Modern Vespa

Well Jess, you're right , of course. I honestly feel bad for the new owner. But it's their money to spend anyway they want.

I don't have time to dig for them, but I'm 99% certain we've seen those two bikes (or two just like them in a storage locker) before.

BaT is a special place...

the rhetoric, glad handing, astro turfing, and general puffery from other sellers is just disgusting.

and make no mistake it happens across ALL makes and the people who speak up about it are flagged as non constructive or labeled as haters. just look at some of the comments.

on one hand I wanna say: good, a fool and his money and all that. but on the other I can't help but think it hurts the hobby.

but it always comes back to: there's an ass for every seat.

also, just because it sold doesn't mean the buyer paid. there's TONS of stuff that gets kicked down the road after auction closes for "reasons". I hope this seller gets the short end of the shitty stick for shilling these absolute garbage piles.

How did they decide it was a 1960, when obviously it is 1965?

VIN: VBB1T001965

Gee…I wonder.

Wrong decoding of the TOTALLY legit VIN

Without a doubt the guys who are bidding on theses burnished BaT Bodges are financially well off...like very well. I don't see them as misinformed, even through they clearly are. They just see something that they like and to them, it doesn't really matter what the scooter's pedigree is. Nor does it matter what kind of shape the scooter was in before the "restoration". So i'm not going to judge any buyer for wanting what their eyes are telling them to buy.

At the same time i don't really feel sorry whatsoever for them either. There's plenty of comment and questions that knowledge people are leaving at the auction's comment section. I'm really wondering if say 3~4 knowledgeable diehard scooter folk decided to leave praises and accolades in the comment section for the next bodge auction. And i'm talking over the top reassurance about the high build quality. Maybe those 3~4 knowledgeable scooter people could drum up enough collusion, that the final selling price could get up towards $30k~$40k? It would sure be a fun game to play. And perhaps buy doing that, buyers would finally get the idea of what BaT is slinging.

BaT gives precisely zero-point-zero shits about what's going on in their auctions short of downright scam or fraud.

the BMW E9 and Alfa guys are absolutely frothing at the mouth about it, and it plays out exactly the same way on the auctions: knowledgeable people get shouted down, comments flagged, questions sidestepped or unanswered. all of the back slapping and collusion between other dealers is entirely evident and has been mentioned in thread on auctions and brought to the attention of BaT and all for naught.

and this is for cars that are trading in the 60K+ for projects, these mopeds are pocket change to these guys.

As said, people on BaT aren't concerned with the tag. They want the thing. It's like buying a 2x4 in my mind. When I want a 2x4, I go buy one, and I pay what it costs. Not because I appreciate the 2x4 as a fine piece of lumber, but because I want a 2x4.

If I had more money, I'd treat air-cooled 911s the same way.

https://seattle.craigslist.org/see/mcy/d/windsor-vintage-vespa-200-piaggio/7693666281.html

Forget BaT and their inflated prices for shiny bikes , here's what you really want. I saw the ad and thought of this thread... It's not cheap like Deal of the Day, but I think priced fair for what it is, an original Rally 200 under 10,000 miles and original owner for only $5000. Top THAT, BaT!

I saw that one, V. That's the Rally I shoulda bought

I think I'm somewhere near $4k into the one I'm working on

I saw it too.

Did you notice it's in Colorado? WTF?

pfft! that's only a mere 18hr drive!

For sure! I've done things twice that dumb for scooters half that cool.

I seriously thought about doing it for that orange smallie that's now part of BN's herd. It's only about ten hours each way from here and I've done it before, towing a boat both ways.

Easy work for Dumb and Dumber.

Seriously though that's a clean looking Rally. Yum

Hudson Hornet in the background

'52 Commodore

You Ameerekeens and your teeny county, we drive that long, and still get nowhere!

A pal of mine in Arizona was at a car show and saw these. I told him that they looked suspicious.

They look more than suspicious. Unless there are 10" VBB's with legshield gloveboxes and tank cavity ignition switches I'm not aware of.

Only 15 miles from here :
https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/406718815253116/?ref=browse_tab&referral_code=marketplace_top_picks&referral_story_type=top_picks

It will sell because it's so bright and shiny! What an overpriced POS!

