1974 Vespa Rally 200 Restoration Project 2018 ________ Rally200 page 1___ Rally200 page 2_ __Rally200 page 3

October 20, 2017 - Dropped off scooter. ______________Rally200 page 4___ Rally200 page 5


Vespa Rally 200 Scooter Restoration Project By Anthony D. Armstrong
Mfd by Piaggio & S.p.A - GENOA (ITALY)
Date of Manufacture 1/74 Model 1974 Serial N: VSE IT 0012416

_Motor No: VSE1M *0012292*
-Frame No: VSE1T *0012416* DGM 10118 OM

A buddy told me he had a scooter I could have if I wanted. I helped him with his vintage
motorcycle racing team. He knew I was into vintage scooters. He didn’t know what type
of scooter it was and said it was rusting away and the motor is seized. He brought the
scooter over and we found out it’s a Rally 200.

Most people today say that’s a great barn find.

I’m a scooter mechanic and know what I’m looking at. A potential money pit!
Looking at the scooter I could tell It will cost a lot to restore.
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September 11, 2018

My first day of working on the scooter, and looking for the hidden problems.

The problems I found are not good!
It’s going to be a street fight the entire time working on this Rally 200.

1. The motor is hardcore seized up.
2. Shifting and throttle lever were seized.

Almost everything had rust or corrosion. The only good thing I found was a dry gas tank
with no rust in it. Tires and rims will go straight to the trash can. The seat
cover and maybe the seat frame.






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September 12, 2018

The goal for today is to safely take the headset apart and free up the lever controls.
I use a propane torch to heat up the headset. It didn’t come apart easy.

Some of the cables were rusted in place. I removed all the cables and wiring with a bolt cutter.
Before I cut the wiring I took photos of the wiring and electrical components. That's a must!

That Rusting Motor!
When I got the Rally a year ago. The first thing I did was wash off all the dirt-dobber bug nest.
Then spray the whole motor down with WD-40 including the piston hole and carburetor opening.

One year later I tried a few tricks to free up the motor. It didn’t budge.
I moved on to the rusting floorboard. I looked at those rusting holes and called it a day!












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September 13, 2018

Remove the floorboard rails, tail light, glove box, choke puller and brake foot pedal.
The hardest thing to remove without damaging the frame was the brake foot pedal and choke puller.
I use a propane torch to heat up the metal too loosen these parts.








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September 14, 2018

Pull the motor, kickstand and front finder today. And took another shot at turning the motor.
Not Going To Happen, It’s Seized Up Good!








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September 15, 2018

The goal today is to remove the paint on the floorboard to get a better look at the rust problem.




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September 16, 2018

I couldn’t get the cylinder off and kept working on the parts I could remove.
I pull the flywheel, OMG! Moved on to removing the next part. Pulled the clutch cover and the clutch nut was
seized on. Heat wasn’t going to fix this problem. I had to drill it off. I don’t know the history of the motor,
My best guess is, the motor seized from running a too hotter spark plug.








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September 18, 2018

I tried everything to loosen the piston. If you run into a hardcore stuck piston.
The best way to move forward on splitting the cases is by removing the cylinder studs, photo A.
When I split the case I found the shifting cross rod was seized, photo B along with the shifting
rod bearing. Some of the metal parts had rust and inside the case look decent.










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September 19, 2018

This turned out to be a good day because the frame wasn’t as bad as I thought it was.
First I acid dip the frame overnight to remove the hardcore rust. The bottom metal plate
only had the rusty holes. The main frame structure was very good with little rust.
This floorboard will be easy to repair.
I ended up destroying the piston to remove it from the cylinder.
Now I can start restoring parts and make my order parts list.














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September 21, 2018

Restore and inspecting more parts today.
The stator plate was a nightmare because some of the wires fell apart and colors faded.
I made my own stator wiring diagram because this Rally 200 stator type, was different
from all the ones I found on the internet.












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September 22, 2018

Looking Good!
Considering what I started with. It’s looking good.








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September 25, 2018

Rock and Roll! The cases cleaned up great. I did spend extra time working on the shifting box.
I had to take it apart because it was seized and corroded. I ended up replacing a few parts.












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October 1, 2018

Cleaned up and restored front suspension and brake hub parts. To finish up the fork I need to
order a bearing seal and brake pads. The rusty front spring could have been cleaned up and
used. I found a original Italian spring I had chromed years ago, that I’m going to use.








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October 2, 2018

Cleaned up and restored carburetor parts, waiting to order new gaskets. The carburetor has unusual
damage to the throttle slider cover. It appears to be a manufacturing casting defect.








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October 3, 2018

Cleaned up and restored rear hub, shifting box cover and carburetor box cover. The shifting box cover
was corroded and pitted. I replaced it with a original Italian one I had in stock.






I’m at a point, where I can order the first round of parts. On page 2 I’m going to talk about flipping
scooters and the reason I don’t buy scooter to restore, then flip them. - The hours spent on this
Vespa Rally 200 project so far is high. And the high number of hours don’t work out with flipping
a (scooter/barn find) that needs a lot of work, haha.


Rally200 page 2




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