JUNE/JULY 2013ISSUE 91

TYRE WORDING

HAYNES MANUAL

BACK TO MODS

ROB’S LMLSHOW WINNER

TV IMPERIALDEALER SPECIAL REPLICA

BSSOEXCITEMENT

EDDY GRIMSTEAD EXCLUSIVE

EXPLAINED

NO.91 JUNE/JULY 2013 £3.60 RALLIES REVIEWS, NEWS,READERS’ SCOOTS......PLUS MUCH MORE

THE FULL UNTOLD STORY. . .

LITTLELITTLEMOTO RUMI FORMICHINO

HUNGARIAN APE

THE CURIOUSCASE OF THE

HAYNES MANUALSEE INSIDE

engine running in order toget the traction to return itfrom whence it came.Not everyone has the

luxury of keeping their bikesin a locked garage on a nicedriveway. Where do you keepyours? I’ve heard many talesabout bikes being kept inkitchens, bedrooms, orsomewhere else in the house.In fact I know of one personwho turned their dining roominto a shrine with it beingcompletely curtained off, onlyfor all to be revealed at someconvenient point. Thestrangest one I’ve actuallycome across was of aLambretta being kept in a topfloor flat with the only accessvia a narrow, windingstaircase. How did theowner get his scooter upthere? He took the flatwindow out and hauled it upby rope and pulley!

Time seems to have shot by– it only seems a couple ofweeks ago since I wascompleting the last issue.I’ve been so busy that Imust put my hands up andsay that I hadn’t even hadtime to check my scootersover properly before I gotthem out of the shed for thestart of the 2013 season.My ‘shed’ is to the rear of

my property and getting thescooters out involves ridingdown a muddy farm track.It’s not so bad in summerwhen the weather’s good,but it can be a prettyinteresting exercise inwinter, or if there’s beenheavy rain. It’s like goingscooter scrambling! Puttingthem away is even harder,as it’s slightly uphill and Ihave on more than oneoccasion had to walkalongside a bike with the

June/July 2013Editor: Mau Spencer 01507 529408

Email: mauspencer@classicscooterist.comGroup production editor: Tim Hartley

Publisher: Steve RoseContributors: Rich Addison; Henry Byer; Paul Carr;Dave Dry; Brian Forde; Paul Hart; Kingy; AshleyLenton; Paul Martin; Pete Newbold; Phillip Tooth;Steve Wright. Apologies to anyone we’ve forgotten.Some of the articles within these pages express theopinions of the contributors and are not necessarily

those of Scooterist Scene.Design: Sarah Scrimshaw

Reprographics: Simon DuncanDivisional advertising manager: Sandra Fisher

sfisher@mortons.co.ukAdvertising: Zoe Thurling 01507 529464

zthurling@mortons.co.ukSubscription manager: Paul DeaconCirculation manager: Steve O’HaraMarketing manager: Charlotte ParkProduction manager: Craig LambPublishing director: Dan SavageCommercial director: Nigel HoleAssociate director: Malc WheelerManaging director: Brian Hill

Editorial address: CLASSIC SCOOTERIST MAGAZINEPO Box 99, Horncastle, Lincs LN9 6LZ

www.scooteristscene.comGeneral queries and back issues:01507 529529 (24hr answerphone)

Archivist: Jane Skayman 01507 529423jskayman@mortons.co.uk

Next issue published: July 17, 2013Editorial deadline: June 18, 2013

CLASSIC SCOOTERIST (ISSN:1756-9494) is publishedbi-monthly by Mortons Media Group Ltd, PO Box 99,

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It’s that time again

4 CLASSIC SCOOTERIST – JUNE/JULY 2013 www.classicscooterist.com

Having troublefinding a copy ofthis magazine?Why not Just Askyour localnewsagent to reserveyou a copy each month?

What’s the strangest placethat you’ve ever kept yourscooter? Why not let usknow – in fact, send us aphoto to prove it and I mightbe inclined to offer a freesubscription if I think it’sweird enough.

