Modern Vespa

Hi there,

I need to take my vespa to my local DVLA (DMV) office for them to inspect this friday

I have a new trailer but ive never had the vespa on it.

It looks like this



It has 3 tie down points, one at each wheel and one at front.

I have 4 ratchet straps and wont have the time to get any more before then

What would be the best way to tie it down using 4 standard straps?

I can practice tommorow night for 30mins lol

The front wheel chock supports the front wheel ok without hitting the mud guard.

The side tie downs are roughly level with the front of the px seat to give an idea of scale.

Any help would be most appriciated!!

Hmm.. what would be ideal is if you had someone weld on a piece of square-bar steel at the FRONT of the thing, extending out from the sides of the wheel chock... and then put two eyelets on that.

Then you compress the front fork a bit and run two of your tie-downs ...one around each side of the headset.. to those eyelets. Those basically are all you need because they each pull the bike forward into the chock, and keep it steady at the same time.

Failing that, i guess i would take two tie downs, wrap each one in a loop around the fork up above the legshield but below the headset, and then ratchet them down...one going each way... to those eyelet bars on each side.

The problem is that you lack any force to pull it FORWARD into the wheel chock so it doesn't move forward / backward within the rail. That's what you need to figure out.

I enlarged the picture of your trailer and I don't see any eyelets on each side to tie the front end to. Are they there and I just can't see them. If they're there, you need to put the front wheel in the chock (I also tie a rope through the front wheel and around the chock just for extra safety) and tie the left & right tie-downs to the left/right handlebars on one end and to the eyelets on the other end of the strap.
I also tie my rear end on each side from the luggage carrier down to an eyelet.

If you don't have eyelets, I would have some welded on the trailer. They should be located forward of the handgrips on each side so that when the straps are tightened, the straps will run at a 10 to 15 degree angle, forward, towards the eyelets (and outboard of the middle rail of the trailer by about eight to twelve inches). This keeps the tension pulling the scooter towards the front end of the trailer and downward. The rear tie-downs should be approximately straight out from where they are tied to the luggage rack.

Like I said, I can't see any eyelets so I don't know how you could safely tie a scooter to that trailer...............but maybe I just can't see them. Good luck.

*After posting this, I see that Eric posted the same thing while I was typing my post.

humm think ill have to have a try tommorow and see what i come up with.

Could i tie the handlebars to the front eyelet then put a strap from each side eyelet round the back of the seat above the light to push the vespa and keep it on the trailer?

the eyelets are right behind the wheels on the pics

I saw the eyelets at the rear but you have NONE for the front which is the most important place that you will need them. Also, if the rear ones are too far from being straight to the sides of the rear tie-downs, then the rear ones that you presently have are useless.

yeah...those eyelets are no good for you, though.


I just noticed, there's SORT of an eyelet on the other side of the wheel chock.


Here's what you can do.

3 tiedowns

One around the front fork column, below the headset, running foward and hooking onto that loop, and ratcheted down to pull the bike forward into the chock.

The other two tiedowns... each one is looped around the same part of the front fork ( put a cloth rag underneath the tie-downs so they don't rub off the paint ) ...above the legshield but below the headset ( the P-series headset has a plastic top, so it's not really the most durable thing in the world) .... then run one each way back to the eyelet on either side of the bike. Hopefully that's enough to keep it from tipping over.

1 pulling forward, one pulling to each side. Should be all you need.

It's by no means as perfect setup. If you just had two eyelets on either side out in FRONT of the bike, that's the best placement.

Push the scoot onto the trailer backwards. Tie the rear wheel of the scoot to the chock with a short strap of somekind, your own belt will work. Tie the front wheel down with another strap or short rope. Put a "canyon dancer" strap on the bars, or some similar strap-up of your own design, and chinch it down tight with the ratchet straps you have hooked to the trailer axel eyelets. This will tend to pull the scoot into the chock. (Warning: ratchet straps are very powerful, you could easily damage the scoot by folding the whole fork backwards against the seat. Keep that image in mind while you are ratcheting ) For a short trip in town mostly this should be enough. If you will be going further or faster I would pull down on the shocks using vertical ropes down to the central track of the trailer.

The long term fix is to have a transverse bar welded under the chock to hold the handle bar straps and tension the shocks , as has been suggested.

I went to a transverse bar one time ... it seemed a hopping place...full of lots of tall women. 2 years of therapy later and i've just about forgotten the memories of what happened later that night.

theres an eyelet in front of the chock

thanks for the advice, ill give it a try tommorow

Oh yeah, Gunga Din's on Bourbon St. in NOLA. I remember it well.

Who's the manufacturer of that trailer?

tall women with deep voices

A vespa on a trailer you're not a mod are you

I'd joke about trailers too, and ride my scooter everywhere..... if my country was the size of 3 football fields like yours.

Quote of the year.....

try something like this with added steel

either 2" channel stock or 2" angle iron

bad drawing, but you get the idea

Thanks for the advice!, the trailer was from a local welders. Its collapsable.

I use it on the back of my campervan. Vespa is ideal for zipping around when the camper van is parked up. Got the collapsable one as alot of camp sites dont like trailers, so this one splits into about the size of 2 sets of golf clubs.

I like riding the scoot but I cant ride it until the DVLA have checked it, cant even ride it to the inspection!! (But yet i could to the MOT wtf?)

And im going to the isle of wight for 2 weeks, 350mile away so scoot riding 350mile on a 125cc in a 70mph zone no thanks!

know why i like the brits? They use unit of measurements like mph and miles per gallon and not hectares to the hogshead or whatever the hell the rest of the world uses


( i kid, i love the metric system..i wish we'd adopt it )

the front wheel chock seems high

you may need to lower that to accomadate for smaller wheels

you could strap the wheel to the chock on a big bike and that would deal with forward and back motion, but the vespa wheel makes this more difficult.

that is why you must secure the bars with straps down and slightly forward and out to pick points.

what you have now is good for a dirt bike
imho

have to admit the metric system is better for smaller measurements, mm, cm etc but us brits still prefer miles and feet lol

Take for example last year I built a shed, I did all the normal measurements in inches then the widths in cm! lol

to be fair you are right there, but the front wheel chock is ok, ive rolled the vespa onto the trailer and wheel is ok

Ill try rover eric's method tonight and see how I go

awsome

i like trailers

i attach a saftey rope from bike to trailer just incase of failure i am draging the bike to the side of the road as aposed to bike falling off trailer and becoming a hazard

good point actually, i was gonna wrap one round the footboard for that very reason

Trailers are no joke there like vans with scooters in just wrong All you need is 2 breakdown cards to get you there and back if needed safetly.
Theres too many scooters that where built with lots of chrome and gold then vanned to rallys pick up another trophy then vanned home until the next one.
Wrong wrong wrong. It's like paying for a boob job and then buying her baggy jumpers.

I agree with you about trailers but this is to take it to a D.V.L.A. office to be inspected so I think we can forgive it this time.
As for I.o.W. on a trailer...

I agree with you about trailers but this is to take it to a D.V.L.A. office to be inspected so I think we can forgive it this time.
As for I.o.W. on a trailer...

Some how I dont think id get the campervan, wife, dog, generator, chemical bog, fridge and awning on my vespa lol.

the inlaws have 11 acres down there so staying on their land for 2 weeks, funnily enough just in time for the IOW scooter rally lol

BTW just for review, rover erics method worked, towed 30mile today without problem. 3 straps on front, one on back to keep it in.

As for trailers each to their own, i agree about trailering them to events is wrong but the main purpose of my vespa is a little run about when im on holiday with the campervan to avoid driving the van everywhere