Even with electric start standard on nearly every underbone sold in Vietnam, the kick starter is still there — and the day your battery dies at 7 a.m. is not the day to learn it. Good kick-start technique takes five minutes to understand and one dead-battery morning to truly appreciate.

Position first

Stand on the left side of the bike, both hands on the bars, right foot on the kick lever. Straighten the bike fully upright — a leaning bike robs the kick of force and can slide out from under you. Make sure the bike is in neutral before you start.

The compression stroke

Prepare the engine correctly first: choke on for a cold engine (most carburetted underbones), throttle closed. Now the kick itself. Push the lever slowly down until you feel hard resistance — that is the compression stroke. Let the lever return fully. Then, from the top of its travel, give one smooth, committed, full-length kick all the way through. Follow through with your leg — a short stab spins the engine too slowly to start.

Three habits that make it work:

  • Full-body commitment: drop your body weight into the kick, do not just flick your ankle.
  • One clean kick, then let the lever return completely before the next. Rapid half-kicks flood the engine.
  • Choke only when cold: a warm engine with the choke on will flood and refuse.

Cold mornings and flooded engines

In Hanoi’s winter drizzle weeks a cold underbone may need the choke plus two or three kicks. If it still refuses and you smell fresh petrol, it is flooded: hold the throttle fully open and kick a few times (this clears the rich mixture), then try again normally with the choke off. If the kick lever feels far too easy and spins freely with no resistance, that is not technique — that is a mechanical problem, and the roadside repair guides are the next stop.

When the electric start works but kick does not (or vice versa)

An engine that starts on the kicker but not the button usually means the battery is too weak to spin the starter — ride to a battery shop. An engine that cranks on the button but never fires, and also refuses the kick, is a fuel or ignition problem, not a starting-technique problem.

Kick-starting is a small, satisfying skill — and on the bikes that still carry levers, it is the difference between riding home and pushing. If your rental bike’s electric start has been acting up, contact us so it can be checked.