Modern Vespa

Prelude

It's pretty sad when a project has been sitting around for so long that you can't remember when you got it. Thanks to a friend's photo album, I can estimate that I've had it since late 2009. I actually picked this one up before the V9A, so it's officially my longest-festering project.

I found this one in East Tucson, out near Reddington Pass. Back then, craigslist ads were less dodgy and more believable. It listed as an "Allstate scooter" for $450 with no pictures. Went out with a borrowed truck and the hope that I found a Cruisaire. It looked interesting enough that I bought it anyway. Was pleased to learn that it was a Puch product, since I had some experience with their Maxi mopeds.

Pedigree

The Allstate Compact is a variant of Puch's DS60 "Cheetah". The model is similar to several 50cc variants of the chassis which had smaller footboards and pedals in order to qualify as mopeds. While it's not a Piaggio in name, Piaggio absorbed Puch in the mid '80s, so it's like a brother from another mother.

Based on the catalog number, handlebar configuration and color scheme, I've determined that it's a '65 model. It's a lean-to survivor. OG paint. Tool roll under the seat still. Lights missing lenses. Broken control levers. UV-baked cable sleeves with oxidized cables. UV-crumbled body plastics. Dry-rotted rubber. Reupholstered seat. '75 AZ license plate.

Scope

This will primarily be an engine rebuild, control repair, rubber replacement and paint rub-out. Engine is going under the knife because it's a booger of sun-dried grease and caliche. Kicker spring was broken. Piston had a sitting seizure, but freed up after a Marvel soak and the tender ministrations of a shot mallet. Inexplicably, there's gear oil in the crank chamber, so there's probably a failed seal or gasket. Clutch is sticky and the gearchange linkage needed a bit of fiddling to select neutral.

I'm going to explore the provenance of the engine a little, since there were some variances in the Puch 3-speeds and they're not well defined. I think the Compact is an "R" motor; which isn't quite compatible with the standard 3-speed engines. I can say the transfer port shape and location is different, so top ends aren't quite interchangeable. I'm gonna probably find some other differences that will make fixing/modding it that much more of a pain.

Status

The Compact's been blocking access to one of the toolboxes for quite some time now. While it hadn't become a tripping hazard, it was definitely a pain to reach over and around it to get to the toolbox. I'd originally set it aside due to seized fasteners and not wanting to break parts that I didn't have replacements for. For the last few months, I'd occasionally warm up fasteners with a torch and spritz them with PB Blaster. Occasionally, I'd try one of the really stuck ones. Right before new years, the penetrant finally did it's job and the biggest bastard bolt loosened with minimal effort. I threw it on the rack for a few hours and worked on unbolting and de-boogering things. The engine is now on the bench and awaiting teardown. Depending on parts for other scoots I'd promised to fix, I may have time to break this one down further.

And now for something completely different!

very cool! I always thought these were neat little bikes.

I see you subscribe to the "pill bottle as tiny parts storage" club newsletter as well!

if you need parts, I know of a small stockpile of these things....

Good to know, thanks! I've heard there are plenty out there, but aside from Nuttmeg, I don't know anyone who rides one.

So far, MotorWest in Milwaukee and RBO in Austria have been my part sources.

The big question I have is this: The V9A reportedly made 3.1hp and could hit 41mph. The Compact reportedly made 4.3hp and could hit 43mph. Is it really gonna be faster than a scoot with 50% more displacement?

I took notes on your paint-recovery-fu and will be trying a lot of it on this one. You've already seen the first stab at the legshield.

All you need is time and money and it could look like this again.

Yep! I figured you'd appreciate my storage system for GY6 too...

heck yeah! take out containers make for awesome parts storage and little tear down bins!

Steyr Daimler Puch - Assault Guns - High End Cars - Mopeds..... what's not to like?

Cracking the Block

Tonight's shop project was my buddy's girlfriend's Vino 125, but I got to the shop early and used the time to start in the Compact engine. Removed the stator bolt before I realized I'd left my Puch flywheel puller at home, so I flipped it over and started on the clutch side.

The kickstarter wasn't keen to come off, but was persuaded to move with propane, percussion and PB Blaster. Then I pulled the kickstart stopper and the clutch adjuster cover. The impact driver was used to persuade the old flathead screws to shift so I could remove the cover. The cover did fight a bit on removal but eventually yielded to the shot mallet.

With the cover off, I used one of those handy-dandy large snap ring pliers to remove the pusher pin. Wahey, there's a roller bearing in the pusher plate! That's performance right there! With the pusher out, it was just a matter of folding the locking tab down and loosening the crankshaft bolt. The pics show some corrosion and the clutch plates were all pretty stuck together.

The clutch basket looked a little hacked, but I didn't note any evidence of this engine being disassembled before. I've confirmed that those boogery welds are in fact factory. New baskets are available and I may consider swapping it out if I upgrade this engine at all. One interesting bit here is that the gear on the clutch basket has 22 teeth on it. The regular old 3-speeds had a 19 tooth gear, so chalk up another difference for the R motor.

