underseat compartment and a rear luggage rack; if any further carrying capacity is needed, then a topbox can easily be fitted using the pre-drilled holes. If you wanted to store your lid under the seat though, you might be a little disappointed – as I found out when I tried to store my Shark Evoline 3 helmet. That said it may well take a ‘Jet-style’ open face – but I didn’t have one to hand to give it a try.

Equipment

What you do get is well presented for a scooter at the budget end of the range, so don’t go expecting too many bells and whistles. It comes with a very basic tool kit and the aforementioned luggage rack and that’s about it; I did also find one other bit of equipment – hazard warning flashers – something you wouldn’t normally come across on something in this budget range.

On the road

Before taking it out on the road, I checked the fuel gauge (a lesson learnt from experience); it hardly registered and showed empty on the gauge – but it only took a little over four litres at the fuel pump. AJS don’t quote the size of the A9’s fuel tank in their tech spec, but this capacity seems a little on the small side if the gauge is to be believed.

Out on the road, the A9 performed much better than I had anticipated. It was a bit slow on take-off (a trait of many low capacity modern four-strokes), but this soon quickly disappeared once underway. The scooter wound itself up quite quickly and easily reached the legal speed limit (according to the speedo that it) which showed that it was capable of keeping up with traffic. In fact it performed much better than other 125s that I tested on the same day.

It wasn’t just the engine that performed well; the suspension set-up wasn’t too hard or soft and the scoot felt at home both in a straight line and on the twisty bits of the road. Both front and rear brakes responded well and stopped the scoot smoothly and efficiently with no unexpected ‘grab’ when applied under pressure.

The seating and riding positions are both ample on what is effectively a smaller-sized scooter. I’m an average 5’10” stature and adopting my preferred riding position, the handlebar controls all fell easily and comfortably to hand; with my feet up on the floorboards, my knees didn’t foul the legshields, so I could easily maintain control on the move. Stopping at junctions, I could also comfortably put my feet flat down on the road with no problem.

All-in-all, a nice little scooter for the money.

We say:

Surprisingly good performance from a budget-priced four-stroke 125 scooter.

Pros:

• Agile and manoeuvrable
• Good engine performance

Cons:

• Limited underseat storage space
• Small-ish fuel tank

Spec:

ENGINE: 4-stroke, forced air cooled single cylinder 124.6cc

BORE x STROKE: 52.4mm x 57.8mm

MAX NET POWER: 5.5kw @ 7500 rev/min

STARTING METHOD: Electric & kick

TRANSMISSION: CVT automatic (twist & go)

TYRES: Tubeless 130/60-13 front and rear

SUSPENSION: Front: telescopic forks / Rear: twin shocks

BRAKES: Disc front and rear

TANK CAPACITY: 4.7L

SEAT HEIGHT: 820mm

WEIGHT: 107kg

COLOURS: Red or blue

WARRANTY: 12 months

CONTACT: www.ajsmotorcycles.co.uk

PRICE: £1049

Words: Mau

Images: Joe Dick