Over the river and through the woods

Extended highway riding on a scooter is interesting. I've discovered that it's a bit scary to travel at 60mph and be buffeted by the wind.

I had a pleasant ride up through the hills of central Pennsylvania today. I went through Harrisburg rather than taking the bypass. The bypass is scary enough in a car, I don't think I'd want to try it on a 150cc scooter. I saw the capitol building, and a good portion of the city.

I then hopped across the Susquehanna to rt. 11/15 north and worked my way up to 322 West. I started up the mountain and was accellerating up to about 65 (the speedo reported 70, but it is 5mph fast), when suddenly the engine lost power and the right blinker came on. Thankfully there was nobody behind me, but that would have been pretty bad otherwise. I was a little panicked, but I pulled the scoot over to the side and the engine died. I was thinking "oh %^&#!" Well, I waited a couple moments, hit the starter and it purred to life. I decided I could either turn around and go home or continue on. Since I had a bit of a idea as to what had happened, I decided to continue on and kept my speed at 55 (60 on the speedo).

I made it safely all the way to State College, even up some pretty steep hills. The Kymco made it up the hills like a champ. It didn't have any troubles with it, and made my way through State College on Business 322. It was a great ride through a very pretty town.

I enjoyed the foliage, and made it back onto the main highway. I passed through Phillipsburg and then on to Clearfield where I stopped at Grice Gun Shop to purchase some ammo. I filled up at the Sheetz in town there and started up Clearfield mountain. Again, the Kymco handled the mountain like a champ with no signs of laboring. I took it easy on the throttle just in case, and when I came to the top of the mountain and turned onto a long stretch of road through a state park I can't remember the name of, and opened up the throttle to see if I could recreate the situation I'd had earlier. Sure enough, the scoot got to 65, the throttle turned to mush, and the right blinker came on. I pulled off the road and the engine died. It started up again without a problem, and I finished my trip.

I really had my suspicions at this point, so when I got to the in-laws' house, I called the dealer. Sure enough, the Kymco People 150 has a rev limiter. Once the engine is about to redline, the cycle goes limp. This is something I'm going to need to disable. I'll have to install a tachometer so I can monitor this myself, but I really don't think a rev limiter that shuts down the engine while on the highway is such a great (or safe) idea. I understand the point, but the limiter should "limit" the engine, not just shut it down.

In any event, now that I know the limiter is there, I'll be careful to never travel above 60mph so as not to set it off, but to all Kymco People 150 owners, now you know, this is not a high speed scooter so don't try to treat it like one.

Aside from that irritating aspect of the trip, the ride was fantastic and I was less saddlesore after 7 hours of riding than I would have been after 30 minutes on my old scooter. The Kymco's seat could use some more padding most definitely, but it's not horrible for long distance riding.

I've also discovered that I need to get another accessory: long underpants.