When I first got the
ped running, me wearing grubs.
Gangly Jeff's page of High Performance Mopeds
The Honda PA 50 is a 50 cc, 2 stroke moped with a Continuously Variable
Transmission (CVT). The CVT works like a snowmobile tranny, as the
rpms climb, the gearing also climbs. One of the PA 50's more notable
features is the decompression lever which makes no noticable difference
as most of the resistance to pedalling comes from the belt drive and gear
reducer on the rear wheel. An interesting fact is that the 49cc motor
is almost exactly 102 times smaller than my 5.0 mustang motor. More
interesting is that at approximately 2 horsepower, the 49cc motor is putting
out almost the same amount of horsepower / liter as my mustang; 40.8 hp/liter
for the moped, and 45 hp/liter for the mustang.
When I first got the
ped running, me wearing grubs.
The Story of my PA 50
I got my moped in the fall of 1997, it cost me a set of slightly used
14" tires. It didn't run when I bought it, and the piston was siezed
from sitting for so many years. My friend Isaac and I pulled the
head off and wire brushed the carbon off of the piston. We then sprayed
the piston with WD-40, let it sit, and then cranked it over with an air
gun. The ped still didn't run, so I took it to my mechanical guru
Dan. The problem, as Dan figured out in about 10 minutes, was a bad
condenser. I got a new condenser for $10 from a salvage yard (any
condenser works, the one I got was from a yamaha) but the ped still didn't
run. After cleaning the carb and petcock, the ped ran. It would
do 30 kph (19 mph) and it ran like crap. The problem was that I didn't
have an air filter (engine is tuned to have an air cleaner), and the pipe
was pretty plugged up. I attained a parts moped which was almost
complete for $20 (starting price was $100, it didn't take much to get the
price down) from a branch of the salvage yard where I bought the condenser.
The pipe and air cleaner from the parts ped made my good ped into a smooth
running machine. I decided I was going to fix it up, so I sanded
both fenders, the gas tank, the rear luggage rack, the lower subframe,
the upper tube frame, the kickstand, the liscence plate holder and forks
down to bare metal and had my friend Mike get them powdercoated.
Mike worked at a powdercoating plant, so it cost me 3 cases of Bud for
the powdercoating. While the parts were being powdercoated I buffed
almost every piece of aluminum and chrome on the ped as well as almost
all the bolts. While it was apart I cleaned and greased all the bearings
which I would highly recommend you doing if you plan on keeping your ped
for a while. I got the parts back from powdercoating, bolted the
thing together, slapped some SPY stickers on the tank and some flames on
the luggage rack, bolted up the motor and it started up right away which
surprised me a little after having it completely apart. Something
else I should note is that I am 185 lbs which is 5 lbs over the 180 lb
load rating for my moped, so your moped may go faster than mine with equivalent
mods (take a look at the different mods sections).
The lower frame after powder
coating, I'm bolting
up the engine. Notice the polished cylinder head.
Driving Impressions of my PA50
Driving a moped requires a slightly different attitude than when driving
a motorcycle or a car. With a moped, not only can you sit back, relax
and enjoy the ride, you MUST sit back and relax because it's going to take
a bit longer than with a vehicle with a respectable amount of power.
You must be able to laugh at yourself, or else you'll be the only one who
isn't laughing at you. In spite of, or maybe because of the lack
of power and the laughs, a moped is a blast to ride. Nothing around
you, no stereo, no power, forces you to look around and enjoy the ride.
Unlike a motorcycle, which most people are not very fond of, most people
have fond memories of mopeds and enjoy seeing them. My moped accelerates
pretty hard for a moped, and it handles incredibly. My riding buddy
is my friend Isaac who has a 1979 Kawasaki KZ650SR and, needless to say,
his bike is a bit faster than my ped. When it comes to corners though,
Isaac slows down, corners, and accelerates after the corner, whereas I
keep the throttle wide open and lean over till I am almost parallel with
the ground. I have to corner hard to keep my speed up, but it's fun
cutting corners hard. Riding up hills I have to pull over into the
bike lane so as not to piss off even the slowest drivers. Gas mileage
is very good, I've never actually measured how far I can go on a tank,
but I know that a 10 liter gerry can costs about $5 Canadian, and my tank
can hold maybe 3 liters. So if a tank lasts me a week, I can go about
three weeks on $5 of gas. I wouldn't recommend a moped as your number
one mode of transportation unless: you live far away from any hills, everywhere
you need to go is fairly close to where you live, and you never need to
take anything large along (nothing bigger than a backpack). I use
my moped as a second vehicle for when I have lots of time, and it saves
me lots of money on gas as my first vehicle is a 5.0 mustang. (update:
sold mustang, am now looking for Suzuki Savage 650, or Intruder 800)
Isaac and myself riding
in our neighborhood
Isaac wrecking his new tire,
what a SKID!!!
E-mail me at the top of this page, I'd be more than happy to here of
your modifications or speed tips; Make sure you explain them in great detail
so that I can try them and post them. You can also send me pictures
of your moped if you'd like them posted on my page (any moped is fine)
and please also send all the specs on your ped so that I can include them
with the picture.