Post by Yoshi on Feb 2, 2022 17:19:37 GMT
Started with a new scoot on november 2021. Was kinda sad looking and neglected for roughly three decades.
Did a little wire-wheeling to see what kind of tinworm lives under the surface. The metal was in surprisingly good condition and a spark of hope was lit on NOT having to build the scooter completely again from ground up.
There was a lot of play in the front swingarm assembly and every single place was rusted into a lump of finest Italian metal. Even the brake pads had to be cut into pieces with angle grinder to get them off. Well, there goes that little hope on getting off easy that was kindling just a moment ago.
One weird thing about the scoot is that it had SHB 16.16 while to my knowledge Primmys should all have SHB 19.19.
Then for the lump someone might call an engine. Well, it's crusty and utterly stuck. Judging by the engine number the lump is original and has not been swapped.
Off go the parts to get into all nooks and crannies
Frame stripped clean and ready for some well deserved attention.
Continued off with stripping all the other assemblies and getting them ready for bead blasting. As the image suggests, the throttle and gear tubes were stuck like hell. Used a torch, WD40 and some love with a mallet.
Parts ready for blasting.
Steering lock has been broken quite ugly in 1989.
Making things flat with a cut off disc
Scavenged some parts from a scrapped frame of a moped
And in they go with help of a welder and die grinder
Making things flat with a cut off disc
Scavenged some parts from a scrapped frame of a moped
And in they go with help of a welder and die grinder
Blasted the small parts in a cabinet with glass-beads while frame went off to be sand blasted in a bigger chamber
After the frame was blasted, I checked there were no further needs for welding hiding under the layers of paint and grime
Couple days later got a picture from the powder coating shop
Nice bright colors coming through!
Got the parts home and the assembly well underway
Lower steering bearing proved to be a bit of a challenge but gave up after making a long punch tool from M20 rod and a washer.
Steering lock barrel turned out nice
Pulling the cables and wiring harness went smoothly with help of an USB Endoscope
No wonder the front swing had some major play in it. Off to the press to get the old worn out axle off
and in with the new one
Ready to be assembled. Not much could be done for the front shocker stud since it appeared to be non-replaceable.
Steering column mostly assembled
New bearings in place and starting to look like a scoot again
Headset assembled and fitted back to it's place
I previously had a slight incident with the white -74 Primavera side hatch. The re-peened latch gave up and hatch decided to go flying in speed of 60km/h. This time I wanted to avoid the same fate and drilled a deep hole with 2,5mm drill. Threaded it with M3 tap and added a nice long screw with threadlock and washer to hold things together.
The locking lug of replacement lock cylinder was a tad too wide to fit inside the slot in steering column. Slight re-shaping with a cut off disc and in with the cover.
Grips in and all the cables routed to their pass-through rubbers
Replacement harness had the flat type connectors for the headlight so chopped them off and replaced with round type connectors.
Looking good and ready for the front wheel and engine
For my own safety I decided to move the scoot into the bathroom for the fitting the motor. Stock motor is still on the healing-bench since I had the pre-Parmakit Polini-engine from the white -74 laying around. The engine has 133 Polini, welded-on Polini reed assembly, Pinasco crank and BGM Superstrong clutch. Topped off with PHBL24, Polini banana-exhaust and HP4 flywheel-stator assembly
Nice to see the scoot standing on it's own paws again
There was a slight hitch with the clutch cable. Engine has a long clutch arm but the cable retainer is the short type that causes the cable to foul with the kickstart lever.
Bit of fiddling around, grinding and welding a solution was conceived.
No more contact with the lever but might had to add some stiffening later to get rid of the holder flexing when pulling the clutch.
The speedo was also not so surprisingly stuck so time for disassembly, cleaning and some fresh oil.
The finished speedo turned out beautiful
Last stretch in the assembly
The original saddle was a sad story. Front hinge was rusted to one piece and snapped off when I tried to lift the seat up. Springs were missing and the whole thing was badly rusted. A silver lining were that the saddle still had the original seat cover AND the stiffening-rubbers under the ugly pull-over seat cover. The rubbers were the only salvageable parts from the seat but I was in luck that I just had a seat that was missing them waiting from the times of white -74 build ten years ago.
This was the first time I installed a new seat cover for a Vespa seat but it turned out quite nice in my opinion.
And in the whole seat goes
After working on the saddle I made a holder for the Ducati-type CDI. Piece of steel, small bend on the vice and holes to fit the CDI mounts.
The red flywheel was fugly to be blunt and did not fit to the color scheme at all
Spinning the flywheel with aid of a M8 bolt, couple washers and a nut. Off comes the paint with wire-brush and then a lick of black paint to make the thing more subtle.
Much better now
Wires routed to the CDI and juction box wires connected. Did the required modifications for the closer-type brake light switch circuit of the harness and some tidying up.
In goes the carb. Might still switch to Malossi 160' bend on the top of the carb.
Light switch took some modifying to get the horn switch converted to a closer-type. It was a bit of a surprise that there are brass brushes on both sides under the horn switch washer that really make the contact for the horn and break when button is pressed which separates the contacts. Chopped one brush off and the conversion is complete.
Some wiring mods under the light switch because of the conversion to regulated AC system. Grounded the green wire from the horn with black wire and moved the white wire from horn from terminal 4 to 8. Also moved the pink wire from the stator light coil from terminal 3 -> 4.
Mounting the regulator and spliced the cable for connection.
Scooter out, fuel into the tank and running with second kick.
The regulator was not working due to wrong connections or just being broken. Decided not to chase it and threw in a single wire regulator from a sled. Added an adapter on the carb and fitted a shortened universal-type pipercross filter on top of it.
Click the picture for a video with the engine running and revving
Some more finishing work. Added a connector for the speedometer light wire and fitted the speedometer cable properly on the lower end. It was poking out a bit and the cable core did not reach all the way down inside the small gear.
Shortened the SIP FastFlow 2.0 tap's lever for 10mm and drilled a new hole to make the lever flush with the frame.
4mm aluminum plate for the registration and bolted on as a package to the frame
Ready scooter and just some tuning to the carb needing to be done.