Modern Vespa

Was that today (Sunday)?

It looks like you are out on Los Osos Valley Road past Prefumo Canyon Road.

Was little red injured?? Or just the motor? We're there injuries? I hope not.

run it rich or you gonna be poor!

The only injuries were to my wallet and my pride.

The TL;DR: is that I had not fully snapped my fuel line quick disconnect into place after the final needle change, so I fuel starved and seized it when the float bowl emptied. As soon as I touched the fuel line, it snapped apart.

Immediate changes once I rebuild it will be no more quick disconnects on the fuel line and adding an EGT (I have two...on the shelf...), which probably would have warned me something was amiss in time to avoid a catastrophe.

Was this on Saturday or Sunday?
Did Ned & Mike get to finish the ride, then come back to get you?

So sorry to hear this news. I am glad you didn't lose any skin though....

well... at least you knew the tune was good?

silver linings and all that....

Damn… Glad everyone is OK though.

That was Saturday. I was late getting off the line, then got caught at a light and didn't make the first turn, so I was blasting along in the completely wrong direction when it happened.

ah man! what a bummer!

I'm impressed by the reaction time on the clutch grab and the length of the roll out after you lost power.

Agreed. You were right on that clutch. No skidding noted. I left a big skid mark when I seized. But I'm an amateur. Sorry about your engine. I'm glad no injuries.

Nooooooooo…..

It was great to meet you guys! Chandler, Ned, you all know who you are. It was a BLAST riding (even though I was a passenger, still loved it) on Saturday in beautiful weather amid the gorgeous Central Coast scenery. Hope to see you all and more people next year!

WOW! I've seized before. It's not fun. Kudos on your quick-thinking safety skillz.

That sucks big time. But at least you figured out what caused the seizure.

These expensive little billet aluminum fuel connectors are the bees knees. Maybe take a closer look at investing into one of these? https://www.powercellperformance.com/product/powercell-billet-quick-release-in-line-connector/

They're a little over twice the price of the super heavy nickel plated brass ones that are out there, but the Powercell aluminum ones are 10x the quantity. Probably 50x the quality of the problematic plastic quick connectors. And yes, i've used all three version in the past. It only hurts after spending the dough on just two of those aluminum jobbies...after you buy six of them you just kinda go numb...

strangely - he and a couple others were.
The exit from parking lot was... lets just say... inefficient.

I may have been going the wrong way, but I was making REALLY good time!

We did! And so did CM - though in an Uber.

After an ugly start that had CM going 70MPH in the opposite direction, and Mike running to catch up with a group of Scoots only to find they didn't know where they were going - we all found our bearings.

The unicorn found it's way to it's happy place - until the clutch cable gave up the ghost about 13 miles out from the finish BBQ. I ran for about 3 miles without a clutch - but the group eventually stopped to gather - and I had to shut down as I was clutch-less.

Luckily I brought a spare cable! So I rolled off to the side of the road to do a quick fix. Unluckily - it was one I had cut short previously... 🤦🏻‍♂️

I had been trying to rig up a fix for about 20 min, when, to my pleasant surprise, Mike road in with the cavalry. He was leading another lost guy - who was supposed to be a chef at the BBQ.

Mike climbed off Yellow and helped me get the Unicorn back on the road - and we hammered the throttle to the BBQ to find some beers and recap WTF had gone down at that starting point.

Then - this morning - in a total act of selflessness - or some kinda caffeine fueled insanity - Mike loaned CM Yellow - so he could get the experience he had come for. Mike drove the Truck as a chase car - and of course - bailed out a broken down GS this morning about 20 min in.

CM and I rode with the pack out to the Ocean - and then bombed it back to the hotel for late check out, and a final in-n-out for the ride home.

After some unloading and reloading of scoots - and a repacking of CM's motor into a giant check in bag - the three amigos called it a win and headed off our separate ways.

MJ - I have your carrier in the truck!
Thanks for the loan!
Lemme know when home - and I'll get it to you.

epic!

just as it should be!

nobody got arrested. nobody is in traction. all the machines are fixable.

mark it a win boys!

