Modern Vespa

@Agent Top End: The rest of the kit -- the barrel, that is -- looks just like the Aluminum Polini 210. Nothing nearly as space-aged as that 221-specific head.

swa45, Willie B: Installation of the kit was pretty much plug-and-play for me. The bulk of the work I'd already done on my cases with Polini's 210 kit; lucky for me the porting on the 221 longstroker matched that on the 57mm 210. It was a fair bit of dremelling but nothing too onerous, maybe 3-4 hours of patient grinding away and sanding. And that was for a n00b klike me.

Re. crank: I installed that rather overpriced 60mm Polini that they claimed was more or less built for these purposes.

Re. exhaust: I was going for more of a touring setup so I ran it with the SIP Road. Pretty conservative, I guess. I'm thinking about trying Scooter Center's BGM Big Box this spring though.

Re. ignition: I just installed it at the recommended 19 degrees and that ran fine. I briefly toyed with the Kheper variable ignition, but I either fried the unit or mine was faulty (probably the former) so I just pulled that. I'm going to try the Smart booster from Kytronic next. Magg over in another thread seemed to get good results with his.

Re. jetting etc.: I'm running with Polini's cheap but remarkably effective venturi intake on a 26/26 Spaco carb. The most appropriate main jet with this setup, I've found, is a big fat 138. (Combined with the 160/BE3, which I haven't fiddled with yet.) I also installed a slightly fatter slow jet, which made for a brighter and torque-ier engine at low revs.

Re. handling all that extra power: I'm using a reinforced, 10-spring Cosa 2 clutch basket from BGM, which thus far hasn't complained about anything. Between the top end and the rear wheel I'm running a 24-tooth clutch cog from DRT, which lengthens the gearing about 6% I believe, and the shorter 4th gear. Lots of people on here recommended this combination and I'm loving it: 1st gear actually makes sense now, and the shift from 3rd to 4th, if I'm really giving it the beans, feels great.

Re. tires -- just standard 3.5 x 10 for now. I'm thinking of the 100/90-10's for the spring though.

As for results? I was very happy with the way it worked out. My goal was to end up with a beefy touring bike that didn't lose any of the traditional PX200 characteristics, i.e. a tractor-like power band that's nice for farting around the city, but also had some racing tendencies. I thrash through the gears and it just pulls in this very linear fashion all the way up to 4th gear at 130km/h at around 7800-7900RPM. And in 3rd I can get it to touch 105km/h at around 8200-8300 RPM. This setup was able to do Belgrade-->Vienna (620km) in 7 hours, no problem. Fuel economy above 110km/h is terrible; cruising at 95km/h, meanwhile, I suspect I might be less thirsty than a stock PX200 doing the same speed, considering this rig does that at less than half throttle.

Another nice way to compare speed and performance is that this setup now has *exactly* the same specs as my friend's GTS300. We've raced against each other down the highway a few times and the two bikes have exactly the same acceleration and top speed. I mean we start from a standstill and thrash the bikes and three minutes later we're literally neck and neck.

Cheers
Sean

@Agent Top End: The rest of the kit -- the barrel, that is -- looks just like the Aluminum Polini 210. Nothing nearly as space-aged as that 221-specific head.

swa45, Willie B: Installation of the kit was pretty much plug-and-play for me. The bulk of the work I'd already done on my cases with Polini's 210 kit; lucky for me the porting on the 221 longstroker matched that on the 57mm 210. It was a fair bit of dremelling but nothing too onerous, maybe 3-4 hours of patient grinding away and sanding. And that was for a n00b like me.

Re. crank: I installed that rather overpriced 60mm Polini that they claimed was more or less built for these purposes.

Re. exhaust: I was going for more of a touring setup so I ran it with the SIP Road. Pretty conservative, I guess. I'm thinking about trying Scooter Center's BGM Big Box this spring though.

Re. ignition: I just installed it at the recommended 19 degrees and that ran fine. I briefly toyed with the Kheper variable ignition, but I either fried the unit or mine was faulty (probably the former) so I just pulled that. I'm going to try the Smart booster from Kytronic next. Magg over in another thread seemed to get good results with his.

Re. jetting etc.: I'm running with Polini's cheap but remarkably effective venturi intake on a 26/26 Spaco carb. The most appropriate main jet with this setup, I've found, is a big fat 138. (Combined with the 160/BE3, which I haven't fiddled with yet.) I also installed a slightly fatter slow jet, which made for a brighter and torque-ier engine at low revs.

Re. handling all that extra power: I'm using a reinforced, 10-spring Cosa 2 clutch basket from BGM, which thus far hasn't complained about anything. Between the top end and the rear wheel I'm running a 24-tooth clutch cog from DRT, which lengthens the gearing about 6% I believe, and the shorter 4th gear. Lots of people on here recommended this combination and I'm loving it: 1st gear actually makes sense now, and the shift from 3rd to 4th, if I'm really giving it the beans, feels great.

Re. tires -- just standard 3.5 x 10 for now. I'm thinking of the 100/90-10's for the spring though.

As for results? I was very happy with the way it worked out. My goal was to end up with a beefy touring bike that didn't lose any of the traditional PX200 characteristics, i.e. a tractor-like power band that's nice for farting around the city, but also had some racing tendencies. I thrash through the gears and it just pulls in this very linear fashion all the way up to 4th gear at 130km/h at around 7800-7900RPM. And in 3rd I can get it to touch 105km/h at around 8200-8300 RPM. This setup was able to do Belgrade-->Vienna (620km) in 7 hours, no problem. Fuel economy above 110km/h is terrible; cruising at 95km/h, meanwhile, I suspect I might be less thirsty than a stock PX200 doing the same speed, considering this rig does that at less than half throttle.

Another nice way to compare speed and performance is that this setup now has *exactly* the same specs as my friend's GTS300. We've raced against each other down the highway a few times and the two bikes have exactly the same acceleration and top speed. I mean we start from a standstill and thrash the bikes and three minutes later we're literally neck and neck.

Cheers
Sean