Modern Vespa

Got me a 1980 P200. I have been looking for a P200 as a project for a while. Has been sitting for more than 10 years but does turn over. 7,500 miles on the ODO. Previous owner says that the engine was built by a tuner and exhaust sorta confirms that. If the motor run's I am thinking I am not going to touch it.

Has been many colors in its life. Currently green. Think it was originally red. Been orange and yellow.

Asking for suggestions as to what you would do with such a beast?

NOTHING!

do nothing.

make it start and run and ride it. that's all.

do you have other things to ride and enjoy while you spend a whole bunch of money and a whole lot of time? if so, start picking into it. otherwise. let it alone and do the basic safety stuff and roll.

Yes I do! I love wrenching and restoring. Its my golf.

nice score! Cool scoot.

Here's what you should do IMHO:

basic safety measures, and ROLL IT.

Greasy has the right track-do nothing (major). Alls fhe safety stuff, check the cotter pins and ride that baby

I'm with Greasy and Geeklion. RIDE IT!

Maybe replace the fuel line with toyox, fast flow fuel tap, clean up the carb to carb box, and carb box to engine and make it flow smoothly. Hmmm, drill the heart on the filter....

Oh, polish up the leg shield and floorboard trim, and also the brake and shift levers, brake pedal, and kick start lever.

Ride it - but....
Have a quick look at what the jetting is - and DONT replace the plug yet.

That pipe is spectacular - does anyone recognize or is that garage built?
Tuner could have put all the right parts on - but bad jetting will ruin the cylinder - and your day - quickly.

So if you wanna - post up some pics of the carb and the cylinder so we can see what might be on there - and perhaps what the jetting is too.
As for that plug - it will give you some information about how well it was jetted previously.
If it starts and you can run it - the plug will quickly take on the colors that can spell out how well the jetting was sorted.

My $.02

Stainless Jim Lomas Pipe, early 2000's edition

^^^

GL with the quick draw on it.

that's a "we not playing around pipe" so there's probably some decent stuff under the cowling.

I'd have a look see, but if she a runner just let it be man. sleeping dogs and all that.

MosDEF a Not playing around Pipe. IMHO one of the best all around real pipes made. There is some crazier stuff around now adays, but hard to beat that JimLomas Goodness. I ran one for a decade on my daily - No playing, all grunt, great pipe

Now---lets see what this pipe bolts up to

I mean anything JL is tasty, but a LH stainless baddie is all: hi, I am the zoom zooms.

granted there's some bonkers stuff available now (and cheap!) but a stainless JL was the bench mark for we ain't playing right now.

I have one for my T5 and the fit and finish is second to none. it also pulls from here to the moon and back again. I regret nothing, but selling the RH stainless T5 pipe was a mistake I'll have to live with until the end of times. there were, other, regrettable decisions... but that one is a sore point.

ANYWAY! what's up with the motor? inquiring minds and all that...

I'm going to say it's the Prima/Scooterworks knockoff of the JL Leftie, not the real deal, which I believe has a JL plate on the side of the silencer.

RedactedRS also made a JL knockoff, but it had a removable silencer.

I have somehow managed to end up with examples of both of them in my parts pile. I bought the Prima super-on-sale, like $90 through maybe a pricing mistake when my Sito+ blew up. The RS came with a motor I bought.

Congrats! Looks like a straight and serviceable scooter.

The P200e has always been the holy grail of scooters for me ever since having a p150 clone in the late 80's.

Possible, as we cant see the stamping on the can. Those series JL's were blank can, or has SIP german emmisions stamping ; if bought from SIP.

However, the Prima pipe is chrome plated steel; which is done after welding. This pipe is mosdef stainless, as you can see the tig welding. I'm not sure about the [redacted] knockoff.

The [redacted] is also chromed after welding. That's it providing Guard Tiki with his perch.

Question for the Mods: why are some shop names being redacted ($….RS), while others are Not (sip, etc) I want to be sure my posts are inline with guidelines. thanks!

Ill see what I can find out on the pipe later today.

The wiring on this one is fubar. I don't know how they shut it off if it ran when parked! There is no ignition switch and there is no kill switch. Lifted the top of the headset last night and OMG. Going to need to run a new harness and get new switches. Thing is going to need a complete go through.

And I would say they did a crappy job of masking when they painted but it appears as if they didn't do any masking!

Looks like original color was red!

[redacted] got itself a bad reputation around here, and while they no longer exist, they are still pretty much universally referred to as [Redacted] or RedactedRS as a result.

Interesting….I'm familiar with the reputation; just curious about the redacted name. Thanks CM

One of the mods can explain... people were complaining about their stuff and they made some threats, so to head off a legal squabble, the decision was made to just not refer to them by name on the forum.

Yeah that makes sense even now

Light reading on the topic:

Notice of Compliance with Cease & Desist Order

An open letter to Randall

Thanks for the update guys. I was aware of the (redacted) drama around that time, outside of the forum *I was not very active online at all when it came to scooters at that time*, but Didn't realize things got that bad here. I'll be sure to not speak that which shall not be named. No wonder they went bully up long ago- good riddance.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled program.

Here is a big ass update with photos. There is no bringing this back like QA's Ruby. The pics will speak for themselves. But no bulbs, no horn, simply unknown electrics (but really bad looking), not a washer on a bolt and most finger tight. Things held together with screws?? Crude oil in the gas tank. Just not what I would call streetable. But it is what I was looking for in general - a pretty straight rust-free body and a solid motor (hopefully).

