Speeding Up My Buddy

SuperGrape · Post by **SuperGrape** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 1:31 am

Hi, I am new to the forum and excited to find a place for fellow Buddy-lovers. (I hope that didn't sound wrong). Anyway, I was wondering if there was anyway to give my little 125cc some extra power? Thanks for any help.

lou76 · Post by **lou76** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 1:53 am

roller weights... 10.5gram... <$20 will give you more useable torque off the line and coming out of corners...

SuperGrape · Post by **SuperGrape** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 7:28 am

lou76 wrote:roller weights... 10.5gram... <$20 will give you more useable torque off the line and coming out of corners...

Thanks. That sounds great. You have any suggestions as to where to buy the weights and who to trust to put them in. This sounds like a job that a lot of people could get wrong.

Leeroy Jenkins · Post by **Leeroy Jenkins** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 2:29 pm

reduce drag.

toddrw2251 · Post by **toddrw2251** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 3:14 pm

I spray the front of my Buddy with Pam no stick cooking spray before every ride. Easy way to reduce drag and add MPH. It also reduces stress on the engine and cuts the breakin period in half.

Lagerhead · Post by **Lagerhead** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 5:22 pm

toddrw2251 wrote:I spray the front of my Buddy with Pam no stick cooking spray before every ride. Easy way to reduce drag and add MPH. It also reduces stress on the engine and cuts the breakin period in half.

I do the same thing but I found that in the summer and fall, the Pam coating would become filled with bugs (in various states of disrepair), reducing any aerodynamic advantage and becoming a sticky mess that was difficult to clean off.

I found that if I switched to Butter flavor Pam and parked the Buddy in the backyard by the dog, he would take care of the cleanup for me.

toddrw2251 · Post by **toddrw2251** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 5:38 pm

Good point lagerhead. My neighbors dog takes care of my bug problem. He prefers lemon butter herb pam. When it gets really hot in cincinnati I switch over to pam for the grill for obvious reasons.

afriendofcheese · Post by **afriendofcheese** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 5:42 pm

toddrw2251 wrote:I spray the front of my Buddy with Pam no stick cooking spray before every ride. Easy way to reduce drag and add MPH. It also reduces stress on the engine and cuts the breakin period in half.

Call me naive, but are you guys really being serious???

poop colored buddy · Post by **poop colored buddy** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 5:57 pm

afriendofcheese wrote:
toddrw2251 wrote:I spray the front of my Buddy with Pam no stick cooking spray before every ride. Easy way to reduce drag and add MPH. It also reduces stress on the engine and cuts the breakin period in half.
Call me naive, but are you guys really being serious???

No they aren't being serious, they use extra virgin olive oil, pam will ruin your paint, and the chains of amino acids in extra virgin olive oil disperse wind therefor reducing drag by up to 20%.

jmazza · Post by **jmazza** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 5:59 pm

afriendofcheese wrote:
toddrw2251 wrote:I spray the front of my Buddy with Pam no stick cooking spray before every ride. Easy way to reduce drag and add MPH. It also reduces stress on the engine and cuts the breakin period in half.
Call me naive, but are you guys really being serious???

no they are being ridiculous. You only need to spray the tires. Guys, come on.

toddrw2251 · Post by **toddrw2251** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 6:33 pm

Another useful tip I discovered is that if you rub icy hot cream for sore joints and general aches and pains on your scoots engine it helps reduce warmup time and engine sputtering in sub 32 degree temps. Some people have been having issues with stators and bad gas, but have they tried icy hot? I think not.

afriendofcheese · Post by **afriendofcheese** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 6:49 pm

I called several shops here in Denver, and only one confirmed that all of the pointers mentioned here do in fact work. He suggested a combination of them all. Apparently the other shops don't disclose these cheap do-it-yourself mods because the sale of performance parts would be dramatically affected since you can just buy cooking ingredients instead.

EP_scoot · Post by **EP_scoot** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 6:53 pm

This is all very funny, but PAM doesn not really do it. It has too many calories which add a lot of weight to the scoot, and increases the width of the scoot in the back thus increasing your aerodinamic drag.

I agree with the poop man. Olive oil does the trick much better, but the it is all on the application. Go light and really massage it in, and make sure you get extra virgen.

jmazza · Post by **jmazza** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 6:54 pm

afriendofcheese wrote:I called several shops here in Denver, and only one confirmed that all of the pointers mentioned here do in fact work. He suggested a combination of them all. Apparently the other shops don't disclose these cheap do-it-yourself mods because the sale of performance parts would be dramatically affected since you can just buy cooking ingredients instead.

exactly. It's a racket.

toddrw2251 · Post by **toddrw2251** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 7:11 pm

FYI: any olive oil other than the use of extra virgin Olive oil will void your warranty.

coopdway · Post by **coopdway** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 8:57 pm

This is rapidly turning into one of our longer topics; I had no idea there was this much interest in drag reduction, or for that matter, this much accumulated knowledge. I'll be watching this one closely.

