Modern Vespa

Good man - that is a thing of beauty. Then again, I might be a little biased.

Check out this post. I made a little light tester to check the points, and never got the bulbs to balance out. I just went with a static Vape AC setup and never looked back.

But check out from this post down because I did have to set the points and replace the condenser, and static time it, which worked!

https://modernvespa.com/forum/post2351531#2351531

Sweet!

Ok so did a lot of thinking on this one and came up with this.

It's a classic tale, one simple adjustment. Just one. Throttle cable was sticking a bit. Weird, the cable and top hat don't enjoy each others company. Let's investigate! Noooooooo don't do it! Too late friends.

In order to properly fix this I have to take the headset off and remove the top hat. Which means I have to undo the wiring and the other cables… the cable outers are all torn up, so let's upgrade that while I'm here. Sound familiar to everyone? Well, since I disconnected the wiring harness and undid the cables I might as well tackle the rust in the tunnel and well, the rust everywhere. So we'll just go ahead and say let's turn this puppy up to 12! Volts that is. Can't get the friggin lights to work anyways so out comes the harness. Ospho down the tunnel time, except there's a hole…. And some quick thinking gets a plastic bowl to catch the acid.

While that's doing its thing I'll pull up the floor rails to address the rust under and around them.

Onwards and upwards or backwards and downwards? Depends on how you're standing I suppose.

I've always been an Ospho guy, but I watched a video a couple days ago and the guy says a product called Rust Kutter kicked the crap out of everything else.

Here's 2 post ospho baths of the floor.
Also wire wheeled the floor rails and going to knock out the end caps this weekend while I wait for cables and the harness. Then the end of the month I'll order the Vape and get on with that.

Interesting. After watching that I ordered some rust kutter. Seems like it'll be good for the tunnel since it's a spray bottle. Can cut the spray tube short in order to be able to spray upside down to reach the top and sides of the inside of the tunnel much better than with the pour it in method.

What works best for removing gunk off the sides of the floor rail rubber? I haven't started on them yet still wire wheeling the floor rails, only have the inside of one left. Just waiting on new wheels to come tomorrow. Wanna clean them then moisturize them somehow. What do you like to use for that as well?

Ospho has been the industry standard for years and years. I'm always a bit skeptical of youtube videos with influencers that are trying to sell me something. It's exactly like modern day informercials...but less entertaining.

I don't necessarily disagree, but it at least looks legit. I just ospho'ed some metal last weekend and it looked exactly like the video.

Finding credible sources is definitely a challenge, even on a good day.

I'd be tempted to throw the rubbers in a bowl of undiluted Purple Power cleaner for 10 minutes or so, then scrub them with some sort of stiff scrubby brush. Just make sure to wear eye and skin protection (that stuff seems to splatter everywhere). Then hose, or preferably pressure wash them off.

Yeh squirting with googone and scrub with nylon bristle brush, rinse, repeat.

Once the goop is gone, I'd soak in 303 Protectant.

Been chipping away little by little.
Got the rails all wire brushed clean and rubbers cleaned up too. Reinstalled them and I am 5 floor rivets short. So the outer most one on the glove box side isn't installed yet.

Got the wire harness, handlebar switch, those SIP performance cables and brake lever screws that are spot on repros of the split headset lever screws. Mauro Pascoli makes them.

Tomorrow the VAPE arrives. Will be my first go at timing an engine. Wish me luck.

That's fair amount of elbow grease that you smeared all over those end caps! Keep up to good work!

Took care of some nit picking today. Since I'm running a new 12v harness, I gotta remove the fork. So might as well fix the steering stop. For once nothing snowballed out of control. One step forward. NO STEPS BACK. A damn miracle I tell ya.

Then I installed the choke cable. It never stayed open prior to removing the clip inside the frame. So I reached out to Scott who gave me the details I needed. Got that sorted and now the choke works as it was intended!

And the VAPE arrived today too.
Not a bad round today. First one in a long time. Gotta get a timing gun, anyone have one they swear by?

While I'm thinking I have a possible idea to run those motogadget led bar end turn signals. Maybe. Spit balling that. Thought was maybe run the VAPE AC. Then get a ac/dc converter and run that converted power to the turn signals? Would that work. Maybe the KOSO one I used for the SIP speedo on my other bike. That one is rated to 6w but the signals are 7w. Would it work? Or would it be better to find a 10w one? But then I'd need relays yes? I suppose I could put them under the tank, there's not a lot of room in these split headsets.

For the timing light, spend the few extra bucks to get a variable/adjustable light. It makes a HUGE difference, especially if you went for the variable timing Vape.

I ordered mine off Amazon, just went with a highly-rated model and it's served me well for at least five years now.

And for the turn signals, why not just get regular bar end indicators and run them with incandescent bulbs? The draw will be fairly trivial (10W/bulb? 15?) and you can just wire the turn signal switch into the pilot light circuit that way. No fanciness required.

I was in the exact same quandary as you when i was deciding upon what to do with my ignition. I originally bought a 12VAC variable VAPE for my Allstate 200. But then i decided i wanted a 12 volt battery. So i ended up buying a VAPE regulator/rectifier, and now i have a 12VDC variable VAPE ignition. I too was (and still am) thinking about spending the waaaay too much money on the Motogadget turn signals for the Allstate as well. My SIP harness is already wired for turn signals, so why not?...because it will cost around $500 for all the motogadget gadgets, that's why. And yes, the MG signals are rated at 7 watts. So if you wire them up as option hazzard lights, then that's 14 watts. A 12 volt battery would provide the smoothest source of regulated 12 DC power. At the end of the day you have to ask yourself how badly do i want turn signals...which is exactly what i'm currently asking myself.

