Scooterotica

Hi, i am having great difficulty talking my scooter off it's stand, could the stand be faulty in some way ? , or is there an adjustment ?.

Are both wheels on the ground when on the stand? Can you rock it from side to side when on the stand?

If yes to either of these, it's likely that either the stand is loose in the brackets, the brackets are bent, the stand is bent or some combination of all three.

Can the stand/brackets be straightened, or do they have to be replaced ?

If the front wheel is well off the ground (I've seen them a couple of inches in the air!) it indicates the stand legs are too long and this will make it much harder to get on and off the stand. Seems to be a common problem with some of the stainless steel aftermarket stands.

Hi, both wheels are on the ground.

The front wheel should just have the weight off it, maybe up to a cm off the ground. If both wheels are solid on the ground then something is bent. Both the J brackets, sometimes on the splash plate, and the stops on the stand itself can be adjusted with a suitably sized hammer.

It could well be a combination of the items mentioned above, including the stand fixing bolts pulling through the frame cross member. There are often cracks in the cross member as a result of previous owners bad-practise when it comes to sitting on scooter while stationary, and riding them off the stand.

Sometimes, only heat and welding can fully address the issues for cracked cross members, but a thick (5mm) rectangular washer with an 8mm hole through it placed in the channel of the frame cross member is a great place to start with redressing the situation. The stand bolt passes through the rectangular washer.

All my scooter restorations start with work in this area, as it is a weak-spot, especially on Italian scooters (Spanish are much better)

Both of my scooters have got alloy wheel weights stuck to the cross member,this lifts the scooter up by just enough when its on the stand.

Unistrut washers (the rectangle shape with the spring taken off) work well to strengthen the struts