Modern Vespa

Well, you learn something new every day...

I guess it shouldn't surprise me that someone's made a study of this. I mean, that's basically the same concept as what an Actuarial does, and insurance companies have made a whole profession out of it...

Welcome to the forum and to the world of vespa!

Lots of good points already made here. For me, it's the reliability and safety aspects. Well, and the fun too!

I wrench on my bikes too -- I'm too cheap to pay the dealer labor costs! But I prefer riding to wrenching, so a bike that is trouble-free is important to me. I rode an LX150 every day to work for 4 years, and it never failed me. Never. Well, other than the speedometer stopped working, which I don't consider a safety hazard. (I replaced it). I never had to clean the carbs. Still haven't. It just runs and runs. Now my daughter is riding it and I'm on a GTS250 which is EFI. And it also just runs and runs. I change the gas, the oil, and the tires. That's about it.

Before my LX I rode a 1985 Yamaha Riva as a commuter for several years. Worked fine, very reliable. Then I made the mistake of test driving a Vespa at the dealer. I just wasn't happy with the Yamaha anymore, even though it is a perfectly fine scoot.

Test ride one and see for yourself. Then look on craigslist if the sticker shock is too high. I got both my scooters for 1/2 - 2/3 the cost of new, with low miles on them.

Have you posted the same question on the Chinese scooter forum dedicated to your scoot, with thousands of members world-wide? Oh, there isn't one? Hmm....

-Dan

Yes, actually, there is. ScootDawg.

That sounds almost like entrapment! Actually I'm on ScootDawg. It seems like there are a gagillion forums where people talk about Chinese scoots, but I wanted to check with the Vespa crowd on the "Why Vespa?" question.

It looks like I made the right decision.

Seamus,

No offense but the quality control and quality of the materials of chinese scooter factories aren't there. The price difference is there for obvious reasons, the craftmanship on a Vespa will never be match on Chinese design scooters.

Look at the TV shows, people eat chicken from the floor, the butchers cut the meet on the floor while the ash from their cigarrete falls on the food, they don't wash their hands and factory workers work 12-14 hours a day rushing their job. Go ahead and ban me for telling the truth but Chinese products SUCKS!!!, maybe they are good at making egg rolls and steamed rice or to make copies of Nike T-shirts.

I hope that I convinced you by now because otherwise you just purchased the worst "road worthy" investment ever. You will find the hard way that the plastics on the scooters are absolutely low quality, they aren't ABS tough plastic, the metals used are cheap metal from probably melting old decaying ships, replacement parts will be a nightmare in the long run and just about everything on these scooters are crap like:

1) Instrument cluster tend to fade with the sun and turn yellow rapidly
2) Gauges needles will curl with the sun and fall off
3) electronics will fail
4) wiring will fail
5) engine is typically crappy, from low quality under engineered parts to low quality seals.

I hope that you don't hate me but I wholeheartedly think this way about Chinese products.. I am inclined to say that I am not the only one that thinks this way.

With all of that being said, best of luck with the scooter regardless. I wish one of these days you try a Vespa.

For instance you might have a old "POS" vespa in pieces, old, rusty, ugly, broken, etc. Well, you will be able to sell every single part on a vespa even if the vespa if for scrap. People will buy you the most "insignificant" parts from it, harness, light, light bulbs, hardware,minor bit and pieces.

Try to do that on a Chinese scooter. The market is not there. A vespa will be worth a whole lot more even if is ugly, its value is much better, on the other hand the Chinese scooters no one wants to run them or work on them.

No blood, no foul. I get what you're saying. As I stated before, I've worked in quality control for an automotive supplier for half my life. I understand the differences between Chinese standards and other standards. I have also seen corners cut concerning the quality standards in parts used by BMW, Honda, Ford and Chrysler when they needed to make a shipment, but perhaps I've said too much.

I hope that I can prove you wrong, but either way I have been bitten by the scooter bug. The reason that I posted here originally was to answer the question "Why Vespa?" and everyone has been very helpful. I especially appreciate the comments from those of you who have ridden both. Here's an analogy, and based on the response I've had here it pretty much answers my question for me.