Drumwoulf · Post by **Drumwoulf** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 9:05 pm

toddrw2251 wrote:FYI: any olive oil other than the use of extra virgin Olive oil will void your warranty.

I just heard about this new latex product that you stretch over the whole front of the bike and yourself that allows it to slip in and out of traffic without friction! -It's being marketed under the label "Safe Scooterin"...

golfinguy · Post by **golfinguy** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 9:41 pm

Drumwoulf wrote:
toddrw2251 wrote:FYI: any olive oil other than the use of extra virgin Olive oil will void your warranty.
I just heard about this new latex product that you stretch over the whole front of the bike and yourself that allows it to slip in and out of traffic without friction! -It's being marketed under the label "Safe Scooterin"...

I guess this only applies if virgin oil is no longer available?

Valgal20 · Post by **Valgal20** » Sat Feb 16, 2008 2:12 am

Oh My - We are an crazy bunch

Keys · Post by **Keys** » Sat Feb 16, 2008 2:26 am

Valgal20 wrote: Oh My - We are an crazy bunch

Not US!! Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll just jump on my frankenscoot and go terrorize the local populace...

--Keys

louie · Post by **louie** » Sat Feb 16, 2008 2:35 am

Lagerhead wrote:
toddrw2251 wrote: I found that if I switched to Butter flavor Pam and parked the Buddy in the backyard by the dog, he would take care of the cleanup for me.
that's called prewash.

louie · Post by **louie** » Sat Feb 16, 2008 2:46 am

Drumwoulf wrote:....Safe Scooterin".....

that's Safer scooterin

jfrost2 · Post by **jfrost2** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 1:57 am

I'm really doubting this "pam" and "olive oil" spray on method, how does oil on the front of the bike increase performance? Is this really true? Because if it is, I'm going to buy 20 cans of spray on olive oil.

afriendofcheese · Post by **afriendofcheese** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 4:45 am

jfrost2 wrote:I'm really doubting this "pam" and "olive oil" spray on method, how does oil on the front of the bike increase performance? Is this really true? Because if it is, I'm going to buy 20 cans of spray on olive oil.

Just call your local shop!

robtaylor · Post by **robtaylor** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 3:34 pm

toddrw2251 wrote:FYI: any olive oil other than the use of extra virgin Olive oil will void your warranty.

i thought that only applied to the italia

Valgal20 · Post by **Valgal20** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 5:44 pm

Yea- here in AMERICA- we use good ol' lard or crisco, heavy on the fat- Heavy on the FUN!

jfrost2 · Post by **jfrost2** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 7:36 pm

If this isnt true, metro scooter will think i'm a idiot. I'm seriously thinking this is fake, but since you're all scooter pro's than me, I will take your word for it.

robtaylor · Post by **robtaylor** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 8:47 pm

how about a little vaseline on the old face shield

twharton · Post by **twharton** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 11:46 pm

SuperGrape,

I haven't posted in a while and have really enjoyed this thread but beware the B.S.

1) Get a windscreen. I'm 6', 190 and that simple addition gave me about 5-7 mph boost.

2) Prima Pipe 5+

3) If you are a newb I would wait till the warranty period is up before even considering changing the roller weights. Give it 3-6 months and if you can't stand it then dive in.

4)KY Jelly. Pam/Vaseline etc is just for poseurs.

toddrw2251 · Post by **toddrw2251** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 1:44 am

Don't forget that the prima pipe also voids the warranty.

jetboy · Post by **jetboy** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 5:17 pm

twharton wrote:SuperGrape,

I haven't posted in a while and have really enjoyed this thread but beware the B.S.

1) Get a windscreen. I'm 6', 190 and that simple addition gave me about 5-7 mph boost.

2) Prima Pipe 5+

3) If you are a newb I would wait till the warranty period is up before even considering changing the roller weights. Give it 3-6 months and if you can't stand it then dive in.

4)KY Jelly. Pam/Vaseline etc is just for poseurs.

twharton - good to see you back here!

He's right - I'll endorse the windscreen option as well as the "poseurs" statement. The vintage guys use bear grease!

- jetboy

Valgal20 · Post by **Valgal20** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 10:18 pm

Yea, The whole lube thing isnt great for speed maybe- BUT, I bet if you biffed it, you would slide farther, it would be like dropping the scoot on a Slip-n'-Slide! or something of that sort

illnoise · Post by **illnoise** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 10:37 pm

The cheapest and easiest way to make your bike go faster is to lose weight (either you or the bike works fine.) It sounds cruel (I don't know if you weigh 90 pounds or 300 pounds) but I'm a big guy and anyone else riding my Blur can go 10mph faster than I can on it. I'm not going to spend $500 on upgrades when my biggest problem is the rider, not the bike. I'm not going to blame Motive Power Industries of Taiwan that they designed the bike for someone 100lbs lighter than me. : )

The Buddy itself is a good example of that, the main reason a Buddy 125 is faster than a Vespa LX50 is that it weighs a schload less. That pretentious steel monocoque frame is just slowing them down.

