Day by Day cartoon

Thursday, August 18, 2005

Rabbit Motorscooters

A few days ago I was talking to an buddy on the phone and we got to discussing motorscooters. Imagine that... Anyway, he asked me what I knew about Rabbit motorscooters and I had to admit that I had never heard of a scooter called Rabbit. He said it was more luxurious than Vespas of the same age and he was familiar because someone he knew had owned one years ago.

Well, my friend was right. There was a Rabbit motorscooter, made by Fuji Heavy Industries after World War 2. They were imported into the US beginning in 1957, in a number of different models. And unique to Rabbit for the time, was an automatic, continuously variable transmission. Unlike today's belt drive CVTs, the Rabbit's transmission required automatic transmission fluid to operate.

I'm still certain that I've never seen one of these scooters. But now, I'm sure willing to look for one!

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