THE FIRST part of our scooter project has stirred up a fair bit of interest, and it’s mostly been with those who haven’t owned a bike before. It’s amazing how many people there are who have always quite liked the idea of a scooter. It’s those Italian good looks that do it.

   If you’re up to speed with the story (if not, click here), you’ll know our Indian Lambretta GP clone arrived just after its last legs got up and stumbled out the door. Knackered is another word for it.

   It was stripped and the frame was sent off to be sand blasted. The next job was to work out how much of the panel work that came with the scooter could be reused. I’d really wanted to preserve the fabric of the original, rather than just chuck anything that was even slightly suspect in the skip and buy new parts. Yes, everything you could want for a GP is still available thanks to the thriving Indian market, but it just didn’t seem right. Plus, I was meant to be sticking to a reasonable budget, so even though the thought of armfuls of brand new bits and a severely thrashed credit card looked attractive at certain points, I tried desperately to stick to the original plan.

   Most notable are on the vertical edges of the leg shields and the side panels near the cut outs for the kick start and the running boards. Ignore these at your peril. Even if the tiny cracks cover with paint, if there’s any damage whatsoever, as soon as ride the scooter, they’ll come straight through. Result - cracks in the new paint and rusty marks quite soon after.

   With this in mind, and much as it pained me to do it, the leg shields were deemed beyond repair. A  new mudguard comes with the bike as a matter of course, and all the other components I decided I’d stick with - even the very sick looking side panels.

   These make or break the look of a Lambretta, they’re just so bloody obvious. A previous owner had decided that the aluminium trim more usually found down the side of 70s coaches would be a good thing to protect them from the rigours of life in India.

   The resulting holes which had been drilled every couple of inches were not too welcome, and would have to be welded. The panels were also cracked in a couple of places. It’s a case of having to grind the cracks out carefully, weld them up and then grind them flat. There’s no guarantee that this is a permanent fix, but working them after with a hammer and dolly usually does the trick.

   When you take on a project scooter, it‘s really easy to kid yourself that this is the easy option. It is, after all, just a scooter. And that’s exactly why eBay is littered with part finished scooter projects because when it comes to sorting out the panel work, there’s a lot of work to do. And unlike a car, most panels are going to have to be painted to an acceptable standard on both sides.

   If you’ve never studied a Lambretta in any great detail before, have a look at the pics on this page (click on them for a closer look). We’ve labelled up all the panels - 12 individual parts plus the frame with its seat bridge. All to be painted in body colour. Lift off the side panel, and there’s another seven metal parts which will need to be stripped, repaired and painted. Finally, there’s the hubs, forks, and wheel rims to be sorted. All relatively small parts - the leg shields are the largest and most obvious single panel - but there’s a lot of man hours in getting it all done.

   You’ve probably gathered by now, most of our Lambretta was pretty tired. A common problem is that years of use, road shocks and vibration running through the machine can cause stress cracks at certain points in the panel work.