Twenty years back, when girls wanted to ride around the town, they'd always want to own a TVS Scooty. Two decades later, the scenario remains the same as Scooty is still the widely preferred brand of scooters among the youth. Over the course of time, the Scooty has received minor styling changes and has added flashy tones to its colour schemes to keep up with the times. But the Scooty Zest is something that is far beyond the usual variants.
The Scooty Zest 110 is bigger and more powerful than any other Scooty model ever launched till date. The Zest is a culmination of TVS's ceaseless efforts to create a solid product in the increasingly important scooter segment.
Design and Build Quality
The Scooty Zest 110 is targeted towards the fairer sex and reminds you of the Pep+ in the first glance. The zest gets a restyled headlight which looks almost similar but a comparatively bigger version as to that of the Pep+. The unique feature of this design is that, it lights up the left section of the road a bit more. According to TVS, this feature is useful to make casual walkers swerving in and out on the road fringes more visible in the night. The dual tone apron houses the front number plate and stylish blinkers with sharp lines flowing around them in the form of decals. A triangular piano black insert on the front apron houses the TVS emblem. The Zest gets stylish leaf-shaped body coloured mirrors and the switchgear is housed on a smooth, painted panel. Below the instrument console, the Scooty Zest features an open glove box, with enough space to hold a big one-litre bottle and more space for other items.
The Scooty Zest looks striking in profile with its big, boomerang shaped rear blinkers extending onto the side panels. The side panel itself is gracefully styled with an uplifted, backward tapering side panel. The panel under the floorboard is also body coloured and looks nice with mild designs. The foot-pegs are neatly housed in a body coloured recess. The Zest has a unique, sporty and yet curvaceous stance in profile, which would be appealing to the ladies. But that doesn't mean that men have to detest these curvy machine.
The Zest also gets a textured floor board for a better grip and a double stitched seat. The scooter sports an LED tail lamp at the rear, but the styling out back may raise a few unimpressed eyebrows.
The Scooty Zest gets its fuel filler under the seat unlike the Wego and Jupiter. The understorage volume stands at 19 litres, which is pretty huge for a compact scooter and can house a full face medium sized helmet.
The switchgear quality is top notch and the buttons feel built to last. The speedometer is backlit and gets the power and economy mode indicators. The handle grips are made of soft and high quality rubber which will be favoured by the female riders. The centre stand is the TVS patented EaZy centre stand which requires minimal effort from the rider. There is also a brake lever clip to prevent the scooter from rolling away when parked on inclined surfaces. With a light kerb weight of 97 kg, putting the Zest on the centre stand will be a cakewalk for the ladies. Fuel tank capacity is 5 liters which, though not too much, is par with the segment and will translate into roughly around 250+ kilometres on a tank full of gasoline.
Engine and Performance
The Scooty Zest 110 is powered by the same 109.7cc, single-cylinder, air-cooled, carburetted engine that we see in the Wego and Jupiter scooters. On the road, the CVTi automatic transmission puts out all of the 7.9bhp and 8.7Nm in a very smooth and refined manner. Fire up the Zest and the motor idles in a smooth way. The motor is refined and a light twist of your right wrist takes you off the mark without any lethargy. TVS claims the Zest 110 sprints to 60 kmph from standstill in about 11 seconds. That's a quick time for a scooter in this segment. With a kerb weight of 97 kg, the Zest feels fast off the mark. The engine is refined even at 60 kmph and the scooter touched a speedometer indicated top speed of 85 kmph on the straight section of the track. TVS has been providing the power and economy mode indicators on its products, which it calls Econometer, and the Scooty Zest 110 gets one too. Up to speeds of 50 kmph, the economy mode light remains on. As soon as you wring the throttle further, the power mode light turns on. Also, the scooter gets a long idling indicator which urges you to switch off the ignition on those long traffic signals.
Handling and Braking
The Zest 110 employs a 100-profile front tyre and a 90-profile rear, while both are 90-section tyres on 10-inch rims. The choice of rubber provides good grip on all kinds of surfaces, while the suspension setup keeps bumps and undulations at bay in a very pleasant manner. What gives the Zest proper stopping power is the 110mm drum up front and a bigger 130mm drum at the rear. TVS says that this setup provides optimum braking performance considering the weight transfer which happens during braking. Under hard braking, the front doesn't lock easily and is confidence inspiring. The rear will lock but has sufficient bite and stops you in a straight line without any drama. All in all, the zest has a very good handling and braking performance.
Ergonomics
With a seat height of 760mm, the average Indian woman (height-wise) would find this scooter quite easy to ride. All the switches fall to hand with only the issue of the parking brake, which requires a large hand to operate. The operation of the throttle requires minimal effort and the big speedometer console with its white background is easy to read.
Putting the scooter on its centre-stand is effortless due to the EaZy centre-stand, as mentioned earlier. The textured floorboard is spacious enough to accommodate the long legs of a 6ft person. The scooter gets an auto choke feature for easy starts. The seat is wide and long enough to provide comfort even during long journeys.
Verdict
The Scooty Zest is a well-engineered, well-finished product that functions in a sound manner and is quite efficient enough. Great styling, fantastic build quality, light weight and easy to ride character make the zest a compelling choice for the gentler gender. However, the black coloured version can very well pass as a unisex scooter for the youngsters.
The scooty Zest is one hell of a value package in its avatar. Do give this one a thought, if you value you are a person who wouldn't compromise on the money-quality ratio.
Technical Specifications
| Engine Displacement: | 109.7cc |
| Engine: | Single cylinder CVTi air cooled |
| Power: | 8PS at 7500rpm |
| Torque: | 8.7Nm at 5500 rpm |
| Ignition System: | Digital IDI ignition |
| Wheelbase: | 1250mm |
| Length x Width x Height: | 1770mm x 660mm x 1139mm |
| Fuel tank capacity: | 5 litres |
| Kerb weight: | 97kg |
| Under seat storage: | 19 litres |
| Turning circle radius: | 1910mm |
Best Scooters Under 1 lakh in India
Suddenly engine stop automatically in traffic.
No mileage in 40kmph speed also hardly 45kmpl.
Back tyre lot of vibrations on riding mode.
Totally i fedup this bike useless.
but after ride this 300 km I got complaints from engine.The casing of engine near rear wheel is cracked . And I give the complained at show room but they did not take my complaints deeply asked me to go again after 15 days.