DMV is a bad word to people who collect antique motor vehicles. When I find an old motor scooter in a barn or a shed, it usually has no title, no registration, and no paint. With no paint, serial numbers are often not visible. There is no hope of getting it registered in that condition, so it has to be restored. Sometimes, if you're lucky, you find a serial number during restoration.

OK, now it looks good, so you take it to DMV and they take one look and say, "No turn signals."

You explain that it is 50 years old and that turn signals were not required in those days. They can't hear you. Some collectors will knuckle under and jury rig some kind of turn signals. This makes it no longer restored "as original," so you can't enter it in a show, unless you want to put it in a custom class. You might go through the same routine with "no brake lights."

I have heard people in other states say that they can't get a license to drive a scooter because the rider and the scooter have to pass tests designed for motorcycles.

DMV's do not believe that motor scooters exist. They have two wheels so they *must* be motorcycles. A few states allow you to register a moped, but the engine size limit is usually 50 cc's, and real scooters, especially vintage scooters, almost always have more displacement than that.

No one is allowed to work at a DMV if they are able to convert cubic centimeters to cubic inches, or visa versa. You have to do it for them. As a result, they get lied to a lot, but they never know the difference.

You could get a lawyer to look up the laws governing the registration of older vehicles, but this is just a hobby, so you can't really afford to do that. The truth is that most states have "grandfather clauses" in their laws that say vehicle must conform to the laws as they were at the time of manufacture. In most states, in the 40's and 50's, scooters were not required to have many of the features required today. But DMV's continue to expect turn signals, brake lights, side reflectors, two wheel brakes, etc. on scooters that were made in the WWII era.
Howard