Somebody talk me into a Blur 220, please.

[FlyingG]

First post here. I'm considering buying either a Vespa 300 or a Blur 220. I'd like something I can commute on, do light duty traveling, & make occasional strafing runs in the mountains. I don't want a maxi-scooter. I'd like to hear from 220 owners about their experience. What do they love/hate? Any problems? Servicing hastles? Irritations? I've read a lot of the threads about specific issues, but I'd like some more general impressions about riding & living with it. There you go - talk me into it. Grazie.

[Scalpel]

I have not tried a Vespa 300, so I'm not the expert here, but I can give you a few reasons to consider a Blur:

• The Blur is #@&%ing fast. I can hit 65-70 mph on the freeway if I'm in a tuck.
• It's light. Of all the "big" scooters I sat on, it felt the lightest and easiest to maneuver. Unlike a lot of bigger scooters, it doesn't feel like a min-van.
• It's unique. Lots of people have Vespas, and quite a few people have Buddies. The Blur looks different from anything else out there.
• Vespas are expensive. If you can afford it, go for it, but you could save a lot of money getting the Blur, and spend that extra cash on something else. And if it breaks, it won't cost a ton of money to get fixed.

[killbilly]

I've ridden both. They're very different machines.

The Vespa is a smoother ride, with softer suspension. The motor is really good, and the acceleration is linear and very predictable. That's not to say the Blur isn't, but the Vespa is just more refined in many ways. It's also considerably more expensive both to buy and to service. Not sure what the warranty is.

The Blur is more like a sportbike. The suspension is more taut, but that translates to "flickability" on lane changes. Very confidence-inspiring at lean angles that I wouldn't attempt on a Vespa. You can whack the throttle open and spank it to death and it will be happy to deliver. The storage on the Blur is a little better, in my opinion, and it's definitely easier to mod/work on due to the placement of the electrics. The key security and easy access to the gas cap are great features. The two-year warranty with the roadside assistance is nice to have, too. I've found a little trailing braking with the Blur makes it incredibly predictable on really twisty roads.

I'd take a Blur to the track in a heartbeat. The Vespa, I'd think twice and beef up the suspension before I did that.

All in all, I don't think you can go wrong with either one. I preferred the sporty look of the Blur over the Vespa. Some people say the Vespa is more comfortable, but my arse prefers the Blur, honestly. Blur is definitely easier to work on, the Vespa has better aftermarket accessory support. There are performance parts for the Blur (it's commonly raced overseas) that you can't get here yet.

You'll get more performance bang for your buck with the Blur. You'll have more refinement and better resale value with the Vespa. Ride both, but just don't ride them on straight roads. Find something curvy so you can do an apples to apples comparison, and then make a decision.

[omniphil]

I do alot of highway commuting and the Blur falls short there, 60-65 mph is about as fast as you want to commute on it (Real mph, not indicated).

It needs 5 more hp and taller gearing to be well suited for highway travel. It also needs to not rattle so much, lol. It is so annoying that the gauge cluster rattles louder than the engine. Fix those 2 things and this scooter is darn near perfect.

On the backroads it is awesome however. light, great cornering, and amble power. I have scraped the center stand on more than one occasion on my favorite twisty roads.

I too wanted a small scooter that could handle the freeway, but in my opinion the blur falls short by just a tiny bit. I didn't want a maxi scooter either, but next year I'll be upgrading to a Kymco Downtown 300i. Yeah, it is a little bigger, but its not super heavy like alot of maxi scooters. Its also not a really big maxi scooter, it is a smallish maxi. It gets the same 70 mpg as the Blur but more importantly for me it will cruise at a real 70 mph.

[killbilly]

I do alot of highway commuting and the Blur falls short there, 60-65 mph is about as fast as you want to commute on it (Real mph, not indicated).

It needs 5 more hp and taller gearing to be well suited for highway travel. It also needs to not rattle so much, lol. It is so annoying that the gauge cluster rattles louder than the engine. Fix those 2 things and this scooter is darn near perfect.

On the backroads it is awesome however. light, great cornering, and amble power. I have scraped the center stand on more than one occasion on my favorite twisty roads.

I too wanted a small scooter that could handle the freeway, but in my opinion the blur falls short by just a tiny bit. I didn't want a maxi scooter either, but next year I'll be upgrading to a Kymco Downtown 300i. Yeah, it is a little bigger, but its not super heavy like alot of maxi scooters. Its also not a really big maxi scooter, it is a smallish maxi. It gets the same 70 mpg as the Blur but more importantly for me it will cruise at a real 70 mph.

Phil, have you considered trying to change the final gearing on your Blur? I've read of people doing that before to get a little more top-end out of it. A competent shop should be able to do that for you.

I've never needed to do highway commuting on the Blur so I've no experience with the freeway-slab-drone-ride. However, I'm told that you get better performance when the motor loosens up some and if you run with a windshield for better aero.

This bike is absolutely SCREAMING for a cold-air intake and a better pipe. I wish like hell someone would start importing the pipe that was linked a couple months ago and distribute a new EFI map for it to the shops. I would readily pay up to about $500 to get the increased performance from that motor breathing better. That's the one downside to EFI - it's much harder to tweak. But everything is FI these days.