My favorite bit was the little drip tray attached to the block below the carburetor location. The carburetor is a Bing 17mm, and if you've ever worked on a Puch or Sachs moped, it's pretty common knowledge that Bings leak. Seems that even Puch's engineers knew that, and thoughtfully included that little drip pan to direct the leaked fuel away from the crankcase. Funny and clever!

Probably won't have more wrench time until Monday, but I'll tackle the shift box and stator next.

Found myself a bit of time at the end of my shop night in order to move the chains on this one.

Shift Mechanism

Removed the shift box off the block. The four perimeter nuts are the only ones necessary to remove them; the two central nuts secure the shift mechanism to the shifter housing. I did remove the tube off the back of the housing that contains the detent for the shifter, but that turned out to be an un-necessary step. The mechanism was full of gritty oil, which probably explains why the shifter was so fiddly. The shift fork stays in the block.

I removed the remaining primary gear from the intermediate shaft. Looking back, I'd have removed that shaft nut before removing the clutch basket to make it easier to keep the gears from spinning.

Removed the support brace for the kickstart mechanism. This was the fiddliest bit so far, as the brace is screwed into special bolts, which support the brace and serve as crankcase bolts. There was a lot of powdery yellow corrosion holding the screws into the bolts an not a lot of clearance to get tools into them. Freed up an exposed case bolt while I was in there.

Since I hadn't planned on working on it, I left the Puch puller at home. Bringing it on Wednesday, since the flywheel and stator come off next. With those removed, I can remove the stator housing/fan case and access the remaining case bolts.

I have a reprint of the parts book/service manual someplace. It might speed things up if I dig that up.

Flywheel, Stator and Splitting the Cases

Another busy night at the shop. Stayed until 10, despite the 38F temperature. Parabolic heater was earning it's keep!

The Compact was not the prime task tonight, but I remembered my flywheel puller and put enough time in to finally get to the guts of the engine.

The flywheel came off under protest. Very similar to the later Puch Maxi mopeds. With the flywheel clear, the fixing screws for the fan casing were exposed. The casing came off with a few taps of a shot mallet.

The stator plate would look at home in a Maxi 2-speed. I didn't find any alignment marks for the stator, so I added some before removing it.

Amazingly, the case screws didn't put up much of a fight. The last bit to remove was the drive sprocket, which wasn't secured by it's lock washer and was barely finger-tight.

The case split with no trouble. Thankfully, it was still sitting in a drip tray, so all the loose rollers for the transmission shafts dropped out into the tray. These need to be glued into their races with grease during reassembly.

Gearbox looks good, but the crank and crank bearings look a bit haggard. I bought a Rito "race" crank several years ago, but recent research suggests the crankshafts for the regular 3-speed and the R motor are different. I'll investigate that once teardown is complete.

The next parts lists for MotorWest and RBO should be done this week. Then I'll pivot to the chassis once those are ordered.

Went to work on that nasty little '87 SE50 tonight, but still put a little time in on this.

Grabbed a magnet and collected all the loose needle bearings into a pill bottle. Removed the starter intermediate shaft, the pedal shaft, the layshaft, the output shaft and the shift fork. All those parts looked pretty good and would only need some light cleanup.

Had to remove one snap ring to free the crankshaft from the right case half. The shaft still had a bit of dried oil to help hold it, but a few measured taps with a shot mallet worked it free.

Brought the Rito crank I bought years ago over to compare it. Wound up bringing both home, since the shop calipers need a new battery.

Dimensionally, the two cranks are identical in most dimensions. The only noticable variance is the threading for the clutch nut: it's 8mm on the R crank and 10mm on the Rito. If that's the sole reason why the crank isn't recommended for the R-motor, I might as well drill my pressure plate and get the bigger nut/lockwasher. Probably should e-mail RBO for their input, since I haven't found a Puch brain trust like NSM to bounce ideas off of.

Anyway, the cases are empty. Time to start cleaning everything up.

Great pics.
This one below caught my eye.
I had considered doing this on my crank to keep it from being able to move in the bearing.
Opted for a retaining compound instead (basically super glued the crank to the bearing ID).
But interesting to see that a circlip is a legit solution.
Curious:
Does the crank press fit into the bearing?
Is that circlip there to keep the crank from being pushed into the cases by the clutch actuation?
Would mean that it must be in contact with the bearing inner race I guess?

There are two bearings on this side of the case. There's a standard single-row ball bearing that fits below the clutch basket and a Bo17 "magneto" two-piece bearing inside the case.

The crank is supported by a Bo17 on each side, with the race opening facing the crankshaft. Puch uses something similar in their other vertically-split motors like the Z50, ZA50 and all the "oldtimer" 2-,3- and 4-speeds. The clearance is pretty fiddly and you shim the inner races off the crank webs to allow for a certain amount of "float" in the bearings.

The crank was not a press-fit into the standard single-row bearing. It only required a few taps from the slot mallet to pop it out. If I cleaned the clutch shaft and the inner bearing race, it would be hard to call it an interference fit. The snap ring keeps the bearing located on the crankshaft, as there's a step on the crank other side of the bearing to keep the two components aligned.

