I want your bike!

The VBB really doesn't have a whole lot left to fix up. It's getting close to time to just put it all back together. I need a few more parts, but most of the major purchases are out of the way. I have the bodywork done and most of the parts primed (pictures will be popping up tomorrow, sorry for the delay). As things are starting to come more and more together, my girlfriend is getting more and more interested in having a bike to call her own.

This is where you come in.

If any one has a project Vespa they are looking to get rid of, I'm your man. As long as it is in the continental US, I will pay shipping. I am looking for a late 50's to late 60's non-oil injected Vespa. I would prefer smallframe as she is a small girl! And body condition is much more important than engine condition.

Make an offer!

Polishing your parts

Polishing parts is a very good idea to save pieces that you might otherwise think are junk. This is especially helpful with internal engine components and hardware. I have been doing a few different techniques lately to restore the beauty in parts and I have found that nothing works better than a bench grinder that has dual wheels. One wheel is typically a graphite stone grinder (DON'T USE THIS SIDE! YOU WILL ACTUALLY TAKE METAL OFF AND THIN YOUR PARTS!) and the other wheel is a heavy duty wire polisher (the side we will be dealing with). This tool is an extremely expensive investment, so if you don't already have one, you might want to try and make friends with some one that does! Luckily, my step-father has one. I can't even begin to explain how well this method works. Last weekend I used it on my gear selector, my clutch cover, my piston, and my cylinder and some random hardware. These parts were rusty, grimy, and extremely dirty. Now they look like they just rolled off of the factory assembly line.

Today, I tried to use a dremel with wire grinding tips to polish some parts. I don't recommend this method at all except for maybe very mild use to get into crevasses that you can't reach with the bench grinder. It works pretty well, but little bits of wire fly off of the dremel bits until all of the wires are gone and you're left with nothing. And this isn't a slow process. I bought two bits this afternoon. Within an hour of usage, both bits were reduced to nothing. So, don't do this more than necessary. Because of little wire fragments flying everywhere, I would especially not use this method on internal engine components as an alternative to taking the parts out of the case and using a bench grinder. It is absolutely crucial that the inside of the engine is COMPLETELY free of debris when reassembling it. And this frankly can't be accomplished with all of those little bits of wire flying inside the case. Take the time to take out the individual pieces and use the bench grinder. Your engine will thank you.

You may be tempted to wire polish your casings. While this will look very nice, a lot of people don't recommend it. Jeremy's blog goes into detail about it, but simply put; the engine case will get dirty, and fast. If you don't want to clean your engine case every day of your life, don't set it up for these high standards. Media blasting or a good scrubbing with paint thinner is sufficient.

Ciao.

Well, time to slow down a bit

My weekend plans are kinda screwed. Well, not terribly.

I was supposed to have the frame and a few of the body pieces media blasted this morning and then spend the rest of the weekend prepping the body so that I could spend the week priming/sanding and paint next weekend.

I showed up to the paint strippers this morning at 10 as I was told to. A guy helped me unload all of the pieces and place them into the facility. Then the guy tells me that he will try to get it done by the end of this next week. A few days ago, I was told it would be done when I brought them and the parts would be in and out in about an hour.

I was kinda pissed, but I wasn't about to try to take my parts somewhere else. I just kinda brushed it off and kept my mouth shut.

So it looks like the weekend will be entirely spent on engine work. Which I suppose isn't a bad thing, but I just don't have all of the gaskets here to put it all back together when I'm done. So I was kinda hoping to do all of that throughout the week in between primer coats.

Oh well, tomorrow will begin with a little bit of (actual) work. I have to go to a customer's house at 10am cause I gotta make that money when I can! Then after that, it's time to get down to business with that piston. Wish me luck.

Ciao.

So here it is...

By the suggestion of fellow Vespa restorer, Jeremy, I have decided to start a blog to keep a record of the restoration process of my 1963 Vespa VBB 150. So, to start it all off with, this is where I'm at...

I have wanted a VBB 150 for about 4 years now. I owned a 2003 ET2 that I got as a High School graduation present, and I just fell in love with everything Vespa. Tragically, that Vespa was very short lived. I got in a head on collision with a drunk driver, and luckily I survived, the Vespa did not. I had it only 4 months but had put over 7,000 miles on it. That's how much I loved it.

While a new one was great and all, I really started leaning towards the classic models. The Sprints, The Supers, The GSX's, The 150's, even the Allstates. I knew one of these was what I wanted, but finding just the right one would be hard. I kind of centered in on VBB 150's as my favorite model. Something about them just really got me. A year ago, I even got one tattooed on my leg. (I know it looks a little flakey in the pic, it was still healing.)

So finally, after years of searching, I found a good example of a Vespa VBB 150 that needs to be saved without being in too bad of shape. I got it on eBay, and it showed up at my door last Friday afternoon. Within an hour of owning this diamond in the rough, I already had it taken apart and brought to the basement to prep it for the make-over it so desperately needs. The picture might make it look like a desirable fire engine red color. I hate to have to say that it is actually a very ugly magenta/raspberry color. And a very terrible job at that. This specific piece was chosen because: The actual condition of the body is very pleasent, every essential part to get it running was included, and it would make for a perfect project bike.

As you can see, there's cables spewing out the head. That is because the previous owner bought this bike just the way he sold it to me. The person he got it from started to restore it, but just kind of gave up and sold it. And the guy I bought it from already has several functional Vespas and just didn't make the time to work on this one. It was taken apart to be painted (again, poorly), and all the electronics, levers, and cables taken out and the engine half disassembled. This is how I received it from the freighters. A slightly assembled bike and a box of parts.

So as of now, the bike is disassembled, all of the body pieces are down to the bare metal, ready to be painted, the frame is in the process of being sanded down now, and the engine is partially taken apart. The only body piece I think might need to be replaced is the glovebox side cowl. It has been abused with bondo and the door won't even fit back on because the metal is so warped. The only thing that actually seems to be wrong with the engine is that the piston has seized. So I am currently working on removing the piston from the cylinder. I will have an update soon with the body pieces ready and how the piston went through.