6 months ago I got the notion to get some sort of moped, scooter or whatever to replicate my childhood memories of riding around on the back of my great uncle's Honda Trail 50. I looked at those, zuma scooters, the honda ruckus, and some other stuff including those 50cc (and 80cc) motors you stuff into a bike to make your own moped. ultimately I got nothing.
Last week, I was once again thinking about it, then took the plunge and ordered one of the $108 50cc kits off amazon. It showed up yesterday, and after spending most the day tinkering, I ended up with this:
My 1993 DB Ascent is now sporting 50cc of Chinese crap. The only real trouble getting it installed was the rear motor mount. The instructions say "go to the hardware store and buy longer threaded rods so you can mount it correctly". Thanks China.
Those 'rods' are M8-1.0, so not exactly standard (M8-1.25 stuff is everywhere). I found 2 bolts and since they weren't fully threaded had to make some ghetto spacers I won't share pictures of out of old nuts and washers, but it worked.
I wants 1:17 fuel for 'break in' for 500km. That's a LONG break in for something that can't go all that fast. I mixed up some 'almost 1:17', dumped some in the tank, started pedalling down the driveway and popped the clutch... damn thing fired right up.
In about 150' the chain popped off the sprocket so I had to go back and tweak with the tensioner a bit, but after that I ended up riding around for about 15 minutes before stopping to let it cool down. It says not to ride more than 30 min at a time during break in.
So it's impractical, kinda noisy and slow and you're basically running around with a chainsaw strapped to your bike, but it's really stupidly fun.
I need to heat the exhaust pipe up and as the manual says "make it flexy" so I can bend it parallel with the frame so the mount will work correctly, but otherwise I think it's good to go. Not sure where, but it will go.
Oh, and maybe figure out how to mount the rear of the chain guard that doesn't involve a zip tie. The manual says "use good zip tie!".
Last week, I was once again thinking about it, then took the plunge and ordered one of the $108 50cc kits off amazon. It showed up yesterday, and after spending most the day tinkering, I ended up with this:
My 1993 DB Ascent is now sporting 50cc of Chinese crap. The only real trouble getting it installed was the rear motor mount. The instructions say "go to the hardware store and buy longer threaded rods so you can mount it correctly". Thanks China.
Those 'rods' are M8-1.0, so not exactly standard (M8-1.25 stuff is everywhere). I found 2 bolts and since they weren't fully threaded had to make some ghetto spacers I won't share pictures of out of old nuts and washers, but it worked.
I wants 1:17 fuel for 'break in' for 500km. That's a LONG break in for something that can't go all that fast. I mixed up some 'almost 1:17', dumped some in the tank, started pedalling down the driveway and popped the clutch... damn thing fired right up.
In about 150' the chain popped off the sprocket so I had to go back and tweak with the tensioner a bit, but after that I ended up riding around for about 15 minutes before stopping to let it cool down. It says not to ride more than 30 min at a time during break in.
So it's impractical, kinda noisy and slow and you're basically running around with a chainsaw strapped to your bike, but it's really stupidly fun.
I need to heat the exhaust pipe up and as the manual says "make it flexy" so I can bend it parallel with the frame so the mount will work correctly, but otherwise I think it's good to go. Not sure where, but it will go.
Oh, and maybe figure out how to mount the rear of the chain guard that doesn't involve a zip tie. The manual says "use good zip tie!".