Piaggio Vespa

Now a venerable icon of Italian style, the internationally known quintessential scooter - the Vespa - was once a two-wheeled revolution, offering mobility to everyone. Today it has come to symbolize scootering status, style, and freedom. As Vespa reaches its 60s without showing a wrinkle, this book celebrates its decades of incomparable spirit. In glowing images and words, the book shows Vespa in its many guises—as the two-wheeled vehicle of the post-war economic boom; as the symbol of the forward-charging ideas of the 1960s; appearing in romantic films such as Roman Holiday; and promoted in delirious ads that claimed, “Whoever Vespas, eats apples.” Decades of period ads and famous calendars are included, as well as technical and production information on every model ever built, including rare prototypes and variants. Each model is detailed in over 30 categories, from engine specs to production facts. Filled with stunning color photos and illustrations, the book is itself a stylish tribute to the iconic vehicle it celebrates. Author Giorgio Sarti knows Vespa, and this book is a thorough and thoroughly enchanting tribute to the scooter as it has sped through history, meaning something new to each generation, and in the process making its unique mode of personal transport synonymous with freedom. Officially licensed and includes a foreword from Piaggio Group President Roberto Colaninno.

Auto a due ruote del primo dopoguerra, bandiera della rivoluzione giovanile, acclamato simbolo di stile in equilibrio sulla tradizione. La Vespa è qualcosa di più che lo scooter più venduto nel mondo, o un significativo simbolo del design italiano: è un irripetibile fenomeno di costume che accompagna la nascita del Paese dal 1946 ad oggi. La storia di questo magico "tappeto volante" in Italia e nel mondo e l'esame dettagliato di numerosi modelli sono accompagnati da splendide fotografie originali. Edizione in lingua inglese.

The Scooter Bible is an entertaining, colorful, and authoritative history of the little motorbikes that could. Beginning with the first motor scooter in 1902, Eric Dregni is your guide to everything from the postwar American scooter boom to the golden age of Italian and European scooters, the rise of Mod scooter culture in England . . . right up to modern electric scooters. Today, nostalgia for vintage Vespas, Piaggios, Cushmans, Lambrettas, and other top brands drive a new thirst for retro-inspired scooters in showrooms around the world. This revised and updated edition of The Scooter Bible brings the story up to date with the drive for zero emissions via electric vehicles. Throughout, author Eric Dregni offers you a wealth of imagery: historic black-and-white photos, evocative period advertisements, manufacturer photos, and more—over 500 images! Along the way, he also shows you scooter evolution, changing technologies, and scooter appearances in popular culture. And as the most comprehensive scooter book ever, The Scooter Bible also includes the world’s most exhaustive encyclopedia of scooter brands, from Puddlejumper to Piaggio, Ducati to Doodlebug, and Zündapp Bella to Genuine Stella. The Scooter Bible is all you need before kick-starting your scooter engine to life and praying for ever more speed. Indeed, scooters are mechanical marvels on two wheels. Streamlined spuds. Mutant oddballs of Jet Age styling gone berserk. Innovative inventions shoehorned like sardines into miniaturized monocoque bodies. Engineering and styling enigmas (the stranger the better). They are the weird and the wonderful. And they are all here in The Scooter Bible.

Eighteen million Vespas have buzzed their way into the world since 1946. Stood end to end, they would form a line measuring 32,000 kilometres – 20,000 miles – in length. This is an almost inconceivable statistic, as with many things that transcend conventional measures and at some point achieve cult status. How did the little machine come so far? The answer is simple. The Vespa has always remained the Vespa, true to itself, and has what others lack: real character! This book tells the Vespa’s story via over 470 photos, corrects many misconceptions and lets the reader become immersed in the culture of Vespa and la bella vita.

The 2-stroke Vespa is a style icon – an undoubted classic, and an immediately recognized symbol of its native Italy. Demand for these stylish scooters is booming, and interest in restoring and renovating them is at an all-time high. With its clear and concise text aided by extensively captioned full color photographs, this practical book guides the DIY enthusiast through all the stages of restoring a classic 2-stroke Vespa, taking it from a rusty unroadworthy wreck back to its factory fresh, former glory. It shows how to assess wear in all mechanical components, then assists in deciding the best and most cost effective method to renovate or repair. Both large and small frame power units are covered in detail, giving the reader confidence to carry out their own repairs to a high standard, which is both satisfying and cost effective. Brakes, suspension, electrical systems and brightwork are all addressed, from changing a bulb to welding in a new floor pan. An essential reference for all Vespa enthusiasts.

Despite the symbolic capital and the global commercial success of the Vespa scooter, there is no academic book dealing with its history, only literature produced by the company itself or by scooter enthusiasts. The origins of the Vespa are shrouded in mist, entrusted more to myth than to historical truth. Based on lengthy research carried out in Piaggio’s historical archives and on an interdisciplinary approach, this volume aims to fill this gap. It shows how the Vespa took techniques from the most advanced aeronautical industries in the world, adapting and hybridizing them in an original way, and how the company disseminated its models in the transnational social space.