And that Vespa does have another 50-70cc of displacement so it might be a better freeway weapon, but it definitely comes at a cost. They go for almost seven grand, right? You could buy 1.5 Blurs for that.

[omniphil]

Phil, have you considered trying to change the final gearing on your Blur? I've read of people doing that before to get a little more top-end out of it. A competent shop should be able to do that for you.

I've never needed to do highway commuting on the Blur so I've no experience with the freeway-slab-drone-ride. However, I'm told that you get better performance when the motor loosens up some and if you run with a windshield for better aero.

This bike is absolutely SCREAMING for a cold-air intake and a better pipe. I wish like hell someone would start importing the pipe that was linked a couple months ago and distribute a new EFI map for it to the shops. I would readily pay up to about $500 to get the increased performance from that motor breathing better. That's the one downside to EFI - it's much harder to tweak. But everything is FI these days.

And that Vespa does have another 50-70cc of displacement so it might be a better freeway weapon, but it definitely comes at a cost. They go for almost seven grand, right? You could buy 1.5 Blurs for that.

I would love to change out the gearing, that would be great. I had no idea that was even an option. Shops carry different gear sets for this scooter? I wonder if the power will be able to handle taller gearing though, on the highway the power is pretty much at its limit as i'm at about 90% throttle just cruising at 65 real mph.

Cold air intake and exhaust might give me 1 or 2 horse power on something like this, but I bet I would have to install a fuel computer and richen things up, then the gas mileage starts to plummet. On my cars, exhaust and cold air intake is always added as you get more power and more gas mileage, but in my experience with motorcycles is that you gain power and lose MPG. I've been down that road with my bikes in the past and its so hard to make more power and the gas mileage drops off noticeably, so in the past if I wanted more out of my motorcycles engine, its always easier to upgrade the entire bike and get something with the engine that suits your needs instead of trying to mod the motor which usually doesn't get you close enough.

Don't get me wrong tho, I am a tweaker/modder, I just have learned that a motorcycle engine isn't well suited to that for what I need out of a bike.

[killbilly]

I would love to change out the gearing, that would be great. I had no idea that was even an option. Shops carry different gear sets for this scooter? I wonder if the power will be able to handle taller gearing though, on the highway the power is pretty much at its limit as i'm at about 90% throttle just cruising at 65 real mph.

I don't know if they carry specific gear sets, but it really shouldn't be that hard to get the right final drive ratio. These aren't exactly highly specialized parts they're using in these price points.

Cold air intake and exhaust might give me 1 or 2 horse power on something like this, but I bet I would have to install a fuel computer and richen things up, then the gas mileage starts to plummet. On my cars, exhaust and cold air intake is always added as you get more power and more gas mileage, but in my experience with motorcycles is that you gain power and lose MPG. I've been down that road with my bikes in the past and its so hard to make more power and the gas mileage drops off noticeably, so in the past if I wanted more out of my motorcycles engine, its always easier to upgrade the entire bike and get something with the engine that suits your needs instead of trying to mod the motor which usually doesn't get you close enough.

Don't get me wrong tho, I am a tweaker/modder, I just have learned that a motorcycle engine isn't well suited to that for what I need out of a bike.

Maybe. I think the results even of 1-2 HP might be more dramatic on something with this kind of power-to-weight ratio.

As far as mileage goes, even if you lose 10% of your mileage, that's still around 63mpg. Which translates on this bike to what...$20 a year? $25? I'm too lazy to do the math.

I don't think you'd necessarily need a fuel computer. From what I've heard from Genuine, the cost of the pipe isn't the problem - it's the gameboy-device-thingy they need to re-map the EFI to work with the freer-breathing components. It's a fairly spendy tool, they told me.

So if they had a chip that came with the pipe/intake, that would definitely help things. Or a new ECU brain or something. Dunno. At some point you have to draw the line in terms of cost.

I'd LOVE to see a big-bore kit for this bike, too.

[omniphil]

I would love to change out the gearing, that would be great. I had no idea that was even an option. Shops carry different gear sets for this scooter? I wonder if the power will be able to handle taller gearing though, on the highway the power is pretty much at its limit as i'm at about 90% throttle just cruising at 65 real mph.

I don't know if they carry specific gear sets, but it really shouldn't be that hard to get the right final drive ratio. These aren't exactly highly specialized parts they're using in these price points.

Cold air intake and exhaust might give me 1 or 2 horse power on something like this, but I bet I would have to install a fuel computer and richen things up, then the gas mileage starts to plummet. On my cars, exhaust and cold air intake is always added as you get more power and more gas mileage, but in my experience with motorcycles is that you gain power and lose MPG. I've been down that road with my bikes in the past and its so hard to make more power and the gas mileage drops off noticeably, so in the past if I wanted more out of my motorcycles engine, its always easier to upgrade the entire bike and get something with the engine that suits your needs instead of trying to mod the motor which usually doesn't get you close enough.

