Aprilia Leonardo 250

Why best of all worlds ? Because you get beautiful Italian styling combined with a hugely reliable Yamaha YP250 engine. You also get decent underseat storage, compact dimensions and fun handling with enough power to make riding around town a total blast. Economy is ok if you ride with some restraint, but that's not easy when it goes so well.

Downsides ? Only a couple. 1) No ABS, though the brakes are excellent anyway, and 2) The stock exhaust weighs about a metric ton. Seriously it's so heavy you would think it was actually a solid lump of steel ! First thing to do is ditch it and fit an aftermarket slip-on system. This lowers the unsprung weight significantly and makes the handling even better.

Call me biased but I personally think the Leo 250 is one of the best scooters ever made, and I'll be keeping mine forever. Because finding anything else that hits all the right notes, and is just so fun and practical, is not an easy task.

I bought an Aprilia Leonardo 250 for £1200 with 8400kms on it in july 2009. Ive done about 2500miles

BAD Stuff

I have had a few problems with my leonardo 250, in tends to fowl spark plugs very quickly with carbon and fuel, but I think the idle jet is basically totally Useless as it has never ticked very well, have have thought about replacing the carb, but as its £800 for a new one not likely, perhaps one day I may get it sorted by a tune up shop/mechanic, so I always carry a spare clean plug and and swap it if needs be. Got sterling MC in south east london to look at it the first time it did it and they told me lies and basically charged me £75 quid for a new spark plug!!!. the other thing i had to do was strip the rear brake caliper and polish and check the pistons and check the seals as the back brake jammed on!!! seals fine and with everything cleaned and polished put back together with a new set of brake pads and it's been fine so far.

MPG

The Best mpg I have seen is about 56-58mpg on a long run Im large at 6'2 and about 18stone. Also again this should be better as I ran a Vespa PX 200 for three years and thats was better on fuel than the LEO

Most of riding is in london town and it's really poor on petrol and will have to fill up after 48 miles when the needle goes in to the red but it only takes 6-6.5 litres to top up so 34mpg ish although tank will hold 9.5 litres. which I have got about 110miles (on along run cruise about 60) out of with a litre to spare.

GOOD Bits

Its good on long journeys say 75miles is fine comfy and room to move about, it handles well and I enjoy the subtle handling to the point of decking the main stand out on soom left handers, looks quite modern in a slight racer boy kind of way, the under seat storage is very good, its a tall scoot but thats fine for me, slightly bulky compared to Vespa px 200 but most things are.

It accelerates quite nicely and will hassle most powered two wheelers at the traffic light grand Prix. it tops out at about 75mph although I don't think I run it for to long at that speed.

The starter and electrics are good and have no probs

TIP

I nearly plopped my pants when the oil light came on but, its just the leo saying change my oil, to reset the light turn the ignition on then push and hold the oil reset switch in the battery compartment down for about 5 seconds.

Over all I do enjoy the bike and the ride but there are some design niggles like the rear caliper does get hot due to the exhaust mounting location and parts costs which i think are mad especially as the motor is from Yamaha ie £800 for a carb.

My Leonardo 250 cc was bought new via bankrupt stock in 2003 for £2500 , but is at least 2 years older than this . I bought it to replace a 125cc Yamaha for my final 18months of work before retirement .My commute included some M4 Motorway and for this it was superb .It has been 100% reliable , averages 80mpg , with a best of 86 mpg .I have done 250 miles in a day on it , with nothing more than a stiff neck , but I am 70yrs. old ! I am still on the original Maxxis front tyre at 19000km. but the Golden Boy make rear tyre put on 2 years ago for the MOT is down to 1mm.- very poor wear !I am due to replace it with a Pirelli SL26 which has 9mm. of tread .If used every day it starts first press of the starter , but churns 5 times otherwise . The original battery lasted over 5 years.The seat height at 825mm is rather tall for a 5ft.7in. Pensioner !

The under-seat space is excellent, but it gets warm under there, so don`t put chocolate or sandwiches there without wrapping well !A consideration when buying was the narrow width for my garden access and where I parked it at work in front of my desk !It was excellent on all counts .Another plus was having the Yamaha engine .I have replaced the brake pads once and change the oil every 1500 miles using 5/40 fully synthetic .

I was intending to replace it with a Yamaha X Max 250 .but for the low mileage I now do and the silly prices being charged , I don`t think I`ll bother .

