Is your scooter a polluter?

Idaho Statesman ^ | 8/8/2008 | CYNTHIA SEWELL

[Domandred]

Which gets better gas mileage, a Hummer or a scooter?

No contest.

But which is more polluting?

It may not be what you think.

"It's true. The cleanest scooter is still dirtier than a car," said John Swanton, air pollution specialist with the California Air Resources Board.

[Domandred]

Article on motorcycle emissions with an Idaho focus, but pretty much applies everywhere.

[camle]

laying the groundwork for more regulation, more hassle, (requireing 2-wheelers to undergo emissions testing for ex), and eventually regulating them out of existance, forcing people to use mass transit.

[TheZMan]

Somehow I just knew we wouldn’t even be done with this crap if we all switched to 85mpg scooters.

[penelopesire]

Exactly!

With the dems in charge, pretty soon we will all be ‘driving’ rickshaws...(eye roll)

[damondonion]

Don't know if the problem is still the same as it was 30 years ago, but.... It used to be the case that pollution was viewed as the RATIO of pollution to total exhaust gas emission, and ratios never hurt anybody. That descriminated against smaller higher-revving engines and nearly drove the Germans out of the American market for a number of years. BMW spent those years selling illegal cars, MB stopped selling small cars in America, and VW pretty much left the American market alone for a while, closing down one large and new plant.

It oculd easily be the case that the Hummer might still have a lower RATIO than a modern motorcycle but I have a hard time buying the idea that a late model bike would produce more actual pollution. Particularly if the bike had fuel injection and particularly if it was something like a FI version of something like a 250 - 400 cc on/off road b ike which got 60 mpg or better. The Kawasaki 250KLR's fuel mileage was phenomenal.

[MarineBrat]

I have an old beat up 50cc Honda scooter that I use to get around our property. The battery died years ago, but it has a kick starter that works fine. I have re-upholstered the seat with the finest duct tape. I put some gas in it about six months ago....

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

I think you might have some fun at the eco-kooks by suggesting that their little putt-putt scooters, since they have such high fuel efficiency, should be the very first vehicles adapted to use exclusively ethanol.

Since pure ethanol has only about half the energy of gasoline, it would cut their mileage in half, but in that a Vespa ordinarily gets 50 to 80 miles a gallon, it shouldn't be too much of a burden to reduce that to 25 to 40 miles per gallon.

Longer range modifications to a Vespa can give it a 2.5 or even 3 gallon gas, or ethanol, tank.

[ClearCase_guy]

We need to live in caves and walk to the berry bushes to get our sustenance.

Once the human population is down to about 10 million worldwide, then Mother Gaia can start to heal.

[JimSEA]

Well if you want to rid yourself of gasoline power totally, an old fashioned solution:

[calex59]

The fact is that scooters and motorcycles pollute less regardless of what their emissions are because the put out less volume, a point lost on the greenies and dems who want to completely control what we drive and everything else about us. We need to fight this. I keep wondering when the people in Southern CA will wake up(and in Coastal CA also) and stop voting these a**hat democrats into office.

[rednek]

I ride a Yamaha VStar 1300. Fuel injected and equipped with a cat converter. 45+ mpg riding 2 up. I suspect my bike will meet all the Fed regs even for cars. >p<regards - red

[Red6]

My first car was a BMW back years ago in Germany.

Over there they would refer to US cars as “Dreck Schleuder” (Filth slinger) and ironically this was years after in the US cars has catalytic converters, were running on unleaded fuel, and had pollution pumps. All the way into to 90s they were driving leaded and without catalytic converts for the most part, but that didn't stop them from snubbing their noses at American cars and calling them “filthy, uneconomical, polluting.... you name it.”

[sionnsar]

forcing people to use mass transit.

We used to be near a bus route. The bus passed by 6 AM into town, 6:30 PM headed back.

But no more. The county shut it down.

[sheana]

laying the groundwork for more regulation, more hassle, (requireing 2-wheelers to undergo emissions testing for ex), and eventually regulating them out of existance, forcing people to all ride bicycles.

Needed a fix. ;)

[Holicheese]

Do they pollute less than Nancy pelosi’s plane?

[poobear]

They can pull my Straightpipes on my Harley from my cold dead hands.

[camle]

ge thanx for the edit but they don’t care if we ride bicycles. in fact the libs would prefer that we use mass transit because it makes us dependent upon them and their whims, schedules, etc..

the whole objective of liberalism is to turn the populace into a shivering, wuivering mass of whining babies that need the libs to run their lives because it’s just so HARD. when we all look to them for our daily bread, and perform their every whim, and enslave ourselves to them, they still won’t be happy - they’ll find something else to carp about.

[popdonnelly]

Great, I’ll buy two. One for me and one for the wife. And we’ll drive up and down in front of Greenpeace headquarters.

[damondonion]

They had a point as I noted. Just once I saw a guy with a device which measured actual volume of pollutants put the thing on a GTA Alfa race car with just straight exhaust and then on a new Buick with every sort of pollution control, and this was in the mid 70s, and the Alfa produced less pollution. Once you get into the modern age of cars with computerized fuel injection of course, the German arguments break down.

[biff]

Mine won’t do 85 but it will turn 14,000 rpm thru its ported, timed, expansion chambered exhaust with no silencer, lubed with castor oil at 22:1 ratio. Screaming, smoking and shrill mosquito killer. Of course, the neighbors just love me!!