40 A tribute of Imperial proportions 44 Szabolcs – the Hungarian Ape

22 Graham Fisher's ‘Little Ant’

48 Rob Mee’s LML 62 Exciting season opener at Croft

9 What’s new?The latest gossip and gadgets

15 Rated or hated?New products on test

17 MailboxReaders express their views, askquestions and show us their pictures

22 Graham Fisher’s ‘Little Ant’1955 Moto Rumi first production model

26 The Eddy Grimstead storyThe man, shops, staff and machines

40 A tribute of Imperial proportionsNigel Hetherington’s Grimstead tribute

42 Back in the dayBringing back memories from the IoM

44 SzabolcsThe Hungarian Ape

48 Tales of the riverbankRob Lee’s pristine LML

51 Rallies and rideoutsEvent roundup

58 Talkin’ ’bout My GenerationThe adventures of Ska-ravan!

62 Exciting season opener at CroftScooter circuit race report

64 Excitement and disappointmentat Santa PodScooter sprinting update

66 Win a Haynes Lambretta manualIn our free-to-enter competition

68 Grasstracker revivalIgnition options explored

70 TyresWhat does the sidewall wording mean?

72 Scooter clubsMeet and greet guide

73 Club newsThe latest club updates

74 What’s going on?A guide to the start of the riding season

77 Scooterist classifiedsFor all your wants and needs

82 The curious tale of the SX150sIndian imports from Italy?What’s going on?

CLASSIC SCOOTERIST – JUNE/JULY 2013mauspencer@classicscooterist.com 5

IN DETAIL58 The boys are back in town! 70 Tyres – what the sidewall

wording means 82 The curious tale of the SX150s

26 Eddy Grimstead – the man behind the legendThe full, previously untold story

Love is a ManySplendouredThing

CLASSIC SCOOTERIST – JUNE/JULY 2013mauspencer@classicscooterist.com 23

Being small is not always an issue if you have a big heart.Graham Fisher, a scooterist for over 30 years also practisesmartial art, karate. He knows all too well that it’s nothing todo with size how well something performs.

‘LITTLE ANT’

Graham Fisher has restored hisMoto Rumi Formichino 125cc twinair-cooled scooter to immaculatecondition. It’s a 1955 first

production run model which makes it a veryrare specimen indeed – but owning approx45 other bikes, Graham could be said to bespoilt for choice when it comes to going outfor a sunny Sunday afternoon ride.

Moto Rumi’s Formichino is perhaps the onemotor scooter widely respected bymotorcyclists – probably because it can burnthe pants off many 250cc motorcycles of thesame era with its horizontal two-cylinder two-

Graham got into the scooter scene aftergoing to Northern Soul nights inPeterborough back in 1978/79. He thenstarted riding to rallies, his very firstrecollection being on the seafront atScarborough in 1981. Travelling across theUK on his J registration orange GP150, hesoon became a regular rallygoer. But he alsohas a love of riding abroad and although heenjoys going to the Isle of Wight Rally, hemuch prefers riding in France or Italy andmeeting up with continental scooterists. Oneof his most enjoyable memories was ridingto the south of France back in 2004 withfellow Rumi-riding scooterists – that’shardcore riding on something like a Rumi.

Racing scooter sidecars has been one ofGraham’s other pastimes over the years,which brings us on to one of his funniestmemories: While attending a grass meetingat a Brighton weekender and sufferingrepeated punctures on his Maicoletta outfit,he decided to use expanding foam in thetyres (the type you inject into walls) tocombat his problems; he went on to win allhis races, but with pain etched on his face.He said: “The bruising was unforgettable.”

stroke 125cc engine. A masterpiece of scooterdesign, Rumi’s Formichino (Little Ant) arrivedin 1954 and progressed via Normale and Lussoversions to the Sport and Bol d’Or racer. Itscompetitors on the market might have beendesigned with cost-effectiveness andsimplicity in mind, but Donnino Rumi startedfrom first principle engineering with theFormichino, using the engine as a stressedchassis member, which was made up fromaluminium castings bolted together. Out ofproduction since the company’s closure in1962, the Formichino is today one of the mosthighly sought after of all scooters.

THE SCOOTER RITEOF PASSAGE

Following the passing of one of the most colourful and flamboyant scootercharacters of the 1960s, CSM has been granted exclusive access to theworld of Eddy Grimstead. Read all about the man, the shops, the staff and,of course, the dealer specials.

