Modern Vespa

The day was starting out as a nice one, it was warming up no rain so I decided to go the store on the scooter to pick up some weed killer.
On the way back I passed a semi-truck and thought his brakes were burning or at least I smelled something, turned off the Blvd onto the residential streets and I continued to smell something burning, drove up to my driveway and parked the scooter – smoke was billowing out. Popped the seat and there were flames. Lifted the pet carrier to see what was burning and saw the electrical (something or other) parts burning at the front of the bay. Couple of hard blows it was out except the pet carrier was burning good, took it to the front outside hose and watered it down.
No one hurt; damage limited to some electrical components and various size and colored wires.
2009 Super 300
I wasn't looking for a project but now I have one.




Anyone have a clear picture of what the front of the motor bay is supposed to look like?

See below for my damage:


The main damage – wiring and some components.


The pet carrier didn't fair well


Other side of the pet carrier[img]









Update:

The fire damaged three branches of the main loom, the main loom integrity was intact. The branch which supplied power to the infamous (red) connector was pretty much toast, heating so much it caught the pet carrier on fire and melted the fuse holder under / behind the pet carrier.
Re-wired the damaged branches eliminated the red connector and created a service loop for the future. Replaced the fuse holders with waterproof sockets and replaced the pet carrier, less the not pets decal, which went up in smoke.
Started right up – all is good!

What happened is the notorious brown connector from the stator overheated melted and caught fire. Known issue and needs to be kept an eye on.
Here is a pic from a 2009 GTS250. The Brown connector is gone as it was starting to melt so removed it, spliced and taped it back together.

Thanks for the picture - I forgot my wife has a 2009 250ie but I thought it was different than mine.
I was aware of the connector issue and always had it smothered in dielectric grease??
Hard wiring is the way to go.

man, looks like you just missed the swing of the executioners greataxe. that was nearly a total writeoff.

tedious repair, but doable.

Yea it does not look like fun - I'm going to splice in new wire, hard wire every thing back together so there will not be another incident like this. Thinking I may have to hardwire my wife's scooter as well to prevent anything like this happening on her bike don't want her to go through that awful experience - I was lucky catching the fire before it got worse.

or strap a fire extinguisher to the top of the battery cover or hang it under the rear rack

Glad it wasn't worse!

I mean, imagine if you kept your "emergency fuel" stored in there...

that could make an otherwise mundane day rather exciting with the quickness.

This is why I always keep a bag of marshmallows in the glovebox.