First component done - Seat

Here are a couple of before pics of the seat. Notice the original thick shaped pad.
The seat frame was beadblasted and painted black. I was going to take it completely apart, but the blasting did a good enough job cleaning everything up that I didn't bother. It looks great and was an easy restore.

I got a Pascoli Mk2 black seatcover to replace the hand sewn cover. The original seat had the original padding which is cushy and comfy. The Pascoli is nice but has thinner foam between the vinyl cover and rubber base. The original foam is thicker and shaped to fill the space between the seat springs and the cover. I tried to put the original foam under the new seat cover but needed a structural backing to prevent the foam from squeezing between the springs. The original rubber backing was too thick so I tried a sheet of black polyethylene. It had the right amount of flex and was much thinner than the original rubber. When dry fitting, it looked like it would work, but when attaching the clips I found out that the stack of padding was a little too thick. So I backed up and put the original rubber (no padding) and the polyethylene under the new seat cover. This made for a good reasonably comfortable seat. Not as cushy as original, but better than the bare Pascoli. I can try again with the original pad if this setup isn't comfortable.

Three coats

Three coats is what I pulled off the body parts today. The original primer and white, another coat of primer, bondo, and white, and a coat or rattle can silver with some more bondo. The second white coat was the most tenacious. Whoever painted that on used some good paint. It was tougher than the original stuff and way tougher than the lousy rattle can paint. With the fenders all taken down to the metal I can see all the ripples and flaws. The front fender will be easy to fix. The cowls will take more work. There were bits of bondo all over and lots of small dents and ripples. Very little rust and no rot though.

Engine grill

As typical with GS engine cowls, the grill was damaged. On this cowl, the grill was cut out and replaced with one out of another scooter. Check out how the slats don't form a parallelegram. The lower three slats are too short at both the front and the rear.
The plan is to cut out the slats to the correct length. If that doesn't work well. I'll need to find another donor cowl with similar slats and weld the set in. Other than the slats, the cowls are straightening up nicely. I've done initial shaping, but still need to get them stripped.

Tearing it apart

The weather and my schedule finally cooperated and I started pulling the GS apart. Lots of notes and pictures during disassembly should keep things organized. I've been picking up parts that I know I need all summer. One good score was a NOS horn cover to replace the rusty one that bulges around the spotwelds.

I pulled the taillight, gloveboxes, seat, tank, and engine today. Most parts look in usable shape with few surprises other than it was easier to do than I expected.

Lots of cleaning to do on this motor before it comes apart.

Next step, take apart the front end.

Floor Strips

I removed all the floor strips and the outer ones are each broken in two, but other than that, they're all in good shape. My plan is to clean, straighten, and polish them, and try to weld the outer ones together. If the welding works, I'll have the correct floor strips and they'll fit with minimal fiddling. If the welding doesn't work, I'll have to continue my search for decent GS floor strips.

I've cleaned a few of the strips up and they straighten and polish right up. The endcaps also look good with a couple of minutes at the polishing wheel. I have access to the correct riveting tool for the floor strips so reinstalling the strips shouldn't be too much of an ordeal.

Nice ride

With very little effort, I was able to get the GS running reliably for the summer. Carb cleaned, new plug, cleaned up wiring and it likes to start in 1-2 kicks. I keep finding more grease to clean out. The thick grease tended to keep the rust down so I guess the dirt isn't so bad.

The biggest performance issue was a shuddering front brake combined with a blown front shock. The shuddering front brake was caused by a rust spot in the front drum. Easily cleaned out. After looking around at various front shock options, I found another old front shock in decent shape that will go on when I pull the front end apart. When the current shock comes off, I'll probably try to put new seals and oil in it.

The other annoyance is that it doesn't like to kickstart when warm. I often end up pushing pushing it and it starts right up.

The GS gets up to about 55 and is a bit slower than my TV175. It's much more torquey than the Lambretta, but doesn't like to rev up. Hopefully a rebuild this winter will give it some more pep.

Here's a shot of the my GS in the front along with my TV175 and a nice original roundtail GS Mk1.

Locks

I lucked out with the locks on this scooter. It turned out that the steering lock had a key broken off in it. I was able to pull out the key with a bit of work and get replacements made at the local locksmith for only $8. The glovebox locks were more expensive because neither lock had a key, but I was able to pull them both out and leave them for a day at the locksmith. Now the scooter has two sets of new keys for all three locks.