Scooter in Oscar Winner "God of Love"

Last week's lackluster Oscars' ceremony was punctuated by just a few bright spots: seeing Billy Crystal again, some impressive dresses, and the acceptance speech of the seemingly genuine and funny Luke Matheny whose short live action film, "God of Love" won the award in its category. Missed it? Well here it is: [deleted by YouTube].

I was roused awake to see this fine acceptance speech by the montage that included a bit from this film in which a scooter could clearly be seen. Scooters? Well I had to find out more.

The trailer for the film does not show the scooter:



So I tracked down the montage with snippets from all of the films, and indeed, it is a Genuine Stella. I bought the film and thought it was funny, quirky and sweet.
 
Buy it for the pocket change of $1.99 (or $2.99 for HD) and support a young filmmaker. Would be a good film to show at a scooter film night.


Blog entry soundtrack:

Stella 4T Update

From Genuine Scooters:

Dear Genuine Customers,

US regulatory agencies have expressed concerns over minor variances between production specifications and our first production run of the new Stella 4 stroke scooter.

We are returning the scooters to the factory to address the concerns.

These concerns are non-mechanical and have no effect on the emissions standards, the safety, or the operation of the Stella 4 stroke scooter.

We will provide more information regarding availability as we complete these tasks.

We know the delays encountered due to this issue have been a disappointment for the many dealers and consumers that were anxiously awaiting the arrival of the new Stella.  It has been disappointing for Genuine as well.  However, Genuine Scooters is always committed to following all laws, rules, and regulations to deliver the best scooters in the business.  Thank you for your patience.

Sincerely,

Your friends at Genuine Scooters

Stella 4T Update from Genuine

This news was posted by Genuine:

Our first production shipment of 2010 Stella 4-Stroke arrived in Chicago on 6-9-2010, and was staged for review by United States Customs (Homeland Security) for clearance. Normally, this process can take a few days or up to a week. However, we have been advised that the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has requested an "extensive" examination of the vehicles. Simply stated, EPA is evaluating the Stella 4T to validate all aspects of compliance outlined in our original certification documents issued for this model. At this point we have been advised to wait for a response from the government without any indication of how long it may take. We intend to cooperate fully with any of their requests.
We have the finest EPA certified test lab and certification agents in the business. We are doing everything in our power to expedite this review, but at this point the government has not given us a completion date. This is extremely difficult for us, for the dealer, and for you our customer, all of whom have been waiting for Stella 4T.
Be assured that we will keep you informed as this governmental process and review continues and we thank you for your support.
We appreciate your confidence and patience, and we look forward to delivering your new Stella as soon as possible.
Your friends at Genuine Scooters.

LML Reuntied with Geared Scooters

LML gave up the geared scooters for motorcycles saying that the Indian market had changed, but it looks like they have realized the error of their ways. Interesting that the scooter market has grown and motorcycles proved less lucrative.

From the Economic Times:

NEW DELHI: The beleaguered two wheeler company LML has launched its second geared scooter in the domestic market, on the back of a revival of
demand in domestic scooter market. LML has introduced a 4-stroke version of its NV brand of scooters in select market of Delhi and Ghaziabad.

Available in two variants, LML claims the 150 cc scooter delivers a fuel efficiency of 55 km/litre. It is available at an ex-showroom price of Rs 39,897 for the base version and Rs 40,800 for the deluxe variant in Delhi.

Kanpur-based LML re-entered the domestic market with its Vespa brand of geared scooters in April 2007 after an 18-month hiatus when it had to stop production due to fund crunch and labour problems.

LML currently has a limited presence in the domestic market and sells 1,500 units of its two-stroke scooter under the Vespa brand in Delhi, parts of Punjab and Haryana, every month. Operating under the Board for Industrial and Financial Reconstruction (BIFR), it is looking to expand its market to Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Assam.

Bulk of its total production of 5,000 units per month are exported to Italy, UK, France, Nigeria, Sudan, Japan, Australia, South Korea and Egypt, under the Stella brand. LML has an installed capacity of 300,000 scooters and 240,000 motorcycles. The company has totally stopped motorcycle production.

The scooter market grew 9% to 11.45 lakh units last fiscal outperforming the two wheeler market which posted a marginally lower growth of 2.6% in the same period.

Correction to Stella Performance Article

In our current issue (#48) there is an excellent article on how different performance upgrades can affect a Genuine Stella. Unfortunately, a graph was left out (it was too low to reproduce in the magazine), one chart was truncated and some of the markers on another graph were misidentified. So, I'm posting corrections here.

Not sure if you can read the chart that was missing, even in the web, so we'll see about re-creating i from scratch in the nest issue. It was referred to on page 46 in the final paragraph.


The chart at the bottom of page 50 & 51 had a mixed-up column & data and one of the pipes has since received a name & pricing. All are updated here:



Finally, we have a correction to the graph legend on graph bottom left of page 48, "4 cylinder kits using Polini exhaust" The legend should read, BLUE-stock, MAGENTA-Malossi, RED-Polini, GREEN-Malossi Ported.

Sorry for any confusion. It was a very technical article with graphs & charts that usually aren't high enough resolution to just drop into the magazine. We'll take better care in the future.