I'm a Mac user. Why? They're so expensive! The reason is that they just work. I have been using Apple products since the early 1980s with very few issues. I pay more for them, but I use them a lot longer. Sure, I could buy a Windows PC, but it will be fraught with problems, built with bargain basement parts and in two years it will be almost unusable, worth nothing and I'll have to replace it. It sure was cheap, though. And I say this with full knowledge of both systems. I still regularly use computers for work ranging in age from the DOS 6.2 machines at our other shop to the two Windows 2000 machines that I use all day every day to the Windows 7 machine I'm programming on right now. And you know what? They work, but I merely tolerate them because I have to.

So, did I just answer my own question? I just wanted to hear it from someone else rather than trying to rationalize my own decision after the fact.

Thanks for the input.

Never mind ... just go ahead and rationalize away!

I'm not so sure watching TV shows is a good way to learn about life in China. I have traveled there and life in China has much more to it than that. I'm no special fan of the "China scooter" brands and don't think they are very good products, but let's not get too carried away in making a point.

I second looking at used Vespas. Both of mine were bought used. I got a great deal on both but the best deal was the '08 LXV. It was advertised here for $2,200 and by the time I got around to asking about it he'd dropped the price to $2,000.

It was only 2 hours away. It had 9,000 miles on it when I bought it and all I've done is put a new drive belt on (it had the original belt on it) and changed the oil. It's got just over 11,000 trouble free miles on it.

Oops I just remembered I did have the head gasket changed but it only cost me $150 to have that done. My mechanic comes to my house and he worked on it in my heated shop during a week in the winter. He's unbelievably reasonable.

The LXV is my daily ride. Now that I'm retired I zip all over town on it.

First of all, welcome to MV. Second, it sounds like to me that you are just as interested in tinkering as riding. If this is true, you will find scooter owning a wonderful hobby. I don't know too much about the China scoots, but it seems to me that if you can anticipate future problems as have been well documented on other forums about said scooter and can fix them, you should be alright. If you want the '65 Vespa, take someone along that knows vintage Vespas to check it out with you. If you like working on the china bike, you'll love working on the Vespa. You can work on quite a few things (carb, clutch, points, cylinder, etc..) without taking the engine out of the frame. Being a '65 will lend itself to driving at speeds mainly under 50, but it's a fun ride. Good luck with any decision you make and come back often.

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SEA I think what your trying to say us,is that you bought it to save on gas money. You have a great dealer and parts are cheap,plentiful. You also can DIY. If you look at it,solely on those terms you might break even or even save money. While vespas are dependable and beautiful there is nothing cheap about them. So you did what you wanted. If you really want a Vespa wait until winter. People sell their scoots to get winter stuff. Some great deals to be had. You really dont have to justify yourself. Its your decision. Seems like you got one of the better chinese models. My SUNL was at the bottom sadly. Live and learn.Have fun

Yep, you're right. My two thoughts ran together, and came out wrong. My reference to hundreds of millions was to the number of persons, riders and passengers, who ride PTW's in India. It should have read hundreds of thousands in reference to the number of motorcycles. Thanks for the correction.

But they are bloody fabulous, the Enfields. 8)

Welcome to the forum.
All that you mentioned is true. The Vespa feel solid and that gives a sense of security and quality for me. Yes they are priced more than Chinese bikes but that doesn't translate (to me at least) to being expensive because I'm getting a lot more in quality. I ride a LX 150 2008. It's smooth and I'm excited to see how many miles I can get on. These machines are built with history and Italians are known to make fine machinery.

I hate to say you pay for what you get however in this case it does play a roll. You should ride one first and see how it feels. I suspect you'll buy a Vespa.

P.S. I like ur 928 in the picture. I'm a porsche guy myself. Trust me as a fellow porsche guy buy a Vespa.

I'm well aware that Keeway is in Europe, no less Greece, as well as ZNEN, LONCIN, YINXIANG, LINTEX, HYOSUNG and others. I challenged citing that Keyway was in the "Top 10" in Italy as rather misleading, and I gave the ANCMA stats for 2012 to show why. ACEM also shows no Chinese manufacturers selling sufficient numbers to appear on their radar.

Yes, you linked nice press releases from OmniMoto, but they provide no info on sales numbers. Using your logic, it would seem that pink Peugeots are taking Europe by storm.

If you dug a little further in your googling, you would have seen that "Keeway.gr" is a web site of their local distributor, MOTOWAY, not a physical presence of Keeway itself. MOTOWAY is an established PTW supplies, parts and accessories distributor/franchiser. 7 retail shops formally offer Keyway scooters in Greece. Compare that to Kymco and Yamaha, which have over 30 retailers each in just the Athens area.

