Finally got around to cracking open the Vespa’s headlight nacelle to install brackets for the scooter’s new windscreen. It’s another Italian engineering nightmare.

Linda accidentally dropped her bike and broke the Givi windscreen last year, just before we were due to leave for Thunder Bay.  I pulled the screen and she rode 3,300 miles without it, in sunshine and in rain.

For the upcoming New Orleans ride, I ordered her a new screen — a Genuine Vespa Part! — from ScooterWest in San Diego. Now all I have to do is install it.

Things went south quickly when I saw the Givi and Vespa mounting brackets were different.

Both use expanding sleeves that slip inside metal tubes in the Vespa’s headset. Once installed, the Givi brackets can be unbolted from the front with no fuss.

Ah, but the Genuine Vespa Part requires the headlight nacelle be taken apart every time the brackets need to be removed. Another Rube Goldberg triumph.