Holy crap, that was one wacky weekend.

Turned out Chandler, Ned and I actually went on three separate "rides" of March.

How is that possible, you ask?

Ok here goes.

After breakfast at the hotel and lots of coffee, we fired up the scoots and rolled into the meet up spot - the Nautical Bean Coffee shop - promptly Saturday morning at 10am. Good crowd, maybe 60-70 scoots. Lots of familiar faces. Said hello to some MV folks, shared some stories. Lots of milling around, lots of chatting. More coffee, more milling around. Then more chatting. More coffee.

Then some more. Like an hour and a half more.

All good. Except all that coffee finally hits Chandler's bladder and he decides he needs to use the bathroom. And just as he walks off to use the facilities, whoever's in charge of the rally decides it's time to start engines.

So there we are, after months of planning, hours of engine swapping, flying, driving … the rally starts… and Chandler's in the head taking a leak!

As the last of the scoots are roaring out of the parking lot, Chandler finally comes strolling out. Ned takes off, figuring we'll catch up later. I wait while Chandler starts his scoot, puts his gloves on, put his jacket on, attaches his camera to his helmet, etc, etc.

The parking lot is now empty except for me and Chandler.

And we basically have no idea where everybody else is.

~~ to be continued ~~

oh this is perfect. we need each of you guys to tell one part.

so it picks up with chandlerman: so I was all dressed up and ready for the big dance, only it was me and mike in the parking lot looking at each other! and we're not from around here...

So epic. That's what these Vespa are built for.

Great stories.

Ha ha -- Well put, Greasy! Group rides are complicated but everyone is unscathed! So, veni vidi vinci.

So nice of SoCal guy to lend CM-squared a battery of scooters and also roadside assistance!

Laughed hard enough that coffee came out my nose.

This story is an absolute classic. The comedy and tragedy of life with vintage Vespas…. So good.

But here's the thing...it was *far* from being just me n' Mike in the parking lot. There were probably ten other riders doing the exact same thing I was, though they were all Lambretta guys trying to kick their rides to life rather than running back from the bathroom to say, "That's gotta be the faster rally rollout EVER!"

I throw my gear on, crank up, and Mike and I hit the road. As soon as we can get past the cars blocking us from getting out of the parking lot and onto the road. At this point, it all started to go both obviously and less-obviously wrong.

Obviously, because when I accelerated to turn onto the road, my water bottle fell onto the center mat, so I paused just long enough to grab it and stick it inside my jacket, then jump out into traffic. This would have been no big deal to catch up to Mike, but those ten seconds were enough that he made a light that I didn't.

So as I'm sitting there waiting, another rider pulls up, lane splitting/riding in the bike lane. Strong local vibes on that move. He's also racing to catch up, and does the "right turn into immediate u-turn" method of red light running. So I follow him, pulling the same move, only maybe skipping the "right turn into a u-turn" part.

Now we're rolling. Sort've. Because he's only rolling at about fifty MPH (51, to be exact) and we're on a road which, while only two lanes, is smooth and flat and suitable for doing much more. I pull around and overtake him, not going crazy or anything, and catch up to the next rider. I continue leapfrogging along like this a couple more times, trying to catch up to the pack.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to me, things are getting ready to take a turn for the worst. Imagine Goose's final ride in Mad MAX, but with the quick disconnect instead of the rear wheel.

Throughout my trip, I'd had intermittent, tiny fuel drips. We'd looked for the cause and come up with nothing. I'd even pulled the tank and carb, set them up outside the frame, and looked. But nothin'. No drips. So I stuck it back in the bike and went on. What I didn't notice, or I should say, what didn't register, was that the quick disconnect was getting increasingly difficult to snap back together after carb changes, Sometimes it would fail to connect back, even though it looked connected, and I'd run out of gas like the fuel tap was off. Which it effectively was.

