When you think of German scooter giants, SIP, you don’t instantly think “Lambretta”, but that may all be about to change as they start to develop more products for the ‘other’ marque.
If their latest custom “Demonstrator” project is anything to go by, they’ll be adding both ‘Performance and Style’ to the world of Lambretta
Humble beginnings
SIP have been building custom scooters for decades, with shop owners, Alex and Ralf, getting the ball rolling way back in the 1990s with their own Vespa street racers. Those two early rally-and-race-going customs helped to start SIP. The duo started selling some of the parts they’d made for their own scooters, after scooterists began asking for them at rallies in Germany, Austria and Italy.
Like most of our readers, the two lads are thoroughbred scooter boys.
Timebound
SIP has become synonymous with the world of Vespa tuning and customising, whether it be classic or modern, but up until now, they’ve not had a custom Lambretta bearing the SIP name.
That all changed over winter, with SIP’s resident Lambretta guy, Jesco, finally convincing the management that it was time to build a custom Lambretta. The project only started in December, but had to be completed in a short space of time, ready for the Bike Expo in Italy in January.
Original paint
Starting off with an original-paint turquoise Lambretta DL, which was stripped right down, cleaned, and had cracks in the panels welded. The frame was also braced to make way for a powerful engine to get slotted in, as you’d expect.
In Germany, nothing is left standard for too long!
SIP BFA 325 engine
For their 30th anniversary, SIP decided to commission a small series of very special engines. Using the Casa Case and built by the boys at Rimini Lambretta Centre, this engine is a complete plug and play SIP BFA 325, a long stroke version of the BFA 306, built using all the best components. You can find out more details about the engine (and order your own) here.
Custom parts
Of course, SIP have many parts on the shelf already, but some still had to be sourced or made from scratch. The drop handlebars were bought in and painted.
The front brake, flywheel cover, spare wheel cover, brake lever and intake manifold were prototypes, made from a solid block of 7075 aluminium by Christian Mühlbauer from IB-Ideenbau. These parts will become products you can buy from SIP.
Other details include the Tag Heuer stopwatch and the front spotlight, which has been partially sunken into the housing.
A splash of colour
Marcus “Pfeili” Pfiel was the master entrusted with turning the paintwork into something special. Inspired by rally stripes, and working with the lovely original paint, he crafted the hand-painted red and yellow stripes, along with the signwriting, to give an aged, authentic look to the whole scooter.
Time is tight
Once everything was sourced, made, fabricated or painted, SIP were able to rebuild the scooter just in time to be shown in Verona at Motor Bike Expo. The project had taken just four weeks from start to finish, and the “SIP Custom Lambretta DL 69” has filled Jesco’s brief very well. It marries retro and modern styling without looking too trick, whilst hiding away some state-of-the-art tuning and engineering.
The scooter is registered, road legal and will serve as a shop demonstrator and will no doubt be used to develop more new Lambretta parts in the future.
Want to know more?
You can read the full SIP blog here.
