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The ribbing has already started now. "So you got a skate board to replace the bike.... What are you going to get for the other foot?"

I laugh at the pump.

My nephew owns a 2 stroke Buddy Stella and really loves it however for running across the State on a 70+ mph road I'll take the 250cc Aprilia with its 15" SportBike/Metric Cruiser tires.

The Fiat was a CraigsList find and cost less than my bike. Needs some work but its rear wheel drive and aside from learning to deal with Diesel is all technology I can deal with. No ECU computer with a pretty basic 5 speed manual transmission. Fuel injection is the old belt driven mechanical injector pump so technically if you can power the fuel shutoff valve you can push start it. Just repacked the front wheel bearings putting in new seals, replaced all the rubber brake hoses, brake pads and transferred the front rotors to the back and replaced the front with new rotors since they are all the same and the back ones were scored. Since the front do most of the stopping I figured that the new rotors would be best up there and since the front ones had plenty of life in them to serve on the back wheels for some time. Rear rotors were scored due to faulty brake service done by Tire Kingdom for the previous owner. They did not align the slots in the rear caliper pistons with the pins in the brake pads scoring the rotors from the improper installation. Put in a new emergency brake cable while I was under there too. Also put in a new master cylinder since it was leaking. Tire Kingdom ignored the shop manual advising that the rubber parts in any OEM spec brake components were not compatible with synthetic fluids and put DOT4 Synthetic fluid in anyway instead of old fashioned DOT3 non-synthetic ruining the master cylinder and rubber hoses. The hoses on the right side had collapsed and were completely plugged. The also left half the bolts loose on the front suspension when they aligned it which I also corrected while I was under there. Parts are available through just about any Adap, AutoZone, Napa, Oreily, etc and there are several US vendors making new replacement interior and exterior body and trim components too.

I just bought it to drive when I was working on the bike since the bike now it has 26,000 miles on it and I want to catch up on some preventative maint. With the top down I find it is closer to riding the bike as you are not isolated from whats going on around you. I find most cars confining and muting to your sense of whats going on around you.

You should see folks looking for the truck at the stop lights when they hear the Diesel and come to the realization that its this little red 2 door Italian convertible.

Micah at AF1 Racing (Aprilia Forum) does mod the Vespa scooters quite heavily and can be great source of knowledge, most of which is through personal experience putting the bikes on a Dyno. Modern Vespa is also a good site for Vespa specific tuning information.

Cycle Gear is catering to women riders:
www.cyclegear.com/womens

They have a number of brick and mortar stores in and near San Diego too such as the 4240 Kearny Mesa Rd store:
www.cyclegear.com/store-finder/findStore

Leather Up also caters to women and has a descent selection of riding boots, etc:
www.leatherup.com/c/Womens-Motorcycle-Boots/sortby_price/2/120.html

xelementgear.com/

Hello and welcome from The SoCal desert! Quite a setup you have there. Great to see more women getting involved in riding and wrenching. (Maybe the manufacturers will take note and start making BETTER riding gear!) When you get done, do you have plans to rattle can it?