Did you ever wonder why hats you bought in the early 70’s always seems to be popular again 30 years later? Two wheelers are really no different. In fact, many of these companies are playing up the trend and coming out with scooters that look retro. The Metropolitan from Honda and the GVS from Vespa actually look like a form of older versions.
Around the beginning of the 20th century, scooters made there way to the market in Europe. They looked like what we think of as a moped in today’s world. A bike with a motor attached is kind of a crude way to describe it. By the late 1910’s people in the USA were driving scooters, but they still never reached the popularity of the auto mobile. Here is a look at some of the better know scooters on the market today:
Cushman Motor Scooters — Between 1936 and 1965, Cushman made many of the scooters that the military had during WWII. These mopeds are really cool. If you ever get a chance to ride one, make sure you take advantage.
Mitsubishi — One of the first scooters made in Japan was the Mitsubishi Silver Pigeon. It was a scooter largely made of warplane wheels and discarded warplane parts, believe it or not.
Vespa Motor Scooters — If you had a scooter in Europe after WWI, it was almost certainly a Vespa. To this day, they are still one of the most popular scooters in the world.
Honda — Honda launched the most popular scooter of all time, the Super Cub, in 1958. With more than 60 million sold worldwide, it is the best selling powered vehicle of all time. Pretty impressive. If you can get your hands on one of these, you will have a classic on your hands.
You can not go wrong with a Honda. They have sold more scooters than any other company. In fact, the Honda Motor Company makes more engines than any other company in the world if you count generators, cars, lawnmowers, snow blowers, etc…….
Fuel injection and the introduction of the 4 stroke engine have made these scooters one of the best buys in terms of cost of purchase and cost of fueling it.
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