European Moped Tour

Dave /

Jul 16, 2001 02:22PM

Me and m' flatmate are planning on embarking on a European tour in August/Sept... on old 50cc mopeds. Hope to travel a few thousand miles over three weeks, starting from England, getting the ferry over to France (what are the chances of disassembling the things and putting them in bags - cheaper as a foot passenger with luggage!) then through France, Belgium, Luxemberg, Italy, Switzerland, Austria etc. etc. down to the coast of the Med. And then, hopefully, back.

Haven't actually bought the things yet. Never even ridden one. Planning on spending about

Re: European Moped Tour

Michael L. /

Jul 16, 2001 02:37PM

I would LOVE to do something like that..but of course, knowing my moped I would have to bring alot of stuff with me so that i dont get stuck anywhere (extra head gasket, gasket material, ratchet and metric set, flywheel puller, spark plug, feeler gauge, screwdrivers, etc).

Re: European Moped Tour

Mike /

Jul 16, 2001 02:50PM

hmmm... up until last week, my 79 puch magnum mk 2 hadn't given me any problems... so yeah. puch has been known as one of the best known and most reliable mopeds... and hondas are built tough too, from what i've heard... so yeah...

-Mike

Re: European Moped Tour

Ron Brown /

Jul 16, 2001 03:12PM

Dave,

Congratulations, go for it! Even if you wind up abandoning your ped by the side of the road, you will still have a great time.

I would try to find out which old peds have the best parts availability in the countries you will be travelling to. As an alternative, find something which is easy to get parts for in England and make a deal to have parts shipped to you if necessary.

Good luck,

Ron

Re: European Moped Tour

Reeperette /

Jul 16, 2001 10:17PM

Vespa and Puch have good part and tool availability over your projected route.

Bring a camera too, we want pictures !

-Ree

Re: European Moped Tour

don-ohio /

Jul 17, 2001 05:36PM

I'm with Ree on the Puch but my other choice would be the tough,`ol MOTOBECANE Moby or Mobylette or the like.You're going into France,right? MOTOBECANE is THE French bike so parts are not a problem.Neither would an experienced mechanic be scarce to find.And unlike a lot of Puchs,these old bikes have the big comfortable seats that make long trips more enjoyable.Sorry,Puch fans.The bicycle type seat is absolutely the ONLY thing I have against them.Take my advice,as a hemorrhoid sufferer for years,I have to have the big nice seat.BYE!

Re: European Moped Tour (a good bike sugestion)

Chris F. /

Jul 17, 2001 06:44PM

Hey that sounds pretty cool, i would recommend a Targa LX (i have one, i dont know if they sell em over there but..) I have almost 5,000 miles on the bike, nothing has EVER broken, it starts first kick every time, and is probably faster than most i've seen (most can only go around 30, my Targa LX goes 40)

Re: European Moped Tour

Dave /

Jul 18, 2001 05:43PM

That thar Targa LX looks a bit, well, pricey. We're going for old bangers. Also, we were frankly horrified at the design of it - it has an early nineties Streethawk look about it, as if it carries missiles or something. No no no, we want real 70s/80s kische mean machines. I love some of the old crap on the photos page.

It seems the Hondas and Puchs are the favourites for reliability (realtively) mopeds.. Cheers for the info peeps.

And yes, we will be taking a camera! We'll be wanting material for our website (www.prop-pak.co.uk)... also we'll keep you all updated on the way if we're in any sort of civilisation with internet cafes, if you want.

Cheers,

-Dave

Re: European Moped Tour

LGK /

Jul 19, 2001 10:50PM

Dave,

Just got back from the Netherlands and Belgium where I was especially interested to see if there were many mopeds. There were not and the few that I saw were primarily Hondas and used to deliver Pizza Hut pizza!!!

However we have found that motorcycle shops can provide needed parts.

I suggest that you take along some spare parts such as a throttle cable, inner tube and especially light bulbs as many of the oldies are 6 volt.

There are many on-line guides to moped repair and we were able to get our going -after being in storage for 10+ years - using one of them.

What a blast to do a moped tour of Europe. It would be great if you could send back reports of your adevnture.

Best regards,

LGK

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