Pics have comments. Going to need a LOT of parts. Hope SM has a shipment coming.

Wow, that is a project!

Thé wiring on my vbb was all on the outside…wrapped in miles of gooey electrical tape. It all worked though.

The case bolt under the oil fill screw is very long and questionable. The right hand kill switch is hard to find and getting expensive when found. Looks like it is wired up to kill with the headlight switch???? Got several layers of different paint going on there, too.

This is going to be a great project!!!

Love it.
Can anyone identify that jug? Malossi?
Was it being run without a cylinder cowl - or did you remove it?

Main 120/BE4/116 with a 50-100 idle.
Looks like someone knew what they were doing.

As if you had two different owners - or owner was doing electrical and had the motor done elsewhere?
Let's hope.

Cool project.
Will enjoy following along.

One thought.
Just disconnect everything from motor to scoot - and simply fire up the motor isolated to itself.
Might just start - without that pantheon of craziness those wires appear to be.

I removed it. Was held on by one screw??? That is the plan. Going to do a soft clean of the carb and give it a bash.

Nice find!! Cylinder is cast iron so maybe stock, O-Tuned or a Polini 208…

Looks like a stock cylinder.

And very solid bike! Congratulations!

116 main jet seems waaaaaay to low for that pipe...

I would assume something around 125 would be good.

Put in a big jet making it four-stroke and work you way down to be safe.


Not sure what cylinder it is, but if it is a Polini208, it requires even bigger jet, around 130 I would guess.

But congrats with nice scoot!

I thought that too but later noted the 120 air corrector. It's not crazy with that in mind.

sdjohn hit the nail on the head.
the 120 AC means it may be right on.
I've run tuned engines with similar.
There are variables - and you may know all about them - but here is a primer if helpful.
(if this is redundant - just ignore).

When you "O tune" a cylinder (involves larger ports and increased flow through the piston), you certainly need to upjet.
A pipe will also demand more upjetting.
A simple rule of thumb could be to add 10 points to your main for each of these alterations.
So if it came with a 105, you would go to 115 for the pipe and 125 for the O tuned cylinder.

However - and this is a big however: the carb can't feed much more than about a 120MJ, without modification. This is where the 120AC comes in.

The specific carb modification needed is to enlarge the hole in the bottom fo the float chamber.
Otherwise, this hole chokes off gas flow and limits you to the above mentioned 120 or smaller main.
I mean - you can put a 160 main in - but you are only going to get the flow of a ~ 120 or so, due to that hole size.
(Side note: modifying the carb is a pretty simple operation).

One way to avoid having the flow choked off is to change the jet stack to using a 120AC.
This shifts the range of needed main jets down significantly.
Example: you could be running a 160AC, with your carb bored out, and find that it tunes in at say a 130MJ. That exact same carb, might need only a 120MJ if it had a 120AC.

Jetting is a bit of an art - and I would personally never trust a new bikes jetting without checking.
Whoever jetted that was probably wise to use the 120 AC in this case - but you can't know how good they were at jetting, or if their final jetting was truly spot on or a little lean.
Other's like Rowdy are encyclopedic on what it would have come with stock - maybe they can comment on whether it started life with a 120.
My assumption was no (may or may not be correct).

If it were me:
1. look at the plug. you can post pics if you like. it will stlll have some evidence from last run. mostly, here you are looking for any little balls of aluminum that suggest lean, or any whiteness vs brown/blk. (brown good. white - not good).
2. if you have a little one of those scope cameras - shoot a pic of the top of the cylinder - or just pull the head and have a look. Top of the piston will be VERY telling. Post a pic or two.
3. If it looks good - then move to running it and use the above methods to confirm it is tuned in. Pay special attention to how it returns to idle (quickly is good) when you rev - as old seals can leak - and leaks create lean - and lean doesn't return well to idle...

Hope helpful.
-CM

with a pipe like that, I'd hazard a guess that it's a 208 or maaaayyyybbeeee an old autista, possibly something stock tuned like a hot rod al super stock or alpha. that pipe on a stock cylinder would run a little funny. I mean, it'd be fine, but just not unlock it's true potential.

pull the pipe, I'd bet you can tell just by looking at the exhaust. and also, if the pipe as a BAU # on the can it'd JL/SIP or, yank the head off and see what's up.

an interesting project to be sure!

I had a JL on my P150. I provided lots of power but was loud AF. It would make the entire bike vibrate like crazy. it would wake up the kids anytime I went for a ride so switched it for something more quiet

Some more updates from tonight's playing. Some pics and a video...

https://youtu.be/oq0TlSp1reY

At the end of the video you may notice the engine starting to run away. Could be starving the gas, OR, something much more sinister. Seals? Air Leak? I don't want to split the cases.

Not to bad for a motor that hasnt run in 10 years.

Great!

Sounds like starving of gas at the end.

If it has not ran for 10 years, the seals maybe good now but prob not for long. The more the crank and the axle rotate the worst those old seals will get. Ride and enjoy it until then.

Oh man, what chunk of wire do I have laying around. Yeah, this will work...

So the pic of the plug: gotta see the inside ceramic below the metal tip to tell the status of the plug.

Here you go...

Dark, dark, dark.... Looks way rich to me