To conclude , it`s an excellent machine . The only snag is a lack of Aprilia dealers here in S .Wales .

An excellent scooter robust but light fast and economical. An excellent scooter for the heavier rider. Excellent accelleration ans speed when required. A well designed and practical scooter and economical costing around £8.00 to fill up.

I love my Aprilia Leonardo 250. I love riding it. Where can I buy a replacement new one? This bike has changed my opinion of Italian manufacturers but not their British distributors.

I have one of these myself, it's a beautiful 150 mojito custom scooter. There are no bad points about it at all.I love the way it handles on the roads, and city. its also a good looking bike and turns a lot of heads as i ride around...

Previously I had a Yamaha Majesty 250, whilst being a reliable machine it's handling never inspired confidence and it was a pain to get through traffic jams. Hence I sold it and got the Leonardo 250.

The Leonardo is a good looking, slimline, short wheelbase machine and the earlier models up to 2002 (which includes mine) are powered by the Yamaha 250 4 stroke engine - in fact the same engine as in my previous Majesty and other 250 scooters. The engines are reliable and easy to service and due to it's ubiquitous nature engine parts should be easy to find - the same may not be true for the Aprilia body parts though they can be found.

In the Leonardo 250, the engine offers plenty of power to get away at the lights or get you out of trouble, it even keeps up with bigger bikes up to about 30-40mph and easily beats most standard cars away.

Speeds up to 85mph are possible with relative ease and therefore it is fast enough to keep up on the motorway and not leave you following behind the lorries. However the small physical size of the Leo means that a you don't have much presence on the roads and drivers assume you're on a 50 or 125 so you have to be much more careful. Motorway riding is a little tiring without a screen, although an aftermarket screen can be fitted would help this

The Leo comes into its own however on twisty back lanes where the excellent chassis offers plenty of fun in cornering. The Leo's handling was a complete revelation to me after the Majesty. I'm guessing it's like the difference between a Honda Goldwing and a CBR900.

The Leo is also fantastic in traffic, and is easy to weave through lanes of gridlocked cars.

It is quite a quiet machine and the seat and riding position is very comfortable. The bike is tall though and shorter riders may have problems touching the ground! The tallness does mean that the bike has decent underseat storage for a scooter of this size. In fact it beats my older model Majesty in this respect although the newer model majesty's have better underseat storage. You can fit a full face helmet under the seat of the Leo and there's still room for either a open face helmet or a bag of bits (eg wet weather gear/ bike chain etc)

All in all a great bike for commuting if the journey doesn't involve too much motorway. My current journey is about 6-7 miles on free-flowing motorway and about 10 miles on gridlocked motorway and town/country roads and the Leo handles it fine!

My Aprilia Leonardo 250 is fast, economical, narrow (i.e. good between lanes of traffic). I can't understand Steve's 35 mpg, unless he's very large. I'm 90kg but I get over 70 mpg on local running and over 60 even at 70-80mph down a motorway.

Starting, particularly in winter, is worrying if it is left for more than a few days. I've only once had to jump-lead mine, but sometimes it only fired as the battery sounded about to give up.

Headlights unimpressive; I find dip more use than full beam, and not much use at that.

MPH scale on the speedo difficult to see. On an earlier 185 Leonardo I had before the 250, the mph scale was in orange and reasonably visible, but some clever-clogs (in marketing?) changed the colour to green for the sake of change but without considering how much less visible green is than orange.

Steve`s Aprilia Leonardo 250 Scooter.

Here is my review on my 250 Leo.

Firstly before this 250 I owned an Aprilia SR125 scooter which I loved but it was very thirsty if ridden fast, 35mpg, dont let anyone tell you 50mpg+ they are not being truthful, also they take a good 90 seconds to warm up and if its raining thats a long time to be going nowhere.

Its also a four stroke so no messing about with 2 stroke oil, I always keep a couple of gallons in my garage in a spare can and top the scooter up at home, every time I go to ASDA in the car I fill up my can, the reason is the filler cap on the Leo is down between your feet under a locked cover and its difficult to see how much is in the tank so fill the car up, fill a couple of gallon containers up and I do it at home, its probably just my way of getting home without having to stop on the way, time is precious my friend. It has a fuel gauge on the dash which is very accurate and also a clock that keeps accurate time which is also very handy.