In looking at the clutch assembly, I've realized that the clutch arm actually lifts on the clutch actuator. So when you actuate the clutch, you're actually pulling the pressure plate off of the clutch plates. It works in reverse of a Vespa, so that clip likely isn't resisting the crank shifting inwards.

Shift Mechanism, Part Deux

What can I say, it's complicated...

Bit of a bugger to get apart due to tiny snap rings, spring washers and actual springs. Lot of scuzzy oil and dirt within. Parts finally started moving as expected once it was all broken down and cleaned up. No scarring on the pivot shafts, thankfully. Need the shaft seal so I can reassemble it all.

Got it.
Thanks.

Gear box looks like a 90° reduction drive off some sort of machining machine.
Looks like an interesting project.

Crankcase

The two halves and the clutch cover are cleaned up. Looks decent, except for the crank chamber. I determined that the gear oil had leaked in there via the clutch-side seal; guessing the spots were caused by water separating out of the gearbox oil and condensing on dry bits.

Race for the magneto bearing on the stator side looks good, but the clutch side one is a bit too corroded. That one has to come out anyway in order to get the clutch seal out. Looks like a bearing kit and seals are on order.

The crank bearings are another variance between a a regular Puch 3-speed and an R motor. The regular 3-speed uses L17 magneto bearings (17mmx40mmx10mm). The R-motor uses Bo17 magneto bearings (17mmx44mmx11mm), which are slightly bigger.

Kinda squirreled when looking at the RBO catalog; they have close-ratio gear sets, slightly bigger bores and even a 12V AC VAPE ignition set for these things! So many ancient deficiencies to improve on! Aaargh! Need to dial it back for now and see if it's enjoyable enough to throw silly money at; can get a lot more Vespa goodies for a lot less money...

Work's going to pivot to the chassis now, while I wait for engine bits and ignore all the shiny upgrades. Got too many pending resolutions to be burning the fun budget on this one.

Not much done today. Cleaned the fan housing. Other than that, just a little forkin' around.

Clutch, Part Deux

Here's the clutch, all laid out. Sad bit is, the inner basket and the top steel plate were cleaned with Super Clean and 1000-grit to remove most of the clutch debris, yet they still look rough. I'll take another swing with a lower grit.

I have new clutch plates, thankfully.

Coffee cup for scale.

I was looking for the buttermilk donut

Looking good!

That bike reminds a little of the Honda Cub. There was this kid in highschool who had a Honda Cub 70 and looked like David Bowie. I thought it was the coolest bike ever. At the time I didn't even know what is was. Searching for one, I discovered Vespa's because when I described the Cub, people would assume I was talking about a Vespa.

Oops

The engine overhaul parts shipped from Austria on the 15th. Shortly afterwards, I received an e-mail from RBO. It'll be about two more weeks before I can validate this.

In the interim, I need to figure out how to extract the crank bearing races from the case halves. Don't have a big enough blind hole puller and don't trust myself enough with the welder to draw a bead in the races and shrink them out. May need professional help here. Take that as you will.

You did well with your redirect sir.

I have an '81 C70 in the garage, bought sight unseen from craigslist a few years back. Friend found it and I was traveling for work. I sent him the money to procure it, since I was looking for something that would pair well with his recently rebuilt Honda MB5.

Unlike my Compact, this craigslist buy was less of a value. No legshield, crumbling plastics, no carburetor and no top end. It's currently dismantled in my garage. Since it was such a heap, I decided to restomod it. What I haven't worked out yet is what the best options are for a late-model 6V engine. I'm still looking to Takegawa, but those goodies make Vespa parts look cheap. Also, the 6V parts are starting to get scarce.

I'll give it another look later in the year. It will be a 4-speed with a revised pattern and an 88cc top end. It will be metallic red and it will have some metal flake vinyl on the seat. I will white letter the tires. The rest is to be determined.

Had to hunt for photos of it when I first saw it:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/Bi3NMXRxNX5UNyYU7

https://photos.app.goo.gl/9JpjuPenB45EZQVB7

Well, the box from Austria arrived on March 7th. I returned from Chicago last night and went through the contents. There wasn't a single spare part missing.

Nah, there were six line items missing. And that's not including the crankshaft small parts kit included with the R-engine rebuild kit.

Sent my response in; I may try to jam together another order and see if they'll include those parts. The 42 Euro flat rate fee stinks, but mistakes happen and I want tracking since it takes almost a month to get the parts.

Now I need to find out whatever happened to my MotorWest order...

Good thing there's no ham riding on this one.

Cases are minty again. Think I need to look into what is needed to build a vapor blaster.

Now to start reassembling things. Need clarity on the crankshaft; either RBO sent me the wrong unit, or I need some additional clutch bits. Old crank had an 8mm thread and both the Mazzy and Rito have a 10mm thread to hold the clutch on.

Still need to place an order for some new bits and have them include the missing six bits. Need to hit up MotorWest for the air box.

And the clutch cover, fan cover, chain guard and fan shroud need to be made shiny again.

More eye candy. Karma did me a solid and a coworker agreed to picked these up from the polishing shop in Deer Valley after he went to our data center.

Now I'm going to have to class it up on the refurb process a bit more.

Fernando does beautiful work!

Well done, this is gonna be a joy to reassemble.