Now off is annoying, but unless it hits you at just the wrong time, it's not really dangerous. What's dangerous is when the quick disconnect is only *mostly* off. Because then the motor doesn't die, it just gets *really* lean.

Back to the present...

In my mind, I now see the quick disconnect letting only a trickle through to the carb as I'm getting more and more aggressive trying to catch up to the group. As I said above, I was going 100% the wrong direction, but I was making GREAT time.

Of course, neither of these facts were known to me yet. Yet.

We all saw when I discovered Problem #1.
When I got to the side of the road, the cylinder was stuck hard in the barrel. All signs pointed toward "Game over." After a couple minutes of waiting, it freed up. Way up. No compression. Not even a hint. But being the Eternal Optimist, I was already building the task list and tool inventory I'd need to get back on the road, so I turned the scoot around and started pushing.

And that's when I met Aaron...

I had no idea all that ^ was going on.
I had caught the pack and worked my way to the middle by the time we hit single track curvy-ness.

Had a good rider in front of me who was picking off slower riders when opportunity arose - and I just tailed along and tried to avoid pissing anyone off.

There was a dirt road portion - which was interesting.
Last year - we did this section on the Sunday - so I knew it was coming.
Had been a gong show: people - don't pull your front break on loose gravel!

As soon as we picked our way through that - we got out to the coast - and it was Katy bar the door.
Got up with the front of the pack and tore down the coast, assuming that Chandler and Mike would eventually catch up - or meet up at the half way point.

When we finally did pull in to the Chevron to refuel, at halfway, I filled up the gas can I brought - assuming Chandler would be needing it - and then moved out of the way so other's could get at the pump - at which point I read Chandler's "I kabloo-ee" text. Fck.

I figured SoCal must have stopped with him - and was back on the road - but had no idea that they had been separated at the starting gun. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The Unicorn with it's experimental frame, and just as experimental motor, ate up the cool air and was too much fun to put words to. Crying shame I didn't have any video. Day was drop dead gorgeous - and we must have done an hour on the coast, with waves coming in, rocky cliffs and GREEN rolling hills, with a handful of wasps doing 65 plus, in a cacophony of harmonized buzz.

Was so awesome - I just kept belting out WHOOO HOOOOOOs!!!! into my face shield.

Sounds like a fantatsic adventure all around. RoM and HighRollers are on my bucket list. One day... one day.

CM, I've been there. Not the kersploded engine, but one time at the Guy Fawkes Rally I got lossssst. I ran middle of the pack as we got out on the highhway. As the super fast bikes separated, the shitbox and I were cruising at 55 mph on average.... it wasnt fast enough for the guys at the front and too fast for the slow bikes in the back, so I had no frame of reference with the ride sweeper and missed a turn off the rural highway. Luckily, one of the regulars saw me zip past the turn whilst waiting for the slowpokes and gave chase.

Idda ended up out of gas and in the middle of nowhere had JJ not come to redirect me. Lolz.

The best stories are the stories that didn't go to plan. And a hard seize at 70, that you can laugh about so soon afterwards. ...That story is gold.
(Gold not being a reference to the cost of the new top end, etc.)

This, as we shall see, is exactly correct.

~~ the saga continues ~~

So, the last of the scooters have now disappeared and the smell of two stroke has faded from the parking lot. Chandler, who is normally borderline hyperactive, seems remarkably unhurried getting underway (ok maybe he wasn't and I was just extra antsy) eventually nods that he's ready.

I figure we'll just head in the general direction of the pack and catch up. They've got a solid 3-4 minute head start, but hey, we've got reasonably quick scoots, how hard can it be? Right?

We exit the parking lot and immediately hit a red light, a line of cars, and somebody at the front afraid to make a right turn on a red light. So we wait another 2 minutes. I'm rolling my eyes and grinding my teeth.

The pack is now 5-6 minutes ahead of us.

The light finally turns green and we turn on to Los Osos Valley Road. I see what looks like a couple of guys on scooters up about a quarter mile ahead and pin it. Chandler's behind me. I can see his blinding white LED headlight in my mirror.

