Modern Vespa

that pipe looks pretty low but also looks pretty awesome

forget the pipe... tell me about the T-T-T-TARGA!!

(the scoot looks sweet as hell, what're the specs?)

I like the 4 scoot storage on the lift.

I noticed that too.

*looks across the shop*
*strokes chin*

sd- the pipe is too low. I'm thinking about a big box muffler, or cutting into it,to get it as high as i can.
greasy- It's a '91 targa c2, and a lot of fun.
Scoot specs: BFA 305 shoehorned into a 64 GL. Had to add metal to both cowls to fit. Crimez disc brake. All fabrication, bodywork, and paint I did in my basement.

It looks outstanding and has to have performance to match. My kind of build

I'm curious to see what you ultimately do to fix the pipe clearance. It looks like you could maybe buy a tiny bit more clearance by increasing the shock spacer length by 10mm or so?

So much goodness in that garage shot, too. How do you get the scoots on and off the overhead rack? Does the entire thing raise/lower?

Chandlerman- Thanks, it was definitely a steep learning curve.
The lift is just a homemade car lift. Pulleys and a electric winch lift the whole platform from the floor to 7 ft up.
The 305 is an insane motor, my daily driver has a malossi 221, and the 305 is easily twice as fast. On my first test ride 20 % throttle lifted the front wheel in 2nd. It's like learning to ride all over again.

finally poured the concrete in the garage.

Alright then! PigeletPilot and JediHunter posting up some hot looking scoots! Nice.

Piglet... is that stand for an 8" bike? Easy fix I suppose.

Did I see correctly in some rendering that you are putting a lift in? Slab looks good man. Heck of a man cave especially in that zip code!

car lift in the front left bay, motorcycle lift set into the cutout at the back.

This will free up the front right bay for scooter parking and maneuvering so no one is gridlocked.

On the road to our 37th National Vespa Summer meeting. Veria to Ioannina, 200Kms…

Love the shifty paint job…
Cool.

Hope the weather is a jt cooler as well!

Stickers. Weather is perfect!

Bad ass. I need to redesign the 1 car that I have... one day.

I need to put walls on the carport, but that's starting to sound way too much like work for my tastes...

Welp… like bad knees and reading glasses… it's a matter of when not if.
My first experience and I don't recommend.

Mmmmrph


Speedo cable nut trying to escape down the forko tubo. :-/

zip tie and leave the tail on it!

(Not pictured zip tie with NOT long enough tail left on it.)😭

Oops!!!

Didn't notice it till today but I know where I did that. It was in a 3.7Km tunnel while overtaking a truck. There were definitely some aerodynamic forces involved…

Same feeling as locking your keys in your car.

Happened to me a while ago. Can't remember if I fished it up with a hooked piece of wire or pushed it from below and grabbed it with one of those mechanic's claw things. You'll get it.

What's your normal top speed?

Weird, this happened to me last night! Used an old inner clutch cable to push it back up till I could reach it with needle nose pliers. Luckily only took a few minutes.

Went out for a good long ride on my PX. Love the Malossi 166. Secret Society Poker run.

Thanks for the compliment. It's possible that it's an 8" stand, we assembled Supers here at the same time we were assembling SS180s. The fix isn't totally simple, our locally produced stands are 18mm diameter, smaller than what Piaggio used originally. When these were assembled in New Zealand they required 20% local content so we got local tyres, local loom, local stand and local labour including painting. (Possibly other local stuff too). No chassis number was actually issued, some scooters had 4 figure numbers stamped in, but it was random and unreliable.
I suspect I am going to get a local scooterist friend with an amazing workshop and insane skills to make a couple of extensions to bring the stand into a usable condition.

Electrical tape just below the nut…

Then the nut never slides past unless you want it to.

putting a blown gun nozzle in the bottom of the fork hole can sometimes shoot that nut back to the top.

This is more of a "yesterday I"…

Rode a smallframe for the first time. I think it was a 50 special with a 100 sport top end.

Handled very differently than the largeframes I'm used to. Acceleration was snappy. I totally dug it! Now I want one

Usually 85 to 95 cause we also have slow / stock scooters in the group…

Well… the blow gun helped move it off the wall and up a few inches.

I then ran a white coat hanger from the bottom upward with a bunch of small curls and curves at the tail end of the hanger.

One of em caught on the second or third try.
PITA, but probably better than dropping the fork.

Boracope was aces in monitoring progress.


The money shot.

The curly cue that won the day.

Not as far and def not as fast, but I was with you in spirit today!

Dropped off our oldest at college for her first year a few days ago. So my most loyal passenger has flown the coop. Bittersweet times!

But we have a pic of our helmet-smooshed faces from the prior day's ride as a memento:

Of my five scooters, the little blue badge 125 is easily the most fun to ride.

I remember people (SoCal, in particular) telling me that Smallies were "just different," but didn't really understand it until I got mine. So small, nimble, and potentially (well...mine, anyway) stupid-fast with the different engine design than a largeframe.

Today, I decided to tackle the fuel starvation issues with my SprintV. First, I confirmed I had good flow through the hose and even through the needle and float.

It's the SIP 24/24 carb that has the expanded float needle passage and takes the larger 4.4mm needle, and that was all looking good. Which left me with only the passage from the bowl to the jet stack. which I don't think they'd drilled out. So I drilled it out to 2.25mm and magically, fuel starvation issues are gone!

Then, on the test ride, the clutch decided to stop clutching, so I rode home in 2nd gear. Lots of WOT screaming. I'm glad the fuel starvation was fixed.

Turned out the pressure plate clip had somehow broken, the plate had come loose, and was jammed into the clutch center at an angle.

I needed to replace the clutch cable inner anyway, so I did that, along with installing the ball bearing pressure plate that had been in the GL, and it's now shifting like buttah, despite being a completely overkill super-strong clutch.

Eventually, I'll throw some love at that motor. It's currently a complete waste of a Malossi 210. Port timings are also too low, too, because I tore a base gasket when I split the cases in the bike and didn't pull the cylinder to replace it. So while it's better than a stock P200, it's far from what it should be (or even was before the split).

There's a bluebadge on Craigslist in Portland right now for around $4200… too rich for my blood. It's being sold by a consignment company.

I remember seeing a couple primaveras in the $2k range maybe 8 years ago. Kicking myself for that now Patrick from P-town scooters in Portland had a smallframe back in the day that I think he used to race. Said it was something like 30hp.

So yeah, you ain't kidding.

Spotted SDJohn's PX…

Yeah, mine is the fastest bike I own. It might as well not have first gear and the top half of 4th is wasted because I don't actually want to go that fast. When I open it up next, it's going to get a super-short 4th to put the power curve down where I'll make use of it. PX looks great in the wild.

And the top speed on his smallfame was somewhere over 100mph...but only if the straightaways on the track were long enough.

Thanks! Were you there? I'd certainly have said hi had I known!

Yeah I'm liking the bike, I wish I'd have had the foresight to use a 36 tooth 4th instead of assuming the engine and bike would be sold. It's not much trouble but I think it would have been nice. And no, I'm not going to change that out .