Mainland Chinese motos are definitely present in Europe, but to date, have not garnered a serious share of the scooter market. Here in Greece, what they do have a strong presence in is the Honda Cub variant market. They are cheap and easy to kit for more power. Very easy to get around the 50cc and 125 cc limited license categories than with a "regular" scooter.

And that's sort of what I've been saying, that in most of the world, these Chinese companies are present and selling their products under their own name, and people buy them and put tens of thousands of miles on them. Here in the US, they aren't. Znen is a fairly small Chinese scooter company, and they seem to have carved out a niche for themselves building scooters a la carte for US importers, but Znen is not exporting Znen bikes to the US. The first time the OP sat on a Vespa, he realized what he owned, but he would have figured out the same thing had he sat on a Honda, Yamaha, or Kymco scooter.
A friend of mine used to sell food to restaurants, and there are different grades of most products. As far as chicken, the lowest grade was called Chinese Restaurant Chicken. US Market Chinese Scooters are the two wheeled version of Chinese Restaurant Chicken.

I would be willing to bet that the legal environment in Europe seriously limits the incentive to "private label" a motor vehicle. Thus, European "distributors" pass the vehicle on under the manufacturer's name, and not bear the primary responsibility for the minimum 2 year warranty, along with other liabilities involved with private labeling.

In the US, just order a couple of containers of scooters with your brand name, offer a 90 day warranty, and you are in business.

However, the Chinese companies are not present. Their European distributor are.

Unnecessary part of US business model removed.

OK, normally I just lurk but here's my two cents worth. First my credentials. I've been riding for over 50 years. My longest running motorcycle, a KZ1000st, had 125,000 miles when I sold it. In my life I've won motocross, Timed Road Runs and Field Meets...on Long Island, NY. President and Road Captain, at one time, of the South Shore Motorcycle Club established in 1931.

http://southshoremc.com/Home_Page.php

Quality is a debatable term. As an experienced rider I can tell you that 85% of reliability is in the rider's hands. Ride foolishly, pay at the counter for repairs.

Proof of that is that British chap a little while ago here who bounces his 250 Vespa off the rev limiter with abandon and ripped the end off his camshaft.

I have this collection right now.

2008 Eagle Milano 150- 8490 miles
2009 Honda Rebel 250- 9536 miles (Hers)
2009 CF Moto Fashion- 10,240 miles
2009 MC-114 50cc Cub Clone- 3785 miles

I bought the Rebel for my wife for the obvious reason. Built like a tank, excellent fuel economy and a dealer if I couldn't fix it.

The other three are mine. The Eagle is built by Bashan, has never let me down and was my first China scoot. Is it perfect? Right. It rides like my 1952 Triumph Terrier Cub did. The CF Moto does the job, is built well and parts are very easy to come by. www.alpha-sports.com sent me a new mirror, after I rode into a flight of wild turkeys, in three days.

The star of the crew is the 50cc Cub clone. In five years it's required a new battery, a tail light bulb and two screws that rattled out the heat shield on the header pipe, wails down a level road with its four speed box at 50 mph, bone stock, easily and gets 135 mpg regularly.

All three together total over 21,000. I doubt I own the three best scooters ever built in China. None of them are shit though and will be running in my hands for a good long time.

I did a lot of research and have some personal experience with manufacturing in China. One can have nearly anything built, to nearly any level of quality. That is why one sees China-scoots at such a wide variety of price points.

The second factor is the dealer assembly. They all come in a box and should be described as a kit. I know a few brave souls who have ordered the drop-shipped mail-order versions for $800-1000, and put them together. The smart ones took the opportunity to replace all the rubber parts first as those are what will give you trouble first. The carb cleanings you mentioned may very well be rubber hose gunk--watch for leaks.

If you have a China-scoot that is one of the better quality and was assembled by a top shop, you'll get a pretty good value.

BUT, at the end of the day you'll be happier, longer with a Piaggio family or at least Taiwanese scoot. If you're looking for value, take advice from this forum on the best used scoot to look for.

Your only kidding yourself, look at your car. You know you like good things and you enjoy driving a car that is well made.

We all want to save money but you are no longer wondering about weather you like scooters. your trying to justify spending money to buy a scooter you will enjoy as much as your car.

