Modern Vespa

Came across this wild custom scooter Piper Moto. Guy was an F1 engineer. Designed and built this with the intention of making them custom to order. Now according to the article I found he's selling the plans and ability to manufacture them.

Here's his site with an interesting gallery of the build process https://pipermoto.com/en/home/

Here is the article explaining the plans to sell everything https://www.bikeexif.com/custom-motorcycle-news-april-5-2024

Here is the original article about it
https://www.bikeexif.com/custom-ktm-scooter-john-piper

I didn't follow the links, but if I recall correctly, those bikes are about $50,000.

They're great looking IMO, and I understand that they're a hand-built custom, but, dang!...$50G's is still a LOT of money.

Maybe the project could be pickup up by one of the major manufacturers, who could give it a belt final drive instead of the chain it now has, a CVT (Honda double clutch arrangement would be nice) transmission instead of the manual shift, and how about a pair of cast wheels running tubeless tires?

Keep the bodywork about the same, and sell it for about.....$15,000?

Maybe you'd get the guys who can't get their legs over their bikes in at $15,000. But definitely lots of reasons why this has never made it to production.

It generally wears the clothing of a 'scooter', but it's really a cleverly disguised conventional motorcycle in all aspects except it's superficial styling and appearance.

That's not meant to be a negative comment on the bike, and if it was affordable for me, I'd take one as-is.

I simply cannot visualize a viable market for this machine no matter who builds and offers it for such an atmospheric price.

Maybe Jay Leno would buy one simply for it's attractive appearance and exclusivity.

Jay Leno would probably like it better as a one-off prototype rather than a production bike.