So I wanted a faster more economical scooter and I certainly got one. I also wanted a scooter that looked like a smaller sporty scooter, I dont like the style of the big Burgmans etc and the Leo seems to be the only one on the market that fits the bill.

I bought the Leo in Dumfries, a round trip of over 350 miles but I wanted it and I couldnt get one closer to Aberdeen. Hired a transit and went and bought it. The scooter has been no trouble to me in the 8 months I have owned it, it was third hand and had a full service history. It is a V plate 1999 so considering its gone through 4 Scottish Winters it is in very good condition still.

It had 9980 Kms on it when I bought it, its now coming up to 13000Kms and I am getting the drive belt changed soon for peace of mind.

The scooter starts on the first push of the button every time as long as its used regularly, if its left for 2 weeks it takes about 10 seconds to fire up but it does start. I would just start it weekly if its going to be left for a long period but I use this regularly even through the Winter months as long as its not too frosty so its been a reliable starter for me. It has a kick start but I have never used it yet.

Within 10 seconds I pull away, its on automatic choke so not running perfect while cold but within 100 yards she is fine.

My first four miles are on a B Country road and the scoot corners well, I drive it quite fast most of the time and I can get it to lean right over to the edge of the tyres and it doesnt even twitch, one thing I noticed on scooters, dont alter your driving position once cornering, they hate it and will twitch badly, just lean in and it wont let you down, yes, even with the wife on the back.

The brakes are brilliant also, they can basically stop you on a sixpence, disk front and rear, pull hard and they are fantastic stoppers. I drive with two fingers hovering over the rear brake as a safety precaution but once you get used to the stopping power they suprise a lot of other drivers.

Now after the B road Im onto a dual carriageway, she pulls up to 75 mph no problem, she tops out at 84 mph at a push, thats indicated on the speedo by the way, anyone who says they can get 90 mph dont believe them. If you are overtaking then be aware that if you are around the 60 mph mark she hasnt got the same acceleration as the 30-55 mph mark. She still corners well at 70 mph on the dual carriageway.

Now Im entering the city, traffic lights everywhere, jams everywhere but the Leo goes through all the gaps to the front of the lights every time, lights change to Green and away we go, it beats 90 - 95% of cars away from the lights, OK some guys in a Golf GTi always have to floor it but I promise you they cant pull away that much and seem pretty embarrassed that the scooter is still up there with them, never mind another set of lights ahead, they are at the back of the queue and I am again at the front, easy.

What else is there to say, fuel consumption, well all through this review I tell you the truth, no exagerations, I drive it hard for the full 10 miles each way and Im getting 63 mpg which I am very pleased with, its nearly doubled the other 125cc.

Insurance costs me £104 Third Party fire and theft. I have two years no claims and Im 48 years old.

Under seat storage is very big, nearly two full face helmets can fit in, probably could at a squeeze, it is also a big comfortable seat, my wife says so anyway.

Its been 100% reliable, never once let me down. It has Bridgestone Hoop tyres fitted which in a recent Twist and Go road test were just about the best tyres you can fit.

I also wear full padded waterproofs with a High Vis waistcoat on, this I recommend, the High Vis jacket is brilliant, get a yellow one because thats the ones the police wear and you do get seen very early, even in daylight.

The lights are very good even on my dark twisty country roads, they light up the road well ahead pretty good.

The speedo is both Kms and Mph but the Kms are the easiest to see which I dont like.

Do I like the Leo, yes I love it to bits, I hate if it I have to go to work in the car now, to me the scooter is first choice every day, I get to lie in bed for an extra 20 minutes every day, my neighbours all set off at 7.00am to work, I set off at 7.30 and still get there early.

So would I recommend this and would I buy it again, I will suprise you now and say no, WHAT I hear you say, cant believe it, well yesterday I bought this months Twistngo mag and guess what, the Leo can now be bought in a 300cc version, its basically identical to mine but a bit faster, 90 mph and its £300 cheaper than the 250cc so I would go for that next time, maybe spring 2005 but if you like the shape of the Leo and you see one second hand, as long as its been looked after then go for it. You won`t be dissapointed.

I will try to post a photo also of my scoot so you can see the style but note, the previous owner chopped the rear mudguard back to make it look a bit sportier, looks good but I now get sprayed on my back so I extended the rear hugger and this does the trick.

Good luck and hope you like my report.

Steve F.