Eddy Grimstead was born onSept 25, 1933 into a poor LondonEast End family. Times were hard; alack of sheets and blankets meant

sleeping under coats for warmth in winterand the family house was sparse with justbare floorboards.There’s an old family story about young

Eddy that revolves around his mum scrimpingand saving to buy a roll of lino for the kitchenfloor. Eddy (before the lino could be put to itsproper use?) appropriated this newacquisition until his sister warned their mumto look out of the window where Eddy, playingout in the garden and using a broomstick for ahorse, had cut up the new lino to make aknight’s suit of armour – times were hard, butnot without humour!After a period in the army following his

National Service, Eddy, then 21, opened his firstshop. Inspiration came from his father, Eddysenior, who, alongside Eddy’s brother Peter, rana cycle hire and sales shop in Beckton Road,Canning Town. This inspired Eddy to do thesame with his first shop in Burdett Road, Poplarselling push bikes. As his father’s businessexpanded into mopeds, Eddy also followed thismotorised route – who’d have guessed that theEddy Grimstead estate would encompass sevenshops, sell almost anything on wheels andbecome internationally renowned?

EARLY TIMESThe business became something of a familyaffair with many employees being related tothe Grimstead family. Eddy’s cousin, Roger,ran one of the earliest Grimstead shops inRancliffe Road. It was Roger’s ideas on scootercustomising that was to seal the company’slegendary status. In fact, the idea of the VespaHurricane and the Lambretta Imperial wereRoger’s brainchild and in the early days, Rogerundertook much of the custom spraying,sometimes in very primitive conditions.

NATIONAL RECOGNITIONEddy Grimstead’s fame spread and by 1965 anational newspaper had featured Eddyalongside a picture of him sat on a scooteroutside the Barking Road shop (modernreaders might feel that some of this article isworth repeating):The scooter represents the contemporary

young; in ways the symbol of how they feelabout life. Eddy Grimstead owns two shops inthe East End of London, where all the sharpestscooter fashions begin. He’s important becausehe customises all his scooters. A Grimsteadscooter is not just a form of transport; it’s afantastic object, glowing with rainbow colours;a new cult, with flashing wheel spokes, badges,symbols and stars sculpted in transparent redlacquer. The fur (look) goes everywhere. Andyou can cover the seat, pillion, tyre and pannierwith zebra or – the latest – ocelot type skin.In front go the lights, you fit a large

chrome frame and screw hundreds andhundreds of tiny spotlights on to this untilyour scooter looks like a floodlight stand fornight football. You alter the exhaust note toget an exclusive sound (Grimstead sells aseveral dozen different types of silencer;connoisseurs can name each one after asingle revving-up burst). On the side you canpaste on to the shiny chrome bulgingbosoms of your scooter a chequered

26 CLASSIC SCOOTERIST – JUNE/JULY 2013 www.classicscooterist.com

EDDY GRIMSTEADTHE MAN BEHIND THE LEGEND

The cult oftoday is the culture

of tomorrow

Eddy – pictured in later life Eddy Grimstead also sold vehicles – here’s Eddy with Gill, the Reliant rep

From the outset the Grimstead organisationwas an innovator and the Rancliffe Road shopboasted a Vespa sidecar outfit, known as ‘thefloat’ that was used to pick up breakdowns.Another inspired ‘one-off’ vehicle was a pick-up style van that had been extended tofacilitate carrying Lambrettas from theLambretta Concessionaires in Croydon; itslonger bed was to save journey times. All thewelding for this pick-up was undertaken by theversatile and talented Roger.

defender. And you can drive off with yourelastic sided feet set at a 45º angle. Veryimportant that 45º.

Now much of this baroque flamboyance(which could add over £40 to the scooter cost) isbeginning to move out of favour. “There’s a coolspirit abroad,” says Mr Grimstead; “The boys arebeginning to pare things down, exposing theframe and engine to get spidery effects, going forpurer matt colours with, perhaps, twoasymmetrical stripes. Less of the chrome – asilent silencer – none of that megaphonenonsense – it was against the law anyway.

