Enthusiasts In Indonesia Are Turning Broken Vespas Into Incredible Mad Max-Like Machines

A silly video is circulating around the internet right now. In it, some guys can be seen mounting and driving compact vehicles best described as absurd. They look like they’ve been taken off of the set of a Mad Max film and they’re so custom that you can’t even figure out what the vehicles started life as. What you’re looking at is what Vespa custom culture in Indonesia looks like. That’s right, a lot of these vehicles started life as a humble Vespa.

The video below was forwarded to me by Autopian readers Andrew and Emely on Instagram. I was hooked from the very beginning. Part of it was the fact that two of these vehicles looked like go-karts with wildly exaggerated ape hangers like they were some kind of alternate universe choppers. But it didn’t stop there, as one of the individuals in the video drove a comically long vehicle with four rear wheels and a single front wheel. The video cuts with a possible six-wheeled creation and a regular scooter taking up the rear of the pack.

There’s just so much going on all at the same time in the short clip that I couldn’t stop watching it on loop. What are these things? Why do they exist? Where is this happening? The video’s description offered no explanation, so I had to find out for myself.

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A Different Kind Of Tuner Culture

The first clue to what was going on was in the description, which states: Silaturahmi lagi di acaranya. Now, this alone isn’t much, but I ran it through a translator and it came back as Indonesian. The statement roughly translates to something about how the person who posted that was part of a convenience store meetup.

But what kind of meetup? The tags help tremendously, telling us about “Vespa Extreme” and “Vespa Extreme Indonesia.” Punch that into a search engine and you’re immediately transported to a whole new world of tuning.

As National Geographic writes, more than 85 percent of Indonesian commuters ride a scooter to their destinations. The country has a tropical climate, and the people out there buy what they can afford. The effect is that the scooter and small-bore motorcycle are more or less their equivalent of Honda Civics and Toyota Camrys.

National Geographic notes that the rise in Indonesian scooter culture began in the 1970s, but the nation was on two wheels before then. For example, in 1962 Honda sold an underbone motorcycle in the region called the Sayur. It had bicycle pedals and a tiny 50cc engine for propulsion.

As 99 Media reports, two-wheel culture changed in Indonesia changed in 1972. That was the year when local company Danmotor Vespa Indonesia began constructing Vespa scooters under license from Piaggio. The Primavera above was one of the first in the country. The Vespa was a hit in Indonesian culture and citizens traded in their old underbone motorcycles for the stylish and sturdy Vespa.

Vespa’s first run in Indonesia lasted nearly three decades. Indonesia was hit hard by the 1997 Asian financial crisis, and the effect was that many could no longer afford a flashy Vespa. As National Geographic notes, scooter prices increased tenfold, locking so many out of being able to buy them new. In 2001, classic Vespa production halted in the country.

You can find an official Vespa presence in Indonesia today, and you can score a basic Vespa LX for the equivalent of $2,766. However, many people cannot afford to buy a new scooter. At the same time, the newest of those old Vespas have now been subjected to 23 years of abuse. What is a person to do? Well, Indonesians are taking the old Vespas and are rebuilding them as new vehicles.

This has spawned an entire modding scene around Vespas called Vespa Extreme. The only real rule of Vespa Extreme is that whatever you create has to use the donor Vespa’s engine. Aside from that, whatever you build is limited only by your skills, imagination, and the parts you find. Bet you’ve never seen a Vespa pirate ship before!

That last bit is the fun part. Builders will make an extreme Vespa out of literally anything solid they can get their hands on. Extreme Vespas have been built out of fallen trees, discarded scrap metal, 55-gallon drums, hordes of tires, and even plastic bottles.

Reportedly, a lot of these builds aren’t street-legal, and the consequence of getting caught is losing your ride. So, some owners of a highly-custom Vespa may not hit the streets until a time when police presence is low.

At first, these were just individual custom builds. However, as National Geographic notes, in about 2003 or so the builders of wild Vespas began gathering and holding meetups. Now, the custom Vespa is a unique part of Indonesian culture capturing creatives both young and old along the way. Social media has helped pave the way for this phenomenon and nowadays it’s not just extreme builds either, but milder Vespa mod builds and just anyone who loves a good Vespa. The Vespa group we’ve featured here is the Balad stank ibliz.

However, as you might have noticed from the above video, it’s not like the clubs are openly inviting people. Apparently, it’s one of those things where you sort of have to know someone who knows.

Vespa culture in Indonesia is such a huge deal nowadays that there are shows with awards for custom builds and it has become a rite of passage to take a Vespa on a long-distance trip across the country.

Scenes like these are part of why I’m working toward getting my passport this summer. This is a kind of culture you won’t see here in America. It’s people taking a necessity and turning it into something to be proud of. Until I figure out how to ride one of these for myself, check out the feature from National Geographic, you’ll love reading it as much as I did.