Modern Vespa

Dear All

My 3 year old MP3 500 HPE decided to stop on the evening commute. After driving 15 miles and filling up with petrol, a further two miles down the road cut out and then stopped on a hill. Tried restarting but no go.
Got bike home and changed the exhaust, as a year ago the catalytic converter had broken free and blocked the exhaust( the new one is getting tappy when cold already!)
Also tried changing the plugs which didn't seem to be very wet from fuel.
I can hear the fuel pump prime when turning on the key, then when starting just turns over with no firing.
Immobiliser light goes out but engine light stays lit on.

I have checked all the fuses and relays that are next to the battery. Trickle charged the battery overnight and showing good voltage while cranking.

Please don't get annoyed, but did you put in diesel by mistake?
It just seems you got 2 miles on a carb full of petrol.
I've almost done it twice 😉

This was a thought of mine too...
But I remember looking at the 10% ethanol on the pump and It was very low on fuel so couldn't have made it so far?
Why is the engine light on? Does it stay on until the engine starts?

Having inverted the emergency tilt module the bike will not crank but upon refitting and resetting the ignition the bike turns over again, so not the tilt switch.

www.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22UI1CN5KKs

Right had both plugs out and very wet. cleaned off , heated and refitted to no difference.

Do you get a spark

No real spark, it seems to cough as you can hear in the video, but the plugs were very wet with fuel.

no spark no combustion

Will take the plugs out tomorrow and film them to see spark. So maybe coil pack or CDI but I guess it is all in one on the Mp3?

Sounds like a bad ignition coil to me.

https://www.scooter-center.com/en/ignition-coil-piaggio-piaggio-beverly-500-zapm34500-piaggio-mp3-500-zapm59200-zapm64300-zapm86100-zapm86101-zapta1200-zapta1201-zapta1202-zapta1204-piaggio-mp3-hpe-500-zapta1204-zapta1202-zaptd1102-piaggio-x10-500-zapm76300-apr-gp639187

Its only £32 maybe I should just order it?

I don't know if this is the same as fitted to the Mp3 500 HPE

I see there is two pins on the ignition coil.
Should I see a stream of pulses coming into the coil when it should be sparking?

I will check this tonight after work. If I can see pulses I will order a new coil. If I cannot see pulses, well then I just don't know!

There should be constant 12V on one pin, and the other gets pulled to ground in pulses by the ECU - just so you know what sort of pulses to look for! An oscilloscope would be useful here.

That's a nice fat spark, so that pretty much rules out the coil.

Starting to look like the immobilizer could be playing tricks with your bike, BUT given that this issue cropped up shortly after refueling I'd drain the tank and lines.

Refill from a high volume quality source that sells a LOT of fuel and not some mom & pop fuel station.

You may have just gotten a bad batch of fuel (which might explain the coughing). I've had it happen several years ago as well.

Also, that spark plug looks pretty sooty which makes me suspect bad fuel.

Either that or it's running rich because of lack of air. Clogged air filter? It can happen if too much oil mist comes out of the valve cover - often due to overfilling.

We have been forced into using the 10% ethanol fuel here in the UK.
This scooter currently has the air filter out. I would like to get eyes on the throttle body to see the butterfly opening.
Should the engine light be lit constantly?
I seem to remember it went out after lighting initially?
Can see this bike going on a trailer to the bike shop next week

The scooter will NOT run properly with the airbox/airfilter removed, for the same reasons these bikes have a bit of a hard time getting running again the 1st time after reoiling the filter. They are extremely sensitive to the A/F ratio

Check engine light should extinguish once engine fires AND stays running.

The HPE is designed to run on 10% BUT you should run 98+ octane only which contains 5%. Esso Supreme+ has zero ethanol in certain UK regions. See link

https://www.esso.co.uk/en-gb/fuels/petrol

Looks like a drain fuel and replace fuel tonight........

Absolutely no need. 95RON (E10) is fine. Nothing in the scooter is compromised by it - it's designed for it FFS.

I think what OP meant to say was to get a batch of fresh fuel to see if that cures the ills.

Nothing else will be as easy or cheap to do.

If the immobilizer cannot recognize the key, there will be no spark. To start the motor, 2 positions are required. Spark and fuel. In a certain place and at a certain time.
1. Change fuel. 2. check the correct opening and closing of the valves.
P.S.Good spark.
P.P.S/ Happy New Year and Merry Christmas!!!

Thank you everyone..... The fuel is drained out and after work I will buy some 98ron or 99ron goodness and refill the bike.
Apart from this I will strip the plastic to get eyes on the throttle body and make sure the cables are operating the butterfly as I did note some tightness on the throttle cable from about 2 months back.

Very nice fuel in.
Tried to start initially then just turns over.
Will remove plastics to see throttle body tomorrow.

Suggest you get a can of starter fluid. IF the bike can stay running (briefly) on starter fluid, then you can eliminate a whole bunch of possible suspects.

If the symptoms do not change with starter fluid, then you could be dealing with a bum injector among other suspects.

I second that.

OK great. I will try to get some starter fluid.

Well using quick start as directed makes no difference??

Putting my hand over the air intake while cranking gives me a big suction which is good.

Something is way off. You have air, you have spark, and the bike will not run even on starter fluid. Be aware what I said earlier, these bikes do not start/run well if the airfilter and airbox are not installed properly. So if the air intake system is not assembled and complete, all bets are off.

Remove the fuel cap, and see if you notice a swirling motion inside the tank as the ignition is turned on.

I'd focus on fuel supply system or immobilizer system. The only time I have known these bikes not willing to start from lack of air is when a freshly oiled air filter is just installed but after a handful of starting attempts it does catch and then no longer has this issue.

When you removed the suspect fuel, did it look clean and did it smell like a fresh gasoline???

The fuel was from a very busy petrol station and this has since been replaced with finest fuel.
But fuel smelt ok and light for a burn test like petrol.
I'm calling the bike shop tomorrow to hopefully arrange transport to the bike shop.

Ridiculous I know but on a 4 cylinder I would say the timing is way off.

Well its being picked up tomorrow, so hopefully a diagnosis and fix very soon.

Good luck. Keep us informed please.

Well after spending a few hours in the workshop they say the bike is electrically good.
Going to do compression test and check the valves then looking at the petrol pump potentially low pressure.

Petrol pump seems favourite. Fingers crossed.

Looks like the rocker arms have worn, causing the valves not to open enough.

Bike is on 22.5 k miles with dealer servicing carried out.

Well there we go - valve adjustment yet again.

I have to ask, was the bike running perfectly ok prior to filling up.

Yes was riding home form a 17 mile commute.
No hard riding, just cruising. filled up 15 miles into the commute, then rode another 2 miles and engine cut out at the bottom of a hill.
Then would never restart.
Engine wise seemed "normal"