One of France’s proudest moped marques (how’s that for a backhanded compliment?) is back, in electrical form: The E-Solex. Surely Chinese, but kinda neat looking with a totally boss red saddle.
Category: International
AGI on U.S. Boom and Piaggio/Vespa hybrids
I’ve long stopped linking to most stories about the scooter “boom,” gas savings, and supply shortage, every small-town paper in America has covered it to death already, but now we’re making news overseas. Italian news agency AGI posted their story today, with some details about Piaggio’s sales (up over 100% in May!), their plans for U.S. hybrid models, and some glaring errors about U.S. motorcycling laws.
Synchronized Scootering?
OK, motorcycles, not scooters, but let’s see if we can pull this off at Amerivespa! Judging by the trouble we had keeping six or eight people together through Chicago Columbus Day parades, I doubt it. Awesome.
Joey, do you like Gladiator movies?
Sfidatela? WTF?
“This is How We Roll in India”
Texting from a Bajaj on the freeway, feet on the tank. Note the “mandals,” India’s a few years behind our flip-flop trend. Thanks for the link, Dana!
Unspeakable Xingyue love
“Local man loves his Chinese-made scooter.” Despite the headline, the video was totally disappointing. Just wipe up your mess when you, uh, “finish,” Mumford.
For the record, that’s a Xingyue Euro 150, and I really doubt he’s getting that mileage. Their logo creeps me out for some reason, but I think that’s the only currently-available covered three-wheel scooter (Bajaj’s autorickshaws don’t really count) available in the U.S., if you’re into only getting your arms wet in the rain.
Auto-Rickshaw Mud Flaps
If you’re riding a Bajaj, you need these, stat. (And here are more.)
Aussies: goodbye PX, hello $10K MP3
The Courier-Mail in Australia reports Piaggio has shipped their last containerload of Vespa PX scooters to Australia. We reported that Vespa PX production effectively ended in December, 2006, though the U.S. received 2007 models (likely manufactured in 2006) and a 30th-anniversary limited edition of 1000 white PXes was released last October in Europe. It’s unclear whether the anniversary and Aussie-market PXes were leftover stock from the 2006 batch, or a later production run.
Also from that story: after a recent AU$1000 price drop, the price of an MP3 250 in Australia is close to US$10,000. I’ll never complain about U.S. scooter prices again.
Pics from LML Factory Tour
Two pages worth of photos from the LML factory in Kanpur show the most detailed aspects of PX-clone production we’ve seen to date. Credit to the boys at Eddybullet.com and Xytar of the BBS for posting the link.
sidenote : I really wish that PK copy would have made it to American shores. I wonder if those were part of the Genuine / LML smallframe rumors i heard several years back that never materialized.
Japanese Customs
Here’s a nice collection of photos of customized twist-n-gos from Japan on twowheelsblog. Not my thing, at all, but worth a look.
Lambretta Pato commercial
A TV commercial for the European-market “Lambretta” Pato (aka the Lance Milan, ZNen ZN151T-F, Flyscooter LaVie, etc.), not to be confused with the Lambretta International Uno and Due sold in the U.S., or an actual Lambretta. The only thing sadder than a Chinese Lambretta is putting end credits on a commercial on YouTube. (Via motoblog.it.)
New Vespa Museum opens in Ravenna
If you’re headed to Italy this summer, and you’ve seen the Piaggio Museum three times already, check out Mauro Pascoli’s recently-opened Vespa Museum in Ravenna. Apparently the Massimiliano Fuksas-designed “cloud” museum hovering over the Pontedera assembly line (that was supposed to be finished last year) was just 60th-anniversary P.R. bullshit.
(See also: Machine-translated story from Repubblica.it via Motoblog.it.)
Peugeot in Canada for 2009
I just read Peugeot will export 7-8 scooter models to Canada in 2009. America is apparently still (rightfully) being punished for creating the phrase “Freedom Fries” and being bossy at NATO meetings.
Econo in Windsor
Rover Eric sent us this clipping from Windsor, OT’s “WAMM” magazine, featuring an interview with his clubmate Otto Buj. There’s a lot of stretching of the truth involved in a lot of the ecology, economy, and style arguments out there, but Otto insists that if economy is your chief goal, nothing beats a cheapo fourth-hand Italian postal Vespa.
India to break the 150cc barrier
Indian manufacturers, who have all but abandoned the scooter market over the past couple years to produce 100c motorcycles, are developing new scooters with bigger displacements to compete with their own motorcycles that killed off the scooter market in the first place. And Kinetic expects to launch the full Italjet-derived line “in the coming months.” Sure they are.