Front mudguard and more paint musings. An accident?

So I took off the lower bearing race and then slipped the mudguard up off the fork.  As I began to inspect and clean the mudguard more light was shed on the original/not original paint issue.  A secret was also revealed from the scooter's past.  It is like reading mystery novel and clues keep being shared until the story is fully told.

So here is the photo.  So you can get an orientation this is inside the front mudguard looking up at the hole on the top of the mudguard where the fork would come through.

The first thing you can see is a large bare metal circle surrounding the fork hole.  This is where I soaked the piece in a pool of evapo-rust and it cleaned up the rust and the primer down to bare metal.  I did this because I wanted to see clearly what was underneath.

Looking at the 11:00 o'clock position on the hole you can see a small golden triangle sitting inside a grey semi-circle.  This is a braze.  The metal had been "riped" or torn apart in this location and it would appear someone brazed it back together with some brass.  On the outside the damage is barely noticeable so some body work and repaint was done to cover the repair.  It is a pretty good job and not major damage by any stretch of the imagination.  This repair is on the front side of the fork hole opening.  SO in order for this damage to occur the mudguard had to have been shoved back against the fork hard enough to have caused the sheet metal to tear.

Photo #2 reinforces the theory.  On the front edge of the mudguard is another small repair.  You can see below where material was added to bring the mudguard back close to original shape.  It is not perfect and takes very close inspection to detect.  On the outside it is not noticeable unless you have seen the inside.  This is in fact damage from an accident.

A final piece of the puzzle (no picture included) is that the rear non engine side cowl was "stuck" on the frame.  When I say stuck I mean that it did not want to give way and be removed.  As I worked the cowl off the frame I realized the reason it was so resistant was because the 5 or 6 long screws which extend from the frame and through the brackets on the cowl were all bent forward wedging the cowl in place so it did not want to be pulled free.  Not just one of the screws but all of them.  After going back to reinspect them I found they were all bent and nearly the same angle.  So at some point in time the frame came to a sudden stop and that cowl jolted forward bending all of the attachment screws.  I believe that happened in the same crash which caused the from mudguard damage.

Conclusion and thoughts:  OK so we have a front on crash.  That crash had to accomplish 2 things.

1) The front mudguard had to have been impacted (not just the front wheel) damaging the front edge of the mudguard and forcing it back on to the fork and splitting the mudguard against the fork.

2) The front wheel and fork had to have come to a sudden stop causing the frame to stop quickly enough that the left rear cowl jolted forward bending it's attachment screws.

So it was a pretty decent crash and it explains some of the body work and repainting like you see below.  The mudguard, along with part of the legshield and one of the cowls, went from original Ivory (Avorio) to Grey (Grigio)

This also begins to explain why the front fork was removed and, as noted in a previous post, replaced but with no bearings.

The mudguard was never removed.  I do not think the person doing the repair and repaint was able to figure out how to remove the lower bearing race to get the mudguard off.  SO the mudguard was repaired and repainted on the fork (this is reinforced by some grey over spray on the shock spring)

The scooter was never ridden again after this accident and she began to sit and gather rust.  The repaint and rebuild was never completed either due to lack of time, energy or parts.

Was the fork damaged and is it still usable?  That is a very real question which will need to be addressed as time goes on.

Was the engine taken out at this time?  I suspect it was and maybe transplanted to another scooter or left sitting on a shelf.

I am thinking more clues will show themselves as the clean up and tear down continues.