Bb.

lou76 · Post by **lou76** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 5:16 am

SuperGrape wrote:
lou76 wrote:roller weights... 10.5gram... <$20 will give you more useable torque off the line and coming out of corners...
Thanks. That sounds great. You have any suggestions as to where to buy the weights and who to trust to put them in. This sounds like a job that a lot of people could get wrong.

prima weights available on scooterworks website for $15 or so... your dealer should be able to order them for you and hopefully save you shipping... easy to put in, hard to screw up... just realllllly need an impact wrench...
and it was a moot point for me, but would that really void the warranty? have i missed/ignored previous discussion on the topic?

SuperGrape · Post by **SuperGrape** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 7:52 am

toddrw2251 wrote:I spray the front of my Buddy with Pam no stick cooking spray before every ride. Easy way to reduce drag and add MPH. It also reduces stress on the engine and cuts the breakin period in half.

Wow! I would have never thought of that! But the whole discussion about it left me feeling a little bit dirty.

SuperGrape · Post by **SuperGrape** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 8:03 am

twharton wrote:SuperGrape,

I haven't posted in a while and have really enjoyed this thread but beware the B.S.

1) Get a windscreen. I'm 6', 190 and that simple addition gave me about 5-7 mph boost.

2) Prima Pipe 5+

3) If you are a newb I would wait till the warranty period is up before even considering changing the roller weights. Give it 3-6 months and if you can't stand it then dive in.

4)KY Jelly. Pam/Vaseline etc is just for poseurs.

Thanks so much for popping up to give me some tips. So, a windscreen will reduce drag? Interesting; I have been toying with the idea of getting one for other reasons, but I thought it would ADD drag. Also, do you think the Prima pipe is worth the money and time in terms of the performance you get from it? Thanks so much for your input (from all of you Pam-users and the rest). It is valuable input...and I really do need to lose weight. That may be the fastest way to get my scooter to jump off of that light.

twharton · Post by **twharton** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 2:21 pm

The windscreen will give you the most bang for your buck. I purchased the short buddy screen and I'm average/tall at 6'. It was on sale from Scoot Richmond at the time so delivered I paid $66.

I don't like the look of the tall though there is a thread here where someone gives detailed instructions on cutting down a tall. Any way the screen does a fantastic job of smoothly channeling air up and around your body to reduce drag. You can crouch behind it but for more reduction but it's not a practical riding position.

I think the pipe is well worth it too. Not just for the extra power but now you can actually hear it when it's running but its not too loud IMHOP. It could not be easier to install. A socket wrench is all that's needed. The old pipe unbolts and the Prima fits right on. In the unlikely event of a warranty issue just swap them back.

P.S. If anyone needs a stock pipe for an 06 Buddy PM me.

StL_Stadtroller · Post by **StL_Stadtroller** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 5:15 pm

lou76 wrote: and it was a moot point for me, but would that really void the warranty? have i missed/ignored previous discussion on the topic?

Contrary to popular belief, simply adding an aftermarket exhaust, an air filter, rollers, seat cusion, headlamp, or whathaveyou will NOT void your entire warranty.

Firstly, the dealer would have to prove it likely that the aftermarket item directly led to the failure in question.

Secondly, aftermarket farkles would only void the warranty pertaining to that particular system involved.

So, in case such as... aftermarket pipe installed and you failed to also re-jet, and your piston melted - warranty for the failed piston is void.
However if you have an aftermarket pipe and you have, say, a transmission failure, then no your warranty is not void, and the repairs should be covered.
Or, you can't call a warranty voided and refuse to cover a blown exhaust gasket because the owner put in an aftermarket headlamp.

get it?

There is a sometimes-refferenced warranty protection act which sets these standards, but I don't have the link or know what it's called. Maybe someone who gives a crap can find in on Google for us?

StL_Stadtroller · Post by **StL_Stadtroller** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 5:17 pm

illnoise wrote:The cheapest and easiest way to make your bike go faster is to lose weight

Or take a riding class.

SuperGrape · Post by **SuperGrape** » Thu Feb 21, 2008 7:20 am

twharton wrote:The windscreen will give you the most bang for your buck. I purchased the short buddy screen and I'm average/tall at 6'. It was on sale from Scoot Richmond at the time so delivered I paid $66.

I don't like the look of the tall though there is a thread here where someone gives detailed instructions on cutting down a tall. Any way the screen does a fantastic job of smoothly channeling air up and around your body to reduce drag. You can crouch behind it but for more reduction but it's not a practical riding position.

I think the pipe is well worth it too. Not just for the extra power but now you can actually hear it when it's running but its not too loud IMHOP. It could not be easier to install. A socket wrench is all that's needed. The old pipe unbolts and the Prima fits right on. In the unlikely event of a warranty issue just swap them back.

P.S. If anyone needs a stock pipe for an 06 Buddy PM me.

Thanks so much for your comments. They were really helpful. I was wondering if you really felt and noticed a power difference after adding these two alterations. if so when it most likely to be noticed (taking off from a complete stop, driving at higher speeds more smoothly). Thanks again for all of your consideration.