Motor scooters, Electric, and Parts
As gas prices rise and fear about the economy increases many people are looking for alternative and cost effective methods of transportation. Many people are leaving their cars at home, walking further, riding mass transportation and driving scooters to save money as the cost of living rises. Investing in a scooter is wise and fun, they can get up to 120 miles per gallon and are a blast to operate. Motor scooters are reliable enough to be used as every day commuters, or they can be used as a recreational vehicle. Some scooters are specially designed for people with disabilities, enabling them to easily get around on sidewalks when walking could be exceptionally slow and painful. Go karts, on the on the other hand are very fast. Though, you wouldnt drive them in town.
Scooter designs have been improving in leaps and bounds in safety, fuel economy and ease of use. Operating any motorized vehicle can be very dangerous and scooters are no different. Even though they look playful and tame compared with many motorcycles and cars, they can be more dangerous to drive than a car. Riding a scooter exposes the driver and passenger to the elements and does not offer any surrounding protection in case of impact. Because of this exposure certain safety precautions should be observed. Freeways, highways and interstates are not safe places to operate a scooter, unless the scooter is specially designed to reach those high speeds, in which case it would be more like a motorcycle.
Most scooters are gas powered two stroke engines with an automatic transmission. A two stroke engine requires a mixture of oil and fuel and almost every model, even old or vintage scooters, mixes them internally so the user only has to keep the reservoirs full. The size of engine varies, with 49cc generally being the smallest while they can get as large as 400cc or more. A 49cc scooter has a max speed of 35-40mph, but gets the best gas mileage at 120mpg. The most common sizes are 100-150cc, which refers to the amount of space in the cylinder when the piston is compressed.
The controls on scooters are set up very similarly to a bicycle, with the brakes on the handlebars. The right hand grip is usually the throttle which when twisted revs up the engine. Since most models have an automatic transmission the bike is always in gear, ready to go at a moments notice. This is part of the appeal of scooters, just gas and go. There is very little knowledge that has to be known to operate a scooter, the most important is basic traffic laws and safety coupled with common sense. There are no safety belts or airbags on a scooter so a helmet is often the only thing protecting your head from the road, and should always be worn.
New scooter parts and designs are being created and manufactured everyday, the market is really expanding and refining itself. Some scooters allow the driver to stand up and steer with their legs and body movements. These have both wheels parallel to each other and use a complex computer balancing program to keep the scooter upright. These are electric powered and designed more for sidewalks than roads with a max speed of 13mph, but many scooter companies are beginning to offer electric scooters that can compete with gas powered ones on the road. The three wheeled scooter improves safety and stability, and the one wheeled scooter is probably not too far off in the future.
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