It's the extra glovebox that makes it a deal. You can't put a price on storage when you're broken down on the side of the road.

Yeah, but if you check BAT you'll see it's not so far out of line.

I left the guy a message with a list....

The paint they do is almost always impressive. Shame about the rest.

A mate of mine was in Bali for a few months. Lots of places repairing and restoring Vespas. One place he said didn't normally let you into the workshop, but one of the workers there wanted to show him something. As they went through, there was a freshly-painted frame on a bench. He said the paint looked amazing. Inside the frame he saw dirt, leaves, and grass growing.

I guess, Scooter Center will be importing bodges now???

By the container load by the looks of it.

I'm morbidly curious to see how this works out for them. Maybe they'll actually have some quality control so they can get street legal in Deutschland.

I don't know if its the angle the photo was taken or the relationship between the PX style kickstart and what looks like to be a Asian Super cowl, but something looks really off.

I was thinking refurb Bajaj Sprint, but looking at your closeup, the cowl doesn't seem to fit the frame, so as of now, I got nothin'.

I assume they're using LML parts pile motors, hence the P style kickstart. Maybe they'll offer a period correct lever as an optional upgrade.

I'm thinking the cowl got pushed down during shipping and isn't sitting against the frame where it is supposed to be.

Or it's just bodgetastic. Could go either way.

looks like the cowl is jumped up and missed the catch so it's kinda flopping out and down.

anyway, I'm sure this is going to be just wonderous...

Got some more intel on the Scooter Center Paki scoots from Savage Scooters Youtube channel.

TL;DW: They bought a container load from Pakistan completely sight unseen. They didn't even know what the models were going to be.

They have a bunch of Sprints which are all Italian imports and VBB's which they don't know provenance yet. No LML's, though.

They will sell them as-is. SC did the import paperwork and they're set so that a buyer can buy them from SC and then get them approved roadworthy after they work on them (and buy lots of parts from SC, natürlich).

They acknowledge that some will be restoration candidates, but others will be bought just for the VIN and paperwork to use on grey market frames.

Anyone who buys one gets a 10% lifetime discount from SC, too. That's pretty damn smart, IMO.

Jump to the 4:00 mark and you can see where they're lined up in all their unrestored glory. They alternately discuss and examine scooters through rest of the video I watched.

I only watched the first fifteen minutes before my brain hurt from the German, but it all makes sense to me now.

$20k

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1968-vespa-vlb-sprint-150-2/

W. T. F.

166 miles - good for another 134.....

the comments are all the usual back-slapping bullshit. any comment of worth is either flagged for removal or not forthright.

I guess it's a good thing these people never ride them. that whole 4mi that was put on it was probably one short ride and the rest of the time pushing it in and out of the shop.

I recently had a dude hit me up about some work. was talking all about it and how beautiful it was and how he'd bought it for a whole bunch of money. he never said it was two-tone and never said 66~68 sprint/super or anything.

shows up with it in a truck and it's obviously a SEA bike. I told him not to even unload it, I wasn't going to touch it. I didn't care how simple it seemed to him the fix was gonna be, supposed to be, how much he was going to pay me.

then proceeded an hour long conversation that followed a winding road of him begging and pleading for me to work on it, telling me I'm a terrible person for being racist for not working on it, and must be a shit mechanic if I couldn't fix it, every tactic to unload that piece of shit on me. nope. nope. nope. all while I told him exactly what was wrong with it that I could visually see from the truck bed, why it's crap, why I won't work on it, and why it's not worth my time.

fun times.

fuck the people selling those, the people buying them and BAT for allowing it all to happen.

Nothing to do with being racist…

You said it in one line, "just not worth your time…"

It's just the mentality of the bodge mechanic. Cutting, welding, hammering it back together.

You can definitely fix it, would just be frustrating.

If only these poor ppl knew...

Here's a gorgeous '65 180SS that seems to be properly done that went for more than EIGHT THOUSAND $ less recently, probably coz only ONE color and no lovely sidecar!

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1965-vespa-180-super-sport/