Friend of the site, Horacio, from Argentina, sent us this photo of his Siambretta LD. It sure looks nice! Siambrettas were Lambrettas built under license in Argentina. They built LD's, Series II's, and their own version of a TV175 Series III that looks very different from the standard Italian TV. The Siambrettas were never sold in the US, so I've never seen one in person.
Feel free to send us your photo, we love seeing scooters!
Friend of the site, Paul in North Carolina, emailed me awhile back when he found a Sears smallframe 125. He ended up buying in, and got it going with a little tinkering. As you can see in the photo above, the Sears 125 has some unique features. It was a one-year only model for Sears, and was sold the last year that they sold Vespas. It has the "mickey mouse" tail light that was produced by Siem to comply with US regulations for that year only. All in all, it was a great find, and you can follow Paul's adventures riding it on his blog.
It is not clear whether this is an original Vespa racer, or a re-creation. In either case, it is an amazing scooter!
Via: Team Vespa Barcelona
This is a photo of the prototype Lambretta twin cylinder motorcycle built in the early 1950's. This motorcycle was never actually put into production. One or two of the prototypes were made. At least one has survived, and is in a private collection in Italy. It was 250cc v-twin motor with a set-up like a Moto Guzzi. I believe that the bike was raced at some point.
This photo comes from Thomas in Sweden, a friend of the site. He's showing off his very rare Svalan scooter. The Swedes make all kinds of good stuff from solid Volvos, quirky Saabs, wonderful wood furniture, and neat objects with great design. The Husqvarna motorcycle is known worldwide, and up until the 80's (I think), they were made in Sweden. It is not surprising that someone up there decided at one point to try their hand at making a scooter. From the bits of information on the internet, Svalan was a Swedish motorcycle manufacturer that used imported motors with home-built frames and other components. Though they appear to have used imported motors for their motorcycles, they used Swedish motors for their scooter and moped.
You can see a nice scan of the inside of the 1955 brochure above, including the Svalan scooter, if you click here. Would this goofy picture on the cover of the brochure entice you to buy one of their motorcycles?
Here is one that you just don't see very often, it is a Motobi scooter. Just like the scooter boom of today, back in the late 50's/early 60's it seems that every motorcycle manufacturer tried to dip their toe into the scooter waters. They saw the number of scooters that Vespa and Lambretta were selling, and wanted to get in on the action. However, virtually none of these motorcycle manufacturers were particularly successful (with the possible exception of the Moto Guzzi Galletto).
In the day, Motobi made some very fine motorcycles. Like many Italian manufacturers, they focused on small displacement lightweight bikes. It appears that they made two different models of scooters - the smaller "Picnic", which came in 75 and 125cc versions, and the Catria shown here. I assume this came with the same 175cc motor in Motobi's Catria motorcycle. I belive that the Catria motorcycle motor was four stroke. That would make this scooter quite fast as well as quiet, and give less vibration than at two stroke.
The scooter appears to have an earles fork set-up on the front, which would make braking quite a bit more stable than on a Vespa or Lambretta. I'm guessing that this scooter was aimed clearly at the Lambretta TV175 Series I. I'd sure be curios to ride this scooter to compare. With its motorcycle-derived motor, I'm sure it was smooth and powerful.
Friend of the site, Olivier from Belgium sent in a few photos of his beautiful '51 ACMA Vespa. The ACMA's were Vespas which were built under license in France. As with almost all of the licensed Vespas, the ACMA's were technically somewhat behind the Italian made Vespas. They had frames and motors from the older model Vespas. (That may have been later because this one looks pretty similar to a '51 Italian Vespa). The ACMA's sourced some of the ancillary systems from French manufacturers. So things like the electrical components, carburetor, and tires were French-made. One of the most obvious differences on the ACMA's is the headlight, which was bolted onto the handlebars. On the Italian Vespas, the light was on the front fender. Though not aesthetically pleasing to my eye, I'm sure the technical function of the headlight on the ACMA was superior to that on the Italian Vespa of the same year. I'm not sure if the typical French yellow light bulb helped any though!
More photos of Olivier's scooter below the jump.
This is the first in a new series for the Scooterlounge blog, the "Scooter Profile". I'll use this space to highlight interesting scooters that the Scooterlounge crew come across, both in person, and over the internet. We expect that many of these posts in the future will be photos that readers of the blog will email to us. I guess only time will tell.
The subject of our first feature is a very clean and original Lambretta TV 175 Series III owned by friend of the site, Gary C. He told us that he recently bought it from the original owner! You just don't see too many original owner Lambrettas any more, that's for sure. This one was certainly well loved, and it is in stunning condition.
More pictures below the jump