I went with the static AC Vape. Ordered a light last night that will be here tomorrow so that's done at least.
As far as the signals go I really really don't like the look of the regular ones. Those motogadget ones are so nice…

Hmmmmm you bring up a good point. I didn't see that the price for the signals was PER SIGNAL. Holy crap! I'll hold off for now. My arms still sorta work anyways!

And man am I loving the (what's the opposite of a rut?) spot I'm in right now. Installed the wiring harness before breakfast. Took 10mins. I'm not shitting you. This is quite the run of good luck. At least with regards to this. My sons eye blew up again 2 weeks ago. Back on antibiotics and the occularplastics doc said if the antibiotics clears up the swelling then we'll wait a month and have a ct scan and see what's going on. If they don't get rid of the swelling we'll need a CT scan stat. So that's happening on Monday. Looking like he'll need surgery, but it's at least a quick common type of procedure so it should fix him up quickly. Fingers crossed.

Seriously. This is going way too well.
Got the tail light wires run, with no guide wire. All 3 of them. Wtf. How? Maybe the later bikes had larger tubing for the wiring? The 58 and 59 Allstates only fit 2 wires at least my two did.

Smaller diameter wiring insulation?

Congrats on getting the harness run so easily!

Most of it is pretty easy in a bare frame, but I have *never* gotten the tail light wiring to run without some sort of challenge.

Here's to hoping that everything continues to go well, both for your scooter and your son!

I bought the same SIP harness for my Allstate project, and i noticed the exact same thing for the taillight wires fitting though that hole in the frame. The insulation is a bit thinner and the wires measued out to be a tiny bit smaller of a gauge. All of that is why i ended up making my own wire harness for my rusty VB1.

Have a quick question about finding TDC.

I have the SIP piston stopper tool, does that get threaded all the way in the plug hole? As opposed to holding the stopper in the hole and finding where the full range of travel is?

This is my first go at ignition timing so apologies if this is a ridiculously dumb question.

Top dead center, does that not refer to the top most swing of the piston or am I thinking too hard about that?

Thread it in.
Rotate the engine against the stopper from both directions, clockwise and counter-counterclockwise. TDC is in the middle of these points.

I ordered some knockoffs from Amazon to try out to see if I could figure out the install and liked them enough to eventually shell out for the motogadgets. I will post a picture -- I'm satisfied with the results, especially at $15.

A standard cast aluminum headset should be fairly straightforward to retrofit a turn signal switch. It might get more complicated with the stamped steel two piece Allstate headset. I suppose it just depends where and what sort of turn signal switch you decide to use. I think i've decided to not install turn signals into my Allstate...i think.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07BNJH5FY/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1[/img]

Thanks! Got that sorted, now I gotta run to the hardware store to get the pieces that were missing from the sip cdi hardware bag then just gotta kick it over and strobe it to make sure I'm kosher.

My hardware bag wasn't complete either. Maybe money saving tactics

Damn. I was missing two of the large washers and 2 bolts. QC over in Germany is killin it!

Only way to do it would to put it on the shifter perch or whatever that part is called. The thingie that holds the clutch lever. I've lost interest in the turn signals for now at least. My harness is wired for signals so in the future it'll be straightforward hopefully.

My thought was to mount a turn signal switch on the left side. But just mocking it up, i'd be concerned that i would break off the switch lever with my knee at some point.

Yeah that's the spot I was thinking would be the only possible place.



In other news I have an issue which I think is a bad switch.
So I got everything hooked up electrical wise. Hook up the test battery and my brake light came on twice when I was checking if any lights worked. All 12v bulbs. So when I got not much I decided to check grounds. All good there. Check the blue wire for continuity and that's fine at the junction box to the handlebar switch. Ok so that would mean that the power is getting to the switch, I have the alligator clip hooked up to the intake side of the VAPE regulator so the power goes in to the reg and out to the triple blue wire connection.

Now I check the wires from the headlight to the switch. All good, all wires are in an unbroken connection. Hmmmm wtf could be going on? So I decided to check the blue wire at the switch to see if I had connectivity with ground? Shit. I do. So I go through all the hook ups ant the switch and Every connection has continuity with each other except the kill button, which makes sense.

None of the wires at the headlight or tail light have continuity with each other. Only have the issue at the switch. So the tail light and brake light don't have connectivity with each other, nor do the headlight wires so long as I don't go through the switch.
So if I touch the probe to the brown wire and the other the purple wire (high and low beam wires) no beeps. If I touch the purple wire and brown wire at the switch together I get the beeps.

It's a borked switch right?


Edit: just remembered I have a second switch so I'll swap that known working one over tomorrow and double check.

The switch on my GL, I put pretty much exactly where you mocked up, whodat. It works great, even if the switch lever broke off on me. I fixed it by screwing in a sheet metal screw and then layering JBWeld over that. It's been going strong for a couple years now,

I've modified two right side switches to be turn signal switches. Stealthy and work just fine, but I think I prefer the GL's switch from a purely functional perspective.

What do you use to protect the bare metal? Wax, linseed oil, or something else?

Sharkhide metal protectant

Update time.

Tried the switch off of Bear the 59 Allstate which also has the VAPE installed, same deal. Both switches also have full continuity to ground on every pole except the kill wire.

Only thing I can think of is a bad wire harness?

Or I just remembered that I had a question about the headlight hook ups before but forgot to ask, is this wired right and also what am I missing between the yellow and black wires at the bottom?

Looks like a bulb socket. What else is yellow?