I gave up a long time ago fighting that feeling. I buy the best I can reasonably afford or I wait until I can afford what I really want. I never buy a knock off when I know I want to real deal. The fact your looking at a 65 vespa shows your not looking for high tech performance. an old vespa is not going to handle like any of the newer bikes with disk brakes and auto trannies. I bet you enjoy every second riding the 65, You will enjoy fixing it and keeping it clean. You will enjoy looking at it and you will enjoy pulling up to the coffee shop and having little chats with people about the bike.

Admit it you want the old scooter because they are cool to look at and they are fun to ride. So the only question left is does your wallet have enough in it to make it happen today or do you need to wait. If you choose to go old just make sure it will do the ridding you want it to. Most of the older bikes are not meant for California freeways. either way life is short and you never know what could happen. I waited a long time to buy the Harley I always wanted, i waited to long and by the time I got it my back was a mess. I ended up selling it. I regret selling it every time i see a harley but I could not ride the bike 5 miles and enjoy it. Get the Vespa if you can afford it take it about have a fun ride and enjoy it.

Hi

If I can add my opinion....


I have tried a few scooters/bikes from different manufacturers (see my signature line)

I tend to purchase used and usually older scooters most of which dont run and then I go about getting them running and riding well. Some have been of a higher quality to others, by this I mean that you can work on them successfully and others have just been absolute nightmares.

Some have very poor quality materials or under engineered components.

I find that Japanese scooters/bikes tend to be well made, Chinese and Korean not so well...even the Kymco's (which are supposed to be the better quality Asian bikes) were of relatively inferior quality. French manufactured scooters were better made than those from China/Asia but were not as good as their Japanese rivals, however they were usually very sporty.

Piaggio products however always seem to be worthy of working on. The engineering is of a higher quality and the components are well made, panels fit well together, everything seem to just work better...and generally they perform well, the Korean/Chinese scooter that I've worked on and that I've also tried always seem so under-powered. Combine this with good new and used parts availability... and a large following its makes Piaggio products hard to beat.

Also, In my opinion, Piaggio have some of the best styling lines around and also a huge heritage behind them. I have also found that when time comes around for me to sell Piaggio products are the easiest to sell... they always attract the most interest and fetch the highest prices.

As I say, this is just my opinion which doesn't mean its right for everyone, but because of the points that I've mention above I've gotten to the stage where i won't buy any product unless its a Piaggio.

Hope this helps

.

This is the 1966 (I had the year wrong) 150 Super I mentioned. I went back to look at it today with my wife. They want $4K for it, completely restored with 300 miles. It has everything including the manual and rain cover.

Comments?

I don't know if it is important to you, but that super is not original. They came with 8 inch wheels for one thing, not 10s. If someone has changed that out, other things were probably changed as well. It may well not have a Vespa engine in it at all. It's your money of course, but there are better ones out there for that kind of money. My 2 cents.

I tried to be too nice on my last post and I don't want to see you get ripped off. AVOID that scooter, walk away, it has all the markings of a SEA bodged scooter. The shop that it is in should be ashamed for selling it and they should be upfront about the POS they are trying to sell.

Motofino appears to have "higher than typical" China scooter specifications.

Thanks for the info. That's why I ask the people who know, because I don't. I know this has been completely restored recently. I did look in a few places for the Piaggio P, but is there a checklist that I could apply to this bike to prove whether it's the real deal or not?

FTR, this is a large, long standing and reputable shop. Doing a quick Google search for 1966 150 Super, I see a variety of wheels, many like these. Could this simply be an upgrade done during the resto?

Here are a couple more pics.


Edit : Found the bodge spotting thread. Lots of reading ...

Check this out.

http://www.barrett-jackson.com/Events/Event/Details/1966-VESPA-SUPER-150-SCOOTER-75536

A bodge on Barrett Jackson?

Stay anyway from that super.
Reputable shop or not, don't buy it.


And the one posted on Barrett Jackson is also
one to run away from.

This description for the scooter is false, or they were lied to when they got it, and they are perpetuating the lie






Rob

I have had several China scooters. They were good learning bikes on both riding and repair. There is a quality difference though in the Japanese and Italian products over the Chinese product. But they served my purpose well until I could and wanted to afford a better scooter.

We have one of the guys in our scooter club who rides a 250CC jonway (I think it is) Last ride I looked at his odometer and he had over 31k. I feel that is impressive. He admits he is constantly working on it though. But he too likes to tinker so the upkeep doesn't bother him.