So I'm blasting up Los Osos Valley Road, trying to catch the scoots up ahead, keeping one eye on traffic, another on Chandler's headlight, another out for any signs that might say "GO THIS WAY —>".

A couple of miles up the road I catch the two guys ahead of me, who've now pulled over. I'm thinking cool, we can discuss the route, and figure out out a game plan.

The first thing they say to me is "Do you know where we're supposed to go?"

LOL.

I pull out the crudely drawn map on my iPhone (see below) and realize we passed the Perfumo Canyon turn off several miles back.

I figured Chandler made the turn and had probably already joined the pack. (Unbeknownst to me, his engine seized shortly after leaving the parking lot.)

I tell the guys. One of them - on a Lambretta - is in a hurry and turns around. The other, Daniel, is the most relaxed dude on the planet. He also happen to be one of the guys serving food at the barbecue. He and I think a bit and decide, screw it, we'll do our own ride. We take a side romp through Turri Road, then loop back on Los Osos, then take Perfumo. We figured we'd take a cut off on the way back and meet the pack somewhere around Arroyo Grande.

Sure enough, after some awesome canyon and ocean riding, we turn a corner heading to the BBQ and there's Ned by the side of the road fixing his clutch cable.

We fiddled with the cable for half an hour, then blasted off to the park. Chandler took an Uber from the hotel and met us there.

You couldn't have scripted this.

At Slaughterhouse one year, the big ride wound up breaking into multiple different rides in the same way, only with it being like 1/3 - 1/3 - 1/3. It wasn't a big deal for me, because it was after we'd gotten back close enough to the North Side that I knew where we were and was able to keep things rolling, but the number of conversations at the BBQ that were basically, "Did you see XXX?" and the response was "But we didn't go by XXX!" were hilarious. Needless to say, trying to run a 200+ scoot ride through dense downtown neighborhoods is always interesting, to say the least.

Right now, even though I'm on my flight back to Nashville and and it would seem like the adventure is over, the tale is actually continuing to unwind. But I'll come back to that after we meet Aaron...

For reference, here's the map we were working with.

At this point, I'm pushing my scoot back toward town, thoroughly bummed, but as I said, already planning out what I might need to pull the top end and, assuming it's just a melted piston with stuck rings, and get back in the game. It's a beautiful day, smallies are really easy to push, I'm not going uphill for once in my scooter pushing career, and other than the whole "pushing a seized scooter part," actually a really awesome way to spend a Saturday.

I've been going for probably half a mile or so when a van pulls up and a guy hops out and asks if I need help. My initial thought was that it's the sweeper van. Turns out, it's Aaron. He's a local dude who saw me and just wanted to see if he could help. He asks if I just need a ride to the gas station, and I explain the situation, ask if he could be me back to the hotel, and he says, "Sure, dude. Let's get you loaded up."

So we load the smallie into the back of his van, I grab shotgun and we head back toward the hotel. Turns out, he's had a few Vespas over the years, and as I explain the situation, he says, "Dude...my buddy Alex is a Vespa dude. Like he has a bunch of them. He lives right around here. Let's see if he's home!" so we take off to Alex's house. Who may or may not be an axe murderer (I didn't ask, though I'm pretty sure he's not), but is at least supposedly a Vespa-riding axe murderer if he is.

We pull up and Alex comes out, introduces himself, and says, "Yeah, lemme grab some tools. Hold on," and heads into his garage, returning eventually with a tool bag and no axe. Meanwhile I pull the tank and carb and lay the scoot down on its side to drop the motor and see what's what. We chat, I fill him in that I'm in town for ROM, and he's like, "Oh shit...I totally forgot that was this weekend!" IT only takes a few minutes to get the motor opened up and determine that the Nicasil is scraped away just over the exhaust port. This cylinder has turned its last revolution.

