Vespa Lane

25th September 2007-Vespa Lane

What do you do when it's pouring rain, your scooter is dead, you have a 2 week wait for parts and nothing else to do? Paint a mural in your shed of course!

I have a limestone brick shed and have been eyeing off this wall for quite some time. I decided to give Lola somewhere familiar to park at night, Vespa Lane!

I was able to use a stream of sunlight coming thru the shed door as a guide

That same stream of light the next morning with the shed door wide open, funny how it seems to light the way up the lane..

Just as well it's Raining!

We should be used to the wind and rain in SW Vic, but it has rained non stop here since last Thursday night. It has been blowing a gale as well so definately not scooter weather. I don't feel so bad when it's like that and Lola is in sickbay.

The engine is actually close to being in one piece again.

I have to buy a few goodies first thing tomorrow but should be able to finish her this week. I have a mate calling around one night to work through the CDI wiring with me as the original wiring was such a cock up, we couldn't even use the wiring charts. Not only that, but the previous owner had told me it was a "new wiring loom", what do you think??

That's dirt you can see , dropped out of the shrink tube when I cut it open. There were so many joins in this wiring I'm surprised it worked. This is the wiring leading to the rear light.

So, it's time for the CDI Wiring Headache (I had been putting it off!)

First I got the placement right and then set about making rubber gaskets for the body and drilling holes for attaching to body as well as to reroute wiring. Note the hole above the rubber backing-this is where the wiring leads into the body cavity under the fuel tank. From here all wires can be joined to the main loom and can be taken out the right side to the junction box and join wires coming from the new stator.

Next Step for CDI, placement in Glovebox cavity, by removing the glovey, you can line up the CDI and Regulator so both can be easily wired and the glovey can be reattached with no dramas.

Placement of Black CDI box and Regulator.

Note the black cable here is the rear indicator connection from the handlebars. This was moved also.

Wiring of CDI to Regulator

Feeding wires out through existing wiring loom hole on engine side. All these wires will be going to the Junction Box, existing Coil and new Stator plate.

Now, where did I put that engine??

CDI Reno

Ready to Go. August 28th 2007

I decided at the start of the year to put a CDI on and get rid of the points, as I hate them. The Vespa points seem to be a bit touchy so along with the fact I can make my scooter a more reliable ride with a CDI, I finally took the plunge and got the parts. It was a long time between the initial idea and the actual job happening as I had been busy with my real job and could just never find the time. So right at the end of winter I decided to go the whole hog, do the bearings and seals and see what else was wrong with her along the way.

What did I find??

Lots of stuff that makes me wonder how the heck she was even running

The Nail that was attaching my right hand side handle bar to the inner throttle tube!



Old Clutch Cover had been epoxy glued where the threads had been stuffed up

The Stator Plate was shorting out on the inside of the flywheel where you see the exposed wire.


All Coked Up!

All sorts of wires where they shouldn't be!


The gasket on the top is what they should have been like, look at how much of each side port was being blocked!

Lots of wiring, lots of joins in lots of colours.

This, according the guy who sold me this scooter, is "New Wiring".

That's dirt coming out of the "New Loom"!!!

Cracked and rewelded crank

Naked! Engine Dropped.. Sept 10th 2007

Engine Out

Sept 11th 2007

Case Split

Engine is Stripped

Cleaned all over using a paint brush and petrol

Some minor case work, open up those ports! :)

September 27th 2007.

Before.... mark out the case and area to be cleaned out

Higgo goes a dremmeling

Vroom Vroom!!!
Now, lets see if it all goes back together!!

Gear Cables

As with most cables, they fail when you need them most. I was miles and miles from home when mine went. Spares with me? You bet! I'm a classic Vespa rider-it's a must. Tools with me. No. Der!!!!!
I had taken them out of the glovebox to charge my battery (put in for blinkers) and forgot to put them back in.
So when I finally got home after calling a mate to grab my van the rest was relatively easy. I only broke one cable but decided to replace both gear cables.

Start by opening the headlight

When done, reconnect headlight fittings the way you took them apart, replace lens, rim and reattach retaining screws. This end is done.


This is where it's good to have a hand, someone needs to be holding the handlebar selector at neutral while you tighten the gear wires in the selector box as it's just not a job you can do on your own really. Tighten and adjust as needed. You are almost there. When you start up just make sure all gears engage how they should. If you have put it back the way it came apart all will be well and you'll be scooting again straight away.

Throttle Cable

I can't study a Haynes manual without a good strong coffee so that was of course the first step.

I gathered all the tools for the job and set about the dismantling to get to the throttle wire. It was during this process that I discovered yet another item wrong with Lola. The outer cable for the throttle was actually 2 old halves (of different cables) taped together to act as the carrier for the inner wire which had weakened at the join and snapped. I am glad it happened in my shed and not miles from home though, I should at least be happy about that.

So putting in a new inner wire would have been relatively painless, only now I had to clearly replace the whole cable and from everything I had read so far, this could be a nightmare job on an old Vespa without the old outer to help pull the cable through the body channel.

It's OK, it's still early, it can't be that hard-I'll be scootin' within an hour. HA!

Man what a job that turned out to be. The outer cable kept getting caught inside the frame as I tried to thread it thru from the handlebar end. I stopped and tried from the other end too, my fingers were red, my hands hurt and I was seriously getting peeved off. It had been nearly 2 hours of battling with it when all of a sudden (after a break and another coffee) it popped over it's obstruction within the frame and I could finally grab it. I was leaning over the scooter with my arm as far up the inner channel as I could reach via the fuel tank cavity to try to feel the cable coming through. I could feel vibrations through the steel as it was getting closer but the only thing that got it through was twisting and turning it hard in my hands as I pushed it through. It was getting late now and my scooting mood had subsided somewhat. I decided to pack up and call it a day. At least I had another crap part off and a decent one on.

New Carby

I decided at some point that the lack of power could be due to the crappy old carby Lola was running with. I had been told it was reconditioned but was so old and cracked, had been glued with that heavy duty metal epoxy gunk at some stage and was a real mess. I put the new carby on and kicked it over, started first start. Yay. I allowed her to warm up as I got the scooter gear on, load the tools just in case, grab the phone, lock the house, open the gate, jump on and.........snap!! Throttle Cable. Grrrr. Climb off, strip off, open the house, put the kettle on!

Paint Booth

I went with the obvious colour in the end. White. It was easy, looked OK due to all the white trim.

First off, I had to build a paintbooth in my shed.


I started my dragging an old chest of drawers to the area I had designated and covered it in a plastic drop sheet. I sat the cupboard squarely under some rafters in the shed which allowed me to make a plastic "tent" out of another drop sheet. The tented area was taped over the covered cupboard to create an enclosed area for painting and drying dust free. I left a flap for access at the front and a flap for flowing air.



The home made spray booth

A small fan heater was set up about 1 metre away from the booth and warm air directed into a cut out area to assist with drying.



All masked up

A chain was suspended from the rafters within the booth to hold work for painting. This meant I could spin the items slowly to get good overall paint coverage.



Parts Drying

Lots of sanding and recoats and finally put her back together to see what she looks like.





Finished- April 2006