Modern Vespa

Greetings:

Now some may ask why I spent more than 1/8 of the cost of the entire scooter ($1,500) on a front shock. Fair question. I was riding on a Hurricane Hannah damaged beach road the other day. I hit a small pothole - having slowed down to 10 MPH or less and the front bottomed out with a Bang! That and I envy the race-bred engineering, although I doubt I'll ever see a track since the HOG 100th anniversary party at the Texas Motor Speedway.

Taking off and especially re-installing the upper mount bracket took me back to the cussword-invention thesaurus. You need Two (2) trained Spider Monkeys if you think you're going to reinstall those lockwashers, but I managed with only one.

Anyhoo, let's get the Eye-Tally-Ann humor out of the way. The installation brochure features um... some Questionable illustrations. Honey, I like-a da compression damping a little softer, OK?

The Prep shot.

The Captive nuts.

The No-Nuts Malossi.

Fortunately, I have a TON of metric fasteners left over from previous Honda reassemblies. Hmm, wonder where THAT one went? I filed off a bit of the flange to allow the lower nut to rest up against the brake backing and prevent it from spinning.

Finally, the finished, mounted RS24. Debating whether or not to use the obligatory quota of Free Malossi Stickers. I'm not so much a sticker guy...


Really? I'm a-like-a the Rebound at positione 12.



Captive, welded-on nuts on the stock shock. Malossi? Not-a so much.

M8 Nuts from my Honda Leftovers Stash. Have a ton of these...

Greetings:

Installed with self-supplied nuts for the lower mounting bolts, since Malossi didn't see fit to include them with the shock. I'm kind of miffed by the oversight. At this price the installation kit should be comprehensive. Grrr.

On the mean streets, all is forgiven. The front handles potholes and. Curb cuts with aplomb. No harsh bottoming, despite spring preload set quite light. The RS24 has rebound damping adjustment but none for compression, but Factory guessed well. My acne cleared up, I grew 3 inches taller, and several supermodels offered to surrender their virtue. Not bad.

The first upgrade for every ET4 owner should be the front shock, either Bitubo or Malossi, I run the Bitubo front and rear

Nice work, enjoy

Greetings:

Thanks Will0! One more thing about the stock shock. The mounting nut for the 2-hole top bracket rests on a crown type lockwasher. With compressed rubber below,, The thing is TIGHT!! Wisely they provised a slot in the threaded shaft for a flat screwdriver. WHAT?! Like that is going to provide enough counter-torque to keep the shaft from spinning?

Here was a rare occasion to break out the impact gun and a 17mm socket. Even with that it was a stubborn cuss. Malossi uses a double nut to lock the mount. I never know just how much to compressed the rubber Sandwich, and instructions don't seem to specify. I went with "Firm".