Don't get me wrong tho, I am a tweaker/modder, I just have learned that a motorcycle engine isn't well suited to that for what I need out of a bike.

Maybe. I think the results even of 1-2 HP might be more dramatic on something with this kind of power-to-weight ratio.

As far as mileage goes, even if you lose 10% of your mileage, that's still around 63mpg. Which translates on this bike to what...$20 a year? $25? I'm too lazy to do the math.

I don't think you'd necessarily need a fuel computer. From what I've heard from Genuine, the cost of the pipe isn't the problem - it's the gameboy-device-thingy they need to re-map the EFI to work with the freer-breathing components. It's a fairly spendy tool, they told me.

So if they had a chip that came with the pipe/intake, that would definitely help things. Or a new ECU brain or something. Dunno. At some point you have to draw the line in terms of cost.

I'd LOVE to see a big-bore kit for this bike, too.

Big bore kit would be great, but this scooter seems to have over heating issues on the highway. So I would think you'd need a better way to cool it with even more displacement.

63 MPG would be doable, but all the same time, I could just get another scooter with 70 MPG and 29HP, that would easily handle what I need without the need of modding, losing durability, over heating, etc...

[FlyingG]

Which all brings me back around to my original question - which I'll have to answer for myself, naturally. I have enough projects in the garage, so I'd be looking to keep whichever scooter stock(-ish). I'm going to Scenic City Scooters in Chattanooga when I get a chance to testride a Blur 150, & that should answer a lot of questions about ergos, handling, etc. Thanks for the info everyone.

[Rush]

I'll be blunt. Here is my opinion-

Go with a Blur - be sure to get a windshield as mentioned earlier - if you plan to be on the highway or in the cold.

Keep it stock and enjoy the 2 year warranty. They put time and money into optimizing this thing from multiple standpoints so you don't need to mess with it.

Don't plan on traveling on highways where the speed limit is over 60mph. You can do 65 mph solid but most cars seem to like to go 10mph over the speed limit here.

MPG is outstanding - just wish the gas tank was a bit larger. I find I have about a very dependable 100 mile range. Use the middle octane gasoline (89).

Height on this bike is excellent - you'll be able to see over all but the tallest of traffic (and stand if needed) - which helps in congested areas. I'm 5'6.5" and I can stand on my tippietoes if needed to touch the ground or ride flatfooted to lower my center of gravity and NOT touch the ground - best of both worlds for me personally.

Here in Cincinnati, Metro Scooter provides the best service and information one could ever expect. I feel like I owe them bigtime. I did all my research and came to the same conclusions that they originally gave me. Genuine will send you a care package after you purchase the scooter - small company is a nice touch.

Good luck finding a Blur - I think the problems in Japan have halted production.

I get looks all the time. I commute 10 miles to work everyday. Anything with less maneuverability and more power would just get me into trouble.

My first motorized bike - and I feel no need to look any further. Bought mine April Fool's Day this year - got a 12 week old son now, put 2,700 miles on the Blur in four months... it just keeps getting better.

Can't believe the Blur is still the best kept secret.

[omniphil]

You got a care package? Hmmm, I never got anything like that. What was in it?

I'll be blunt. Here is my opinion-

Go with a Blur - be sure to get a windshield as mentioned earlier - if you plan to be on the highway or in the cold.

Keep it stock and enjoy the 2 year warranty. They put time and money into optimizing this thing from multiple standpoints so you don't need to mess with it.

Don't plan on traveling on highways where the speed limit is over 60mph. You can do 65 mph solid but most cars seem to like to go 10mph over the speed limit here.

MPG is outstanding - just wish the gas tank was a bit larger. I find I have about a very dependable 100 mile range. Use the middle octane gasoline (89).

Height on this bike is excellent - you'll be able to see over all but the tallest of traffic (and stand if needed) - which helps in congested areas. I'm 5'6.5" and I can stand on my tippietoes if needed to touch the ground or ride flatfooted to lower my center of gravity and NOT touch the ground - best of both worlds for me personally.

Here in Cincinnati, Metro Scooter provides the best service and information one could ever expect. I feel like I owe them bigtime. I did all my research and came to the same conclusions that they originally gave me. Genuine will send you a care package after you purchase the scooter - small company is a nice touch.

Good luck finding a Blur - I think the problems in Japan have halted production.

I get looks all the time. I commute 10 miles to work everyday. Anything with less maneuverability and more power would just get me into trouble.

My first motorized bike - and I feel no need to look any further. Bought mine April Fool's Day this year - got a 12 week old son now, put 2,700 miles on the Blur in four months... it just keeps getting better.

Can't believe the Blur is still the best kept secret.

[killbilly]

You got a care package? Hmmm, I never got anything like that. What was in it?

I got one a few months after buying, too.

It had a keychain, a little notepad, a sticker, I think, and some paperwork. Nothing fancy, just a nice touch.

I'm surprised about problems in Japan slowing production - PGO is a Taiwanese company. Maybe some of the components come from there?

I just figured that Genuine didn't order enough of them and they are sold out until the next round.