All About Scooters

Scooters in India are evolving with time.  But there function remains the same even today. To make city commute smooth and hassle free. Over the last few years, scooters have seen countless upgrades and addition of latest feature such as mobile charger, bluetooth connectivity, fuel cap on the outside and the likes. Last year the Indian government has taken a closer look at motor vehicles plying on Indian roads and the safety aspect of these vehicles and it has called for some positive changes. One of those changes was the addition of disc brakes in scooters with an engine capacity of 125 cc or above. With that law in place, we have a handsome number of scooters sold in India that sport a disc brake at the front wheel. (Piaggio Vespa Image Source: Imghulk) So how does a disc brake work? In Simple words, when you pull the brake lever, pressure is transferred instantly using a fluid to the brake pistons which in turn pushes the brake pads to the disc, thus result in s...

Is flushing a good practice? If you are thinking about the toilet or washroom, then it is undoubtedly the best practice. But I am here to talk about flushing a scooter engine or any other automobile engine. (Vespa Image Source: Creative Market) Before coming to a conclusion, let's understand what is flushing. Engine flush is process where an aftermarket chemical additive is introduced to the engine and then its allowed to idle for 10 to 15 minutes. This additive mixes with the flows throw each and every corner of the engine, merges with engine oil, dissolves and flushes out all the impurities and deposits that have accumulated in the engine over extended period of usage. You can then drain the impure oil, change the oil filter and then go on driving your scooter. Sounds simple isn't it? Considering that engines are majorly closed units, what are these impurities that accumulate inside the engine and how do they accumulate? Let's take a look at that here....

Maintaining a scooter is something that a user might have to do every 45-60 days depending on usage. But these maintenance are limited to engine oil change, brake pad scrubbing, washing, etc. But over the course of usage, there are a few more things that you need to intricately look at when it comes to maintenance of your scooter and ensuring that keeps of delivering optimum performance and fuel economy. One such crucial thing is the gear oil change or the transmission oil change. If you are wondering why would a gearless scooter require a gear oil change, don't worry, I thought the same way few months back. Luckily the service mechanic at a Yamaha service station was more than kind to educate me on this topic. Though these scooters operate with an automatic dry clutch, they mechanism has an inbuilt gear system. That is the reason, the acceleration is smooth and you do not experience that jerk that you usually get on geared vehicles. (Yamaha Fascino Image Courtesy:Redi...

Almost 2 decades ago Honda revolutionized the Indian scooter market with its first 4-stroke gearless model Activa. Over the last 2 decades, the Activa has been the top selling product In India and this product single handedly managed to topple the Indian king of two-wheeler, Hero and make Honda the highest selling 2 wheeler manufacturer in India However, the same cannot be said for 125 cc scooters in India. For a better period of the last decade and this one, Suzuki Access 125 was the lone wolf in the market. Periodic competition from time to time by the Mahindra Gutso and Vespa has not been able to disrupt the trust that the Access has earned from the Indian market. But, things have massively changed in 2019-20. Suzuki has the Access and the Burgman Street, TVS offers the NTorq 125, Honda has the Grazia and Activa 125, Hero presents the market with the Destini and Maestro Edge 125, Yamaha upgraded the Facino and Ray-Z to 125 cc units and then we have the performance and quality...