Turbo charged scooter?

[JimIsbell]

Back in the late 1960s I had a Yamaha 50cc motorbike. It had a rotary calve.
I modified that valve till I was able to attain 65 mph on the highway.....for about 12 miles....until the spark plug gave up....melted closed.....I carried several spark plugs until I found I could modify the spark plug by filing down the center electrode flush with the ceramic and then bend the ground electrode into a "J" shape to point directly down at the filed off center electrode. This allowed a long life plug.

The fuel mileage was hardly affected, but the sting of bugs in the face was definitely increased. Once I got a Tarantula Hawk (Big red wasp with black wings) up my short sleeved shirt. I almost came off the bike at 6t5 mph. So I added a windshield......this did reduce the fuel mileage and the speed.

[hfbmw]

I don't think the suspension or small wheels on a scooter is meant for triple digit speeds.

An older friend did take his scooter to Sturgis, SD. 100 mpg. "But Tim I am only doing 24 mph so it takes 4 hours to do that 100! He also told me that it took him 2 and half days to ride the 670 miles from Minneapolis, MN to Sturgis, SD. On the return trip he did it in 2 days. "Wind was at my back!" He said.

take care!

Tim Lindstrom
Columbia Heights, MN

[Isaac Zackary]

Originally Posted by hfbmw

I don't think the suspension or small wheels on a scooter is meant for triple digit speeds.

An older friend did take his scooter to Sturgis, SD. 100 mpg. "But Tim I am only doing 24 mph so it takes 4 hours to do that 100! He also told me that it took him 2 and half days to ride the 670 miles from Minneapolis, MN to Sturgis, SD. On the return trip he did it in 2 days. "Wind was at my back!" He said.

take care!

Tim Lindstrom
Columbia Heights, MN

In my original post I didn't mean to turbocharge a scooter to make it go faster than it was meant to. The bikes I'm principally interested in are the Grom 125 and the PCX 150. The newer models reach 62 and 70mph respectively and they are rated to get 125 and 100mpg respectively. I don't really need to go over 55mph. There aren't any interstate highways where I live.

What I was intending the turbo for was a way to have a highway capable scooter and not have to drive it like a 50cc scooter due to the average 10,000ft altitude and steep grades.

If I could do at least 45mph on a 5% grade and 35mph on a 8% grade at 11,000ft I'd be happy. That's about what my current cars do now.

[Danncomm]

There is a site that covers putting a supercharged diesel engine on a motorcycle with a forum. I don't remember the name but I found it using google. I was just starting to do some research on doing just that when the GF made it clear that my bike riding days are over so don't even think about it.

[Bicycle Bob]

Apologies for duplication - I'm not going to wade through seven pages.

A turbo can be a reasonable solution if a burst of power is needed, but they sure should switch to premium gas to avoid compromising normal performance. For steady use, they are likely to overheat things and ruin longevity.
If you want freeway speeds on a scooter, use streamlining, not power.

[steffen707]

check out hondaspree.net Plenty of CVT scooters going 50+ mph. Gearing is easy to change in the honda elite scooter. I have a high compression 72cc polini corsa bore kit on my elite. It'll do 0-55 quite quickly. And that's maxing out my gearing at 12,400 rpm. It has plenty of power to go faster with longer gearing. It screams. Not sure how efficient this setup is. I'm sure its guzzling gas (for a scooter anyways). If you look for steffen707 on that site I have a thread about using a wideband o2 sensor to tune my setup. That was never done before on that site. Probably very uncommon in the scooter community in general.

I wish you luck in the turbo scooter. It was a pipe dream for me. Maybe when i'm 50 and have time for all the work involved.

[jojogunn]

This guy set a record for a small diesel back in 1981: 156.53. He got better mpg with a gasoline engine: 157.192
I think the small diesel lost thermal efficiency due to less heat mass of a larger diesel

The California Commuter - World Record Holding 155 MPG Freeway Legal Car!

[sendler]

Matsu Matsu got 470 mpg in the 1985 Vetter challenge.
.
High mileage fairing
.

[GoldCrazy2]

50cc's at highway speeds? I can see a transmission meltdown.

But there are ways to increase HP and MPG.

There is an interesting pamphlet from Eagle-Research.com titled "Why 200 MPG is Possible". The higher the compression the higher the burn rate goes up exponentially. the problem is in the fuel (gasoline) which is made up of over 20 different fuels from one hydrocarbon in the chain to over 20 hydrocarbons. Guess which one vaporizes first causing vapor lock. There is a device similar to what the gas refineries use that will now fit in your car that will convert the gas to one hydrocarbon, the outcome of which somehow gives you more gas but with only one hydrocarbon. But it is piss poor mileage in low compression engines.

You can also increase the air flow into the engine by doing something that Leepu and Pitbull did on the History Channel, and that is to carefully bore out the intake and exhaust ports, which I would not have though about.

Something to think about.

[Grant-53]

Modern scooters may be less likely to need cylinder head porting but it still is being done by speed shops. I saw an ad for a new battery powered leaf blower on TV. That might be something to help counter the altitude. Add some alcohol injection to reduce detonation. Streamlining always helps.