Domestically Manufactured Scooters

It is a great frustration to me that my country does not manufacture scooters.

 

Janus Cycles of Goshen Indiana makes a sort of moped with an interesting 50 cc two stroke motor, but the end price is rather high. It's really nice looking, don't get me wrong. It's just too expensive and slow to be a useful transportation machine. Its a fancy toy, like a Harley. That's a pity because, like a Harley, it is rolling art. But I'm looking for transportation solutions that aren't ugly. The only motorcycles America builds are Harleys which loud and expensive toys for rich guys, Indian which is also for Rich Guys, and Confederate which is, you guessed it, for rich guys.

 

A few years ago, a new manufacturer of less expensive motorcycles started up, called Cleveland Cycle Works. They used Chinese engines and parts and assembled them in Cleveland and sell them for a reasonable price so you can own a motorcycle which can do highway, but not freeway, speeds. This is a good start. They are 250cc machines, and they've starting building their own engines. They sell for about $4400, which is the same price as a Japanese starter motorcycle.

 

This is not to say that Japan couldn't be competing better in the USA. If Honda sold its EFI Wave 125 with vintage fairings, that would be more useful than their other bikes with small engines that won't climb hills. They also have a 110 cc EFI SuperCub, which boosts the power and has a nice vintage look. Neither underbone scooter is fast enough for freeways, but they'd work fine on the highways and streets of California. California and the West in general lacks many connecting roads between cities thanks to narrow passes and distance so any bike sold here needs to be able to sprint on and off freeways to reach the next frontage road.

 

Honda is currently selling several versions of their 500cc bike, but not a single one with Vintage looks, and their Rebel 250 EFI is still a cruiser, a market segment entirely dominated by Harley in America. For all their faults, Harley Davidson motorcycles climb hills great with their torque-heavy Vee-twin engines. This is why so many roam up and down Hwy 49 and 395 and 70. Those are great roads for those bikes, and being expensive, few criminals have the necessary cash to spend on them so bikers tend to be cosplayer-Pirates more often than outlaws. And when you see leather clad bikers in the same mental space as 20-something girls in blue hair and sailor Fukus, you find yourself smiling a lot more often.

 

So scooters come in two different styles. Modern Chinese and Vintage. Modern Chinese scooters are all about cheap function. They have lights that look like they work, like on a car, but are hit and miss from what I've read. Their styling looks dated within months and their resale value is scrap, zero.

Compare the above to a Labretta or Stella which reference movies and have a bulletproof design because original ones are still out there, still being used after 60 years.

And

And

As you can see, a Vintage scooter looks good and holds its value. Modern scooters get throw away. All time ugliest is the Honda Elite from the 1980s. Ugh.

Worse, most of these are still around. It is a mutt. Nobody loves them for their looks. They sell dirt cheap because people recoil in horror at seeing them. They are like 80's haircuts. Wrong in all sorts of ways. But since they are Hondas, the engines just go and go.

 

So what features are appropriate for a scooter made in America?

1. Vintage looks. Metal, not plastic bodywork. Metal lasts and can be fixed. Plastic warps in the sun and falls off. Metal is heavier, but you'll still have it in 60 years. These plastic Vespas will fall apart in a decade. And they're really ugly underneath.
2. Working lights so you can see around corners after dark.
3. Engine on the frame, not the suspension member like Vespa.
4. 3-4 inches of vertical wheel travel, not 1-2 inches like a Vespa.
5. Flat bottom floorboards for groceries, with a folding hook.
6. Automatic transmission, because girls don't understand a clutch. 
7. Front disc brake. Replacement brake pads available everywhere.
8. 110-150cc four stroke engines, CARB legal and catalytic converter, able to pull a hill and reach 40 mph.
9. 12-16 inch wheels to roll through potholes without spilling the rider.
10. Adjustable rear suspension so a passenger riding pillion still has suspension. Average rider weight is probably 180, can be detuned to 130 for coeds.
11. Add about 10 inches to bike length to accommodate engine, etc over standard tiny Vespas, will help with stability too.
12. Offer 300 cc engine upgrade and EFI for highway riders and mountain riders, since The West is big spaces.
13. Offer oil cooler standard, and consider water cooled engines too.
14. Use standard industrial Kevlar belts for the CVT rollers since they last and are cheap.
15. Use transfer pivot for actual exposed drive chain or belt to rear wheel as greatly reduces weight and improved handling.
16. Mechanical steering lock, motion sensor alarm, and text message alert via free IT setup. Will require cellphone signal for that one, but will cut down on thefts if E911 GPS chip tasked with sending location of Scooter.
17. RFI key fob, rotating codes like Honda uses on cars uncovers steering lock, requires physical key to unlock frame, brakes unlock when key in ignition so can be rolled unpowered for ground floor apartment dwellers, or roll out of garage.
18. Backup kick starter.

 

And people already know about Enduros so don't bother competing with those. They have their place too. These scooters are for getting to work and college as the oil runs out and gets much more expensive. When the roads go away, people will switch to long suspension Enduros or move into town where a scooter still works. The trouble with starting a scooter company to build a model that actually suits American roads is the other makers could easily cut their prices by half and still make a huge profit and get most of your customers. I wonder if pretending to start a company would be enough to trick other makers into price cuts? Its not like normal people in today's economy can afford to buy a Tesla S when they're $65K. A scooter is $5K for the fancy one, but so is a used car, with a roof and 4 wheels that won't tip over and can't be thrown in the back of a pickup truck by a couple strong men and stolen in moments. Cars are currently nearly as cheap and a lot less trouble. But someday the cost of gasoline will make you suck your teeth noisily, and a scooter gets 100 mpg. What car gets that? In a world where the only jobs a college graduate can get are part time and minimum wage, all the money they get needs to go towards fuel and housing, not gasoline. And that's where our world is heading.