“But we are getting some new accessorycreations in. I saw a new design Japanesewhiplash aerial this morning. It’s fitted with(Mr Grimstead casts his eyes modestly to theground) a naked lady sculpted in plastic righton the very top.”

Apart from Vespa and Lambrettas, Grimsteadssells Hondas. He drives a Mercedes Benz, nota British product. He stocks foreign productsjust in the way that television people hireIrishmen and Icelanders (presumably, a ‘dig’at the BBC presenters Eamonn Andrews andMagnus Magnusson?) to avoid classassociations and consequent antagonism.

CLASSIC SCOOTERIST – JUNE/JULY 2013mauspencer@classicscooterist.com 27

Eddy Grimstead outside his Newbury Park shop

Douglas Vespa MD, Eric Brockway with Eddy

“It’s funny the way scooters have caught on.I don’t have any anti-British prejudice – didyou know that the scooter was a Britishinvention? We just didn’t carry it through – butit just happens that the Italians and the Japshave moved, they haven’t stuck still. Andthere’s an anti-scooter Puritanism in thiscountry. I have this uncle working in my dad’smotorbike shop – he just won’t touch scooters.He’d resign before working on one. Scootersare decadent, or something?

“I admit, I understand the feeling,sometimes. There’s a mechanical beauty to amotorbike, functional – not all smoothed over.But there’s no doubt that the scooter has won.The boys feel that it’s not a dirty greatmachine, not working class, the way bikes are.

“It’s funny the way that the scooterexpresses how people are now interested insmooth appearance rather than the guts.

“The cult of today is the culture of tomorrow”.I told Mr Grimstead that he looked as

though he would be a culture hero. “Goodheavens!” he said.

A superb survival of a nice periodpiece including elusive quotes from theman himself.

MANY THANKSTO THE FOLLOWING

for helping to put this article together:John ChinreyMarco FacciniRoger GrimsteadSteve GrovesMalcolm Perrett

I can’texplain

At first glance these two SX 150 Lambrettas could pass asnormal Italian imports, but delve deeper and things become alittle more confused.

THE CURIOUS CASE OFTHE IMPORTED SX150s

When Nigel Miller purchased twoSX 150 Lambrettas from a batchof five scooters imported fromItaly, he didn’t realise how deep

amystery he was about to become involvedwith – because to all intents and purposes thescooters appear to actually be Indian!

The first clue came via the serial numberswhich weren’t stamped into the frame whereyou’d expect to find them, but instead they areon a registration plate fitted in between thefuel cap and the seat securing plate. To furtherconfuse matters, the engine numbersthemselves (SX150-752945 and SX150-752876)indicate their year of origin as 1966, whereasthe frame numbers shown on the silver oneindicate to it being of 1968 origin, and theblack one as being 1969.

Whatever the answer, all of this indicates tothe actual year ofmanufacture being pre-Scooters India ‘SIL’ ownership (if they were ofSIL origin, they would be post-1971). However,there are lots of signs of ‘Indian tampering’which includes clues like the fitting of a Series 2

rear footboard support strut, an upside-downkick-start stop and the fitting of a dodgyHT leadamongmany other dubious build qualities. Thelist goes on: glass fibremudguards, panels (andeven the toolbox), as well as strange-lookingfootboards and panel handles. Even themodelbadges aren’t consistent between these twoscoots. The horncastings and headlights arepure Italian Innocenti, though one is an earlierstyle pattern and the othermuch later.

All five scooters in the Italian importedbatch show signs of being from the sameproduction run with the frame numbers allappearing to be within 200 digits of each other.The number span also appears to indicate thatthere may have been an original batch ofaround 400 scooters, so was this a special one-off batch order for someone – or even a specialrun? Or could it be that these bikes were madeup out of ‘new old stock’ which was transferredto India when Innocenti sold out to SIL? Or isthere some other (and possibly even stranger)explanation? We don’t know – do you?Mau

82 CLASSIC SCOOTERIST – JUNE/JULY 2013 www.classicscooterist.com

Star of India maybe?

The steering lock indicates mid-60s Italian origin

A Series 2 back leg is fitted – alongside a verydodgy HT lead

The toolbox door lock indentation is different to a normalInnocenti one

Kick-start stop is welded-on upside down

The dodgy-looking serial numberplate