Shopping on eBay for Vespa parts

[railfancwb]

I have a 1980 Vespa P200e motor scooter. They were never that common in the States and it has been a long time since that design was made... two cycle engine, four speed transmission, clutch...

 

Equivalent machines are still made in India by a [former?] licensee. So replacement parts are often sourced there.

 

Thinking now of the clutch - eBay prices range from $200+ for one from Italy down as low as $34 or so. Most are in the $45 to $70 range. All sound the same in the descriptions. All look about the same in the pictures.

 

Any fail safe way to avoid buying a substandard one?

 

I’m not certain that the $200+ one from Italy isn’t made in the same factories as the others. If actually made in Italy by the Vespa Factory it probably is the safest choice.

 

Otherwise?

 

 

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[Cougar_ml]

From my experience with other types of machines, either you pay the premium for the premium parts (and verify that they really ARE the premium parts) or just buy the cheapest one.  A good set of images for the auction and verify the part matches the images, and verify that against images from the company.

 

No, there is no fail safe way to avoid the cheap knock off, apart from avoiding epay all together and ordering from a reputable source like the manufacturer or factory authorized parts distributor.  For something like this though you're kind of out of luck, as original parts have most likely long since dried up except for the die hard parts hoarders that think it's made of gold.

[railfancwb]

I went for the lowest price clutch. When I ordered the $200+ one from Italy was not listed.


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