Agree with Music 100%. Both of them are bodges - stay away.

Tortoise, interesting videos above. I think it was 2005 I ordered a 125cc scooter from them, and Tom actually took the order. My wife put 4000 trouble free miles on it (one headlamp bulb) and it was sold to a friend. It now has 21,000 miles on it the last time I serviced it. Two more headlamp bulbs, a belt (just because he wanted to), and two rear tires.

Word of mouth caused two more to show up locally, and I have been conned into initial prep and keeping them up. I got a chuckle out of unboxing them and the huge plastic bag + the smells. They have been reliable, but one looks REALLY rough because of abuse. Parts ordered from Motofino Dave in GA, always available and arrive quickly.

I have absolutely NO Vespa automatic experience and have never seen one in person, so no basis for comparison. I try to keep them away, but a Zuma 50cc and a sort of lookalike Her Chee sometimes show up.

Some people can break an anvil, but seemingly these days all anvils are not made alike.

For what it's worth . . the MotoFino Facebook page indicates they are near releasing a 125cc QT-2 with Walbro EEM fuel injection.

Nooooooooo!

http://scoot.net/faq/Asian_Restorations

http://www.scooterlounge.com/vespa/buyers-guide/asian-restoration.shtml

http://www.rovers-usa.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1938

A haiku for you

My restored Vespa
Five old ones and a rickshaw
were used to make it.

It's like getting a great deal on an old Corvette made out of five Corvettes and a ford pinto.

From the link above:

"The sturdy MotoFino 125QT-2 lets you enjoy the flavor of old Rome with the Classic style scooter. It is an extremely durable 49.9cc scooter with a 4-Stroke, Single Cylinder, Forced Air Cooled Engine that was engineered for maximum performance with the help of Castrol Oil."

Emphasis mine. Somewhere, on a scooter forum in a far distant galaxy, someone is asking whether this thing would perform even more maximumized with Amsoil.

Life is far too short not to start a savings jar for a Vespa.

You know the first rule of finance?:

Pay yourself first.

You know the second rule of finance?

Get out of debt as quickly as possible.

You know the third rule?

STAY out of debt by not buying what you cannot afford to pay in full at the time of purchase.

---

I'm deeply sorry. I cannot justify buying a Chinese scooter.


Harv

I find that to be just a tad racist. Have you ever been to China? It's not even close to what you think.

Dave Ramsey?

Believe me, my wife and I are very much this way. We own four cars (plus the Chinese scoot), all paid for. Except for the airline tickets that we purchased this past week (which will be paid off immediately after the trip) we have no credit card debt. Our only outstanding debt is the mortgage that we have refinanced twice to pay off early. We have a great credit score and enough cash in our checking account that I could realistically write a check for the row of Vespas at the dealership. We both have healthy 401Ks and really no worries.

This isn't bragging; it's the result of hard work and frugality over a long period of time. Perhaps that's why I originally posed the question.

One thing that I have learned to appreciate over the years is how passionate people are abut things that they love. I felt that in the VW Bus community when I was part of it, I feel that amongst the Volvo crowd, musicians, artists and anyone who really takes a serious interest in something. There's certainly no lacking of that at MV, and I really get that, and I appreciate it.

Being new to the scooter world I was testing the waters, so to speak, with the Chinese scooter. The one thing that I can tell you is that there is a subset of Chinese scooter owners who are equally passionate about their bikes in their own way, and I love that, too.

Just like my first car was not a Mercedes, my first bike was not a Vespa. I am leaning in that direction because of what I've read here and because of the passion that I see Vespa owners have for their machines. I'm sure that there are exceptions, but I don't see a lot of ego here (much) or people riding their bikes simply for bragging rights. You guys (and girls) really love what you ride, and that's what it's all about. That's what I'm looking for.

We just had a meet here in Grand Rapids at GR Scooter. It was their 2nd annual BBQ Rib Cookoff. It wasn't a lot of people, but out of the twenty odd bikes I saw a Genuine, a Buddy, several Chineese bikes, a Burgman, an old Honda Elite and even a Ruckus fatty conversion. The common denominator was that everyone there loved their bike and wanted to share that. And good ribs.

I'm still learning a lot, but I learn quickly. Thanks for all the info.

WOW, someone got burned on that one! $7150.00! That thing is fffffffffffugly