February 2013 Archives

This Iso scooter is for sale on ebay in Virginia right now. Iso was an Italian manufacturer of refrigerators, most famous for originally building the Isetta bubble car. That car saved BMW's bacon when they made it under license from Iso in the 50's. I'm not sure if the Iso was sold in the US, and I think they were not. In any case, this one appears to be an Italian import. While the seller states it is in original condition, it has clearly been repainted. You can see overspray on the cable clips and on the wheel nuts. He mentions that he was planning on working on the mechanics, so you can also bet that it will need attention there too. Do you want to pay a lot for a non-running odd-ball scooter? If so, than this could be the one for you. The bidding is now at $2200, which I would say is all the money and more for this scoot.

By 1951, the battle for the Italian scooter market was at a fevered pitch. MV was determined to field a credible scooter; the result was the "Ovunque" ("Everywhere"). The main characteristic of the "Ovunque" was its single beam frame, constructed of large diameter tubing. While the engine used the same block and head similar as four-speed models, the "Ovunque" used a three-speed transmission with a twist-grip gear selector on the handlebars. The rear suspension was rather tidy; it was a swingarm design that used the engine as an integral part, as well as a single hydraulic shock absorber. Two versions were built; the O51, which used a single exhaust, and the O52, that utilized a double exhaust system. A popular seller, production was approximately 10,000 units.

This scooter recently sold at auction for $5000.

This Sears Allstate Puch sold at the Las Vegas Auctions in January for $2000. This is about what these routinely sell for... perhaps on the high side. This one looks pretty original. Not many people seem to be into these scooters, but Sears seems to have sold a lot of them.

While most of us appreciate the Vespa for the beauty of its design, there appear to be some people around the world who think to themselves, "How might I make this wonderful object horribly ugly?" My friend Pelayo sent me photos of this scooter, which is for sale in Reno, Nevada. It appears to be a mating of a Vespa motor in a home-made frame, with a lot of farm-engineering in the mix. They put a Vespa motor in this frame, and also seem to have welded the Vespa fork tube on the front. Note the Vespa fuel tank cap on there as well. Pretty wild.

Photo by theomen.

This 1950 MV just sold last month at the Las Vegas auctions for $5500.

MV entered the scooter market at the Milan Trade Fair in 1949, and in 1950, introduced the CSL model (C Super Lusso). With its tubular and pressed steel step-through frame and non-stressed body panels, it incorporated a forced air cooling duct that ran down the middle of the foot-rest platform to provide cooling air to the engine. For better cooling, the engine was equipped with a fan installed on the magneto flywheel. Its 2-stroke single-cylinder engine displaced 123cc, and its 6:1 compression ratio helped generate 5 HP to the rear wheel via a 4-speed transmission. Production of this model was 2,500 units.

This Sears Allstate recently sold at auction in Las Vegas for $5000. It is a very nice scooter. The paint looks fantastic. I'd call it a "resto-mod," in that it hews to the original scooter, but there are a lot of obvious modifications. It is clearly much nicer than the original scooter was. If you are not into originality, this would be a very good choice. The price is higher than these usually sell for, but it appears to be much nicer than average. A fair deal all the way around.

This scooter recently sold at auction in Las Vegas for $4500. It was part of a large collection of MV's that were sold and scattered.

The CGT is an evolution of the "A" series scooter, the 'GT' standing for Gran Turismo. The scooter debuted at the 1950 Geneva Show and was first called the "Popolare", then the "Normale", finally settling on CGT. It had the same engine layout as the CSL, but without body panels to cover the powerplant. The front portion of the scooter used essentially the same components as the CSL. With the exposed engine, the cost savings were considerable; the CGT sold for 175,000 Lira, making it very competitive with its rivals. With 6 horsepower and four gears, the CGT could attain 80 Km/h. With its pressed steel frame, the CGT weighed 86 Kg.

New York City - Oct 20, 1971 - A city policeman ducks behind a police scooter as he takes up position outside a building on 44th St. where a office robbery was reported in progress. Dozens of city policemen, several armed with shotguns, poured into the midtown area to spectacularly break up the robbery as thousands of workers left nearby buildings and witness the action.

This scooter recently sold at auction in Las Vegas for $4000.

This very original Triumph Tina Scooter has only 202 actual miles showing on the odometer. It had reportedly been in Burroughs Cycle Shop in Burr Oak, Indiana, since 1963, and was sold to a collector approximately ten years ago. Very few Triumph Scooters were sold in the US and they made two models: the Tina and Tigress scooters. The Tigress was the larger and more sophisticated model, and this Tina represents the budget model. As motorcycle manufacturers, Triumph's heart was simply not in the scooter market. Just looking at this thing, you can certainly tell that Triumph did not even try to understand what the scooter market was all about. To top it all off, their scoots were more expensive than either Vespa and Lambretta, and were not nearly as well made. A clear recipe for failure in the scooter market, which quickly followed.