So I button it back up enough to get home and Alex asks if I want to check out his scoots. Of course I do! So we see his herd, which includes things like an amazing old San Francisco Police Sprint and a sweet old Lambretta.

As we're talking, he asks how a Nashville guy wound up at ROM, so I tell him the Modern Vespa/Orange Count/San Diego connection to Socal and CM2 and he says he's on here sometimes, and that he'd helped a guy in San Diego with the details on a smallie project, and they guy had made him some custom double-end wrenches by welding together specific pairings, like 17mm/14mm.

Now it's my turn, knowing it was SoCal who made those wrenches, to say, "Dude! That's one of the guys I'm here with!" Turns out, Red is the smalle he advised SoCal on building!.

So we hang around for a while, talking scoots, other mutual acquaintances, and life in SLO versus San Francisco, where he lived until mid-COVID, until finally everyone needs to get rolling, so we load up Red into Aaron's van, they give me a lift back to the hotel while other adventures unfolded without me, because I was taking a nap.

Oh, no, it was the slower than 90 wt gear dope on a freezing cold morning.

🙂 Poor Red. She managed to trick here captor into bringing her to a place she knew.
Year's of therapy will be required.

Funniest line of the BBQ:
"It's the Rides of March, and I am playing the staring role as Siezer". ~Chandlerman

It's not really a rally unless something breaks and someone gets lost.

Now that the first chapter of the tale is complete, let me pause to catch up on my correspondence... We need to do a better job of setting an NSM/MV meetup for future rallies. We don't bite, although we have been known to create some awkward moments for those around us. Comes with the territory I guess.

And I 110% see a "Safety Third" sticker in my future. I'm taking the "Any ride you walk away from was a good ride" view of the whole thing. That's almost the worst part! It was CRUSHING it. You saw the death video where I was slingshotting around that guy who was doing 50 MPH himself. I'd finally nailed down the 1/8 throttle needle diameter, and the CHT was only at 275F when it happened. It wasn't a heat seize, it was a lack-of-lube seize, and we all know that lack of lubrication is never a good thing. Nothing like the sound and feel of rear wheel skidding to inspire the reflexes... Everyone out there was awesome--I met so many fun and friendly folks. I'm glad you came out and made the most of it, despite your recent loss. Sometimes, I feel like I should just buy my top ends by the case, not the box. Even when everything's going right, something goes wrong. There's just not much room for error when you're out at the edge of the envelope.

Yeah, I'd love to see a large-scale migration to HighRollers. I don't even like Vegas, but I'd still go in a heartbeat. ROM was hands down awesome, though, chaos, disaster, and all. I can't wait until next year.

And it sounds like there are soooo many amazing rallies out on the west coast. I've pretty much decided that I'm going to start a Southeast rally, but maybe aim for Chattanooga rather than Nashville, since I seem to be the northwest-most Vintage Scooterist in that part of the world. But that'll be its own thread and adventure in good time.

And I'm renaming the Smallstate "Brutus."

hmmmm may have to plan better myself for next year.... maybe tag along with you all. probably my P will be gone by then but i'm not sure if my VBB will be ready. still, attending an event is motivation to move on a project!

Looks like you had a great time, regardless the mishap. It's not a Vespa rally without someone seizing, we've been there too...

Chandler, as Jack says, "It will live again. Chuck more money at it"

And a final question for the admins. Does Chandler now get a second "Broken Piston: Smallstate disaster" badge or an x2 next to it??

What an epic adventure. There were twists and turns, break downs and rebuilds. Yall made it happen one way or another! Its a great story, and thanks to everyone for sharing.

I definitely want to meet up with you guys sometime. It's difficult for me to get out to ROM because it's the same weekend as my wife's birthday and we usually go out of town.
She is home sick right now so I kind of had a hall pass. Kind of.

I'm getting more "Safety Third" stickers in the next day or two.
I'll be happy to post one out to all who want one (while supplies last).

PM me names and addresses.

Thanks for the sticker! PM sent and I will wear it with completely misplaced pride!

The only thing missing in that video is a drogue chute.