Continually evolving
Our scootering life is not unlike life in general, things are always evolving and that’s what makes our world so exciting.
It's not so long ago that the world of scooter tuning was the domain of guys in sheds with drills, files, and emery paper who tuned cast iron barrels by reshaping and enlarging the ports. That all changed at an AF Rayspeed Open Day in 1990, when along came the TS1 barrel. For those into tuning the game changed. The TS1 was a huge step up in power and was a product that anyone could buy off the shelf.
But of course that wasn't enough and fairly quickly the TS1 barrels were also being attacked by files and drills, making it produce even more power.
The technology used by the TS1 of a steel liner encased in alloy had been used in motorcycles for a long time, but its use in scooter tuning was spurred on by the TS1. Soon other barrel kits that used piston porting as Mr Innocenti had envisaged were spawned and once again Rayspeed was at the front with the Rapido kit. Once this was made legal for use in racing then yes, you've guessed it, the tuners got the drills and files out and made them even faster.
But of course power and speed were only one element of this revolution. As the alloy barrels ran cooler, heat seizures soon became a thing of the past and scooters became more reliable over long distances.
Things trucked along, slowly evolving for a few more years. But in the last decade there's been another leap forward.
As good engine cases became harder to find, with many of them requiring major work simply to remain roadworthy, it became clear that a new supply was needed. With the assistance of modern technology such as CAD, rapid prototyping and 3D printing, companies like Casa, Uniauto and of course Tino redesigned the humble Lambretta engine casing to produce something new and exciting. The game changed again.
Of course the tuners will still get their drills and files out but now there is little need to. Products like the Casa Case and SSR kits, with uprated and redesigned internal components aren't just keeping our scooters on the road, they're also faster and more reliable than ever before.
Of course the end result is far beyond the original intention of the scooter as cheap transport for the masses, but that's not what our scooters are used for now. They are leisure vehicles that we lavish with attention and money.
Of course there's a huge section of our world that keep their scooters just how they were intended and in beautiful original condition, although even among this group the attraction of electronic ignition is hard to resist!
In the scooter racing world it struck me recently that the Production Class has been created to use some of these off-the-shelf new products.
There are even rules to keep those pesky tuners away with their drills and files. The class is fast, the engines are reliable and relatively economical. They have provided fantastically close racing with very few failures. Machines have literally been raced on the circuit and with no changes, then been ridden across Europe.
Without this continual evolution it's unlikely that our classic scooters would have retained their popularity.
For the majority of scooterists the machines have evolved and changed along with their own.
This constant process of evolution is just one of the many great things about the scootering life – and who knows what the next great leap will be?
Machines have literally been raced on the circuit and with no changes, then been ridden across Europe.