Modern Vespa

Greetings scooteristas !
I am new to scootering, but have ridden street and dirt bikes for the last thirty years.
My current stable is two KTMs (640 adventure and a 300exc) and the charming,new to me, '90 PX200E


I have used the scoot almost daily for the last month or so and now winter is approaching.. here that means rain.. lots of rain

Brakeshoes are original piaggio that were covered in an oil-water slurry when i serviced them after the purchase, i cleaned them up with brake cleaner and roughed them up a little and they worked flawlessly until i left the scoot out in the rain one day.

To my surprise i had no front brakes whatsoever

After spending the night in the garage the brakes are yet again perfect.

Is this a common trait?
Are there other not so sensitive to moisture brakeshoes out there ?

Should there be water inside the brakedrum just from being parked outside in the rain at all?

PS Rear brake was not affected by the rain at all.. or i would have rear ended a volkswagen

My front brake is useless...Rear brake and learn how to down shift...I'm sure Rover Eric will give you more insight to this.

My friend complained about this on his rear tire the other day ...so we pulled the hub and found a really really tiny, slow leak of case oil onto the pads.

Now, in the front hub you don't have that... but there is grease in there to keep the bearings greased, and there's a seal to keep dirt and shoe dust from getting in the grease, and the grease from getting on the shoes.

So... i suppose if the seal on the front hub was bad, that COULD be happening, but i think it unlikely.

i'll keep brainstorming.

I've also had this problem with the front brake. It all went away when my rear hub went out of true and I started relying on the front brake. A good thing to do after a rain is to ride the bike slowly (or walk it forward) while applying the front brake slightly. When it starts catching, you're ready to go, although you'll want to test it a bit before entering traffic.

The front seal on hubs I've personally seen isn't exactly watertight, but I don't have enough experience with that part of the bike to definitively tell you. Thankfully, you can still rely on the rear brake, which is typically the strongest on vintage scooters (there being the most weight over it).

Thank you for your input guys, i think the water-oil slurry i saw inside the front hub was from the previous owners pressure washing the bike before selling it.
i Just found it odd that rain water could reduce the stopping power from virtually "stoppie" to nil
Now that the brakes are dry they are back to near disc brake performance.

Guess i will just have to get used to it and rely more on the rear brake

BTW
I have surfed through quite a few scooter forums the last weeks and this place seems to be the best source for tech tips

Wibbo

What about a Grimeca disc kit for the front?

OP is in Europe, so other than the taxes, it should be cheap....

That's bolt-on for a P. right?

Yes and no.

The semi-hydraulic (cable-operated master cylinder on the fork) can be done bolt-on, but the fully-hydraulic (lever-operated master cylinder on headset) version requires a new (or modified) headset.

Can you provide some more detail on this? I started researching semi vs. fully-hydraulic disk kits. IF you go fully-hydraulic, you need a new fork and headset? I'm not exactly sure why?

Yeah, AFAIK the only full-hyd kit is only for the 20mm axle found on later P-range bikes. Your (and my) '79 have the old 16mm axle. I'm not sure, but I'd bet even the Grimeca 16mm semi-hyd kit can be set up fully-hydraulic by using a different master cylinder. I'm not sure, though, because I don't have one to try out.

Yeah, thats exactly what I was wondering! I'm guessing youc an buy different master cylinder units quite easily?

Yeah, go to any Genuine dealer and order a Stella headset from them. You might need to drill a hole for your ignition key since it's on the column on those bikes, but the rest should match.

Last edited by ianp on Sun, 26 Oct 2008 08:45:45 +0000; edited 1 time

Wouldn't I need to also buy a hydraulic cable to go down to the brake? Curious, why most people don't do this?

Yeah, thst's a standard auto part. Get some braided brake cable in whatever inner diameter the kit is (you will have to measure it.)

Hmmm, will look into it. The brake disk and pad units would be the same between the two?

Can't see what all the fuss about a front disc is.

Matt

My front brake isn't very good at stopping the hulking machine. Disk brake has much better stopping power.

The kit would come with all the lower stuff. Disc, caliper, pads, etc... The only part you would replace theoretically would be the headset/mastercylinder and brake line.

Theoretically..hehe, I've had that blow up in my face a couple times...would be interested to see if this has EVER been done before or are we on the frontier of grimeca brake installation on 16mm forks??

Well, the Grimeca kit is designed for 16mm forks. There's a 16mm version specifically for our bikes. The untested part is abandoning the semi-hyd master cyl in favor of the fully-hyd headset off a Stella or '98+ PX150.

Yeh I know that, I ride motorcycles as well where the bigger the disc the better.

What I'm trying to say is you've got to put it into perspective.

BHP= minimal

Top speed= low

Drum brakes= more than adequate if you ride accordingly and have them set up well.

And it looks cooler too. 8)

Matt

I have one 80 P200E that is original drum. The other 79 P200E was upgraded to the semi hydro disc. You have to be careful when you ride the disc brake as it will really grab compared to the drum. I havn't had to change the brake pads on either yet but I would say the disc will be easier. Also the one with the disc I tend to use it more than the rear brake at slow speeds which I think ends up saving the wear on the rear brake shoes.