Modern Vespa

Why Black, especially flat black?
Black disappears against asphalt, it's hot & is hard to keep clean
A black helmet is a solar oven
I know, I know Black is cool, I just don't think being red asphalt is cool

Black is dramatically masculine for those manly men.

Why anything?

Why red is red.

I have to confess - I like colors. To me black, gray, and white are sort of non-colors. I'd say blue, red, orange, green, and yellow are colors. However, looking around, I appear to be swimming against the current.

Black, grey, and white are neutrals. They're "classic" and they match pretty much everything. They also make for great blank canvases. 😉

There's a few colors I would absolutely love to have a PTW in. It's a point of frustration and sadness that it either never or only extremely rarely happens. If I get one used, I might have to see about doing (or getting done) a custom paint job. One such color is a Salsa (🚲) or Stella creamsicle orange. Yum.

Swimming with you, then.
For cars it is a sad thing here. Almost all cars are black or white or a grey in between black and white.
My BMW X1 is in mediterranian blue (mediterranblau) and that is a very nice metallic blue color.

On the other hand my BV 300 is in Cosmo black with silvery details and a brown saddle and brown glove box hatch. I find it a very nice color combination. Piaggio on the BV 350 combined the Cosmo black with burgundy saddle and glove box hatch which has even more class.

If they can't see you they can't intentionally pull out in front of you. You think that was an accident you had?

As I read this i knew it was you 🤣

Huh?

Also known as, to use the term I picked up from some EMT people, "street pizza."

lol what even is this thread? XD

Street pizza to me means vomit. Think of being too drunk when walking home from a big night out and stopping to empty you stomach on the pavement and realising that the kebab is now wasted 🤮

Red Asphalt is a classic driver education series, showing the results of unsafe driving in graphic detail

I got interrupted by the Real World, so here's the other half of my thought.
I'm fond of black to some extent. I can mix & match my gear without having to think about clashing. I'm all for it as an alternative to chrome. It's handy for when you don't want to stand out. If you like to have one thing that is color, it really pops as an accent.

That said... I make active efforts not to be a street ninja. I DON'T like street ninjas. Lights are a good thing (in moderation). Lateral movement and attentive riding, too. I also like making custom decals with 3M reflective tape for my helmet. Several of the stickers I have in my bike are road-worthy reflective.

Ignoring the function & looking at aesthetics, I would love to see bike painting make a (tasteful) comeback. I recently saw an overlander ("onherbike" on Instagram) post about her custom painted Arai helmet. THAT seems like something I would love to try.

A different
Form vs Function thread
Style vs Safety

Yes I strive to appear as manly as possible riding around on my little scooter...

To be honest I switched from black to white scooters and seem to have less near hits.

Try yellow ones.
Yellow is the colour best noticed by human eyes.

I used to have a black gts and I hated how hot it got and how dirty it got. I chose the grey supertech when upgrading as the only alternative was black. I would have prefered something with a bit of colour but still not dark. really not sure if it's more or less visible ... there were idiots in cars on the road before and after

Human eyes know! Yellow is the best color for a Vespa!

What would be far worse would be to look down at the mess in the street and realize it reminds you of your Vespa.

I mean, since we're going there...they call it that because they joke about needing a spatula to scrape you off the road into the ambulance.

I prefer fun colors as well but will live with a boring color if thats all they have. A friend and I went to check out our relocated Vespa dealership a few weekends ago. They had the orange GTS on the floor but the corner it was displayed in made it look brownish orange, because of the recessed lighting. Not very flattering. If that was my shop it'd be near the front window drawing attention.

I always wondered why new fire engines were green.

Oh, wait....

Black is one of those colors that people will usually settle for if the color they really want isn't available. It's not a polarizing color, like Kawasaki green or Neon orange. So dealers tend to order it more than a lot of other colors, and people often take what's available, even if it's not their first choice.

when I was selling I always found that people would gravitate toward silver (or variations therein) if their first choice wasn't available or something wasn't the *right* shade of [blank].

I don't particularly care for red OR black, and somehow like 75% of my bikes have all been red or black, or both.

Black scooter, but hey, when you put my height on top of it, it's not the scooter people see.
If it were just the scooter going down the road it would be one thing, but I'm almost always hi-viz and I at least hope that catches some attention. With black and yellow I'm sporting the bumblebee vibe...

Sully.... my hangout in suburban Chicago for a few years was Lombard..."The Lilac City." And yeah, their fire trucks were lilac.

Explained.

Why NOT black should really be the question..

Because it came along at the right time at the right price.

I concur. And explained very well thanks.

I think the tests were in the early 70's Yellow with contrasting blue is the highest visibility combination.

Coincidence?

I once read that bikers wear black because there isn't a darker colour...?
Judging by the range of clothiing on the marget, black is the predominant colour.

When it comes to cars, where I live the majority are white and silver. When it comes to merging with the colour of asphalt, there is a colour popular with our noir riche community that exactly matches asphalt - particularly if they customise it to black or grey any chrome trim.

Anecdote:
My late dear friend Peter only bought yellow cars. He would order them and wait for a batch to come off the production line. His insurance broker found from trade statistics that they had the least number of accidents and Peter was a frugal man. He structured his insurance cover with a large deductible for own damage and saved over 50% of the premium. He then opened a tax-free savings account and deposited the discount into it monthly in case he ever needed to claim. He never did. When he passed, his accumulated savings in that account were paying the entire discounted premium on his last car - a yellow MB Vito van.

Yes! Go MB.

I wear a blue jacket and a white helmet. Contrast is the key!

I don't know about your country, but here in South Africa RED cars have the greatest number of accidents per colour. I heard from a psychologist friend that it relates to the aggressive driving habits of exhibitionists who like red... I used to work in a government department that included transport management.
What really matters is visibility in ALL light conditions.
White is terrible in snow and sleet.
Silver is terrible in mist.
The yellow-green reflective film is good in all light - sunshine and overcast - and at night the reflectivity contrast with the blue makes the combination excellent.

Back in Black

Black or bright helmet?

it's the difference between SMIDSY or SMYDSM

I also tend to avoid bike gear advertised as 'Urban Camo'

All of us older folks may recognize the term but the under 50? group might not have heard it.

Side note my wife was born with 90% hearing loss so without super powerful hearing aids that she would not keep in until 3 she is legally deaf without them. She was mainstreamed her whole life so has only limited sign language but reads lips like a champion, just like in that Seinfeld episode with Marlee Marlin from across the room she knows what you said but it might be a little off.

So about 8 years ago my kids my kids came home from school and were talking about "hump day" being over with. My wife had never heard the term and the kids had a really hard time convincing her that it really was an old saying and not something they just made up.

This explains two things, 1.Why my posts are so long winded. "I have to explain thoroughly in daily life" and 2. Some people for legitimate reasons just miss stuff.