Vespa Once Made a Go-Fast Scooter Shaped Like a WWII Bomb

Vespas away!

01:05

Jonathon Klein

By: Jonathon Klein

Jul 8, at 8:33am ET

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The '50s were a time for design, folks. Hot off the big Dub Dub Dos—that's World War II for those who don't listen to the excellent Behind the Bastards history podcast—the sky was the limit, as the world entered the nuclear and space ages, and military surplus was just everywhere, making it incredibly easy for designers to repurpose weapons of war, or their designs, to do whatever they wanted.

The result was vehicles that looked like they were either ready to raze Berlin or could take Neil Armstrong to the moon—oftentimes blending the two, too. Think belly tankers that once roamed the Mojave and Salt Flats with rumbling V8s and little to no passenger protection.

One such machine of such ilk I didn't even know existed until I was reading stories from friends around the web, and came from a rather unexpected source: i.e., scooter extraordinaires, Vespa. Y'all ever see the 1951 Vespa Siluro?

Brought back to the forefront of the internet's consciousness by our friends over at Jalopnik (Hi, Lalita!), the Vespa Siluro—torpedo in Italian—was an alcohol-powered single-cylinder two-stroke streamliner designed to beat the then-flying kilometer record. As for which alcohol powered the Siluro, it was probably race-spec, but in my heart of hearts, I really hope it was something like Grappa.

And it beat the record, nabbing the record with a 20.24-second elapsed time at an average 106 mph. Imagine riding a Vespa at 106 mph? I know that the Siluro was far more streamlined and race-prepped than your average modern Vespa, but still. Add the aluminum skin that was likely just as sharp as your average switchblade, a gas tank full of alcohol, and a rider that was probably running on espresso and cigarettes, and woof, that'd be sketchy.

According to Vespa's own history, "In 1951, Vespa broke its most prestigious record: the flying kilometre. On the 9th of February, between the 10th and the 11th kilometre of the motorway of Rome (near to Ostia) a Vespa engine with two opposed pistons (power: 17.2 hp and 9500 rpm), designed by Corradino D’Ascanio, and led by Dino Mazzoncini, run the flying kilometre with a record time of 21 seconds and 4 cents with is an average speed of 17.1 km/h."

What do you think?

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Oh yeah, I forgot to mention this was all done on a public highway outside of Rome. And you know it wasn't closed to motorists at the time. Vespa just went out and went for it. As you did back in the day.

The whole saga makes me long for the space-age designs of old, though, as today's modern everything just looks...bland by comparison. Sure, they didn't go as fast as today's machines, but they certainly looked cooler and more futuristic than anything we've come up with since.