Mike Stewart

My Guzzi's have never used much oil at all. Are you checking the bike after is sits for a few minutes and with the bike standing vertical Mike

Stucchi offers a chin fairing. Check with MG Cycles: http://www.mgcycle.com/bodyparts.html Mike

Velo, I could of not said it better with coffee! You are spot on! Mike

Carl, Can't you take the VIN plate off the old bent frame and install it on your frankenstein frame? I don't think you have to worry about the engine numbers, I don't think they match the frame number. Look at all of the warrantee cases being replaced. But if you still want the frame and matching pink, we can talk about it in a week or so when I get the bike back. Mike

The vibration could be from the throttle bodys being out of sync. Once adjusted, the vibration is just soothing pulses. With mileage, the bike becomes smoother too. The worst vibrations are usually about 3500 to 4000 rpm. Have fun with your new bike! Mike

Richard, I may have one in a week or so away. I am thinking about parting out my 00 V11 Sport after the trans recall is done. I should have the bike back next weekend if everything goes right. I just have too many bikes right now and with the addition of the Ghezzi-Brian, one has to go. I am planning to part out the bike and keep the engine and trans for possible updates to the Ghezzi-Brian. Mike

Here is a V11 Sport painted like a 750s, 1000S. I do have a stock 1000s tank and 750s tank if you need any pictures of how the stripes are layed out. Hum, I also have a Lemans I and II tank also What I like about the stripes on the 750 and 1000S is that they line up with the valve covers pretty well. Mike

Come on Guys, let's keep it in the Guzzi contents! Mike

Ratchethack, Last year I took the scenic way home on the way back from Iowa to the Bay Area California. I was riding a Jackal two up, fully loaded and had a wild hair to take Old Route 66 from I 10 to 29 Palms in July. At 9 AM it was 110 degrees . (not the brightest thing I have ever done in my life) We were in full leathers (I had my Bates boots on) and the heat was OK. I guess I was lucky to be on a Guzzi because it never missed a beat. Now I know why the small towns are deserted, there is nothing out there I guess what I am trying to say is, it was so hot, I did not feel any discomfort in my feet. Mike

Hal, Do you mean like the 1000S? Mike

Welcome aboard to riding again and Guzzi's , I always wanted a Guzzi eversince I saw a used cafed 850T in 1989. I just had purchased a K75S and then went back two weeks later to purchase the Guzzi but it had been sold. Years later, 2001 to be exact, I was at the BMW shop buying a bike cover for my R1100RSL and I saw the Green 2000 V11 Sport in the parts department. I was in lust once again and I ended up purchasing my first Guzzi. I remember my wife asking "did you test ride the Guzzi" and "then how do you know you will like it"? I answered no, the bike is not preped yet. So, my first ride was after the deal was done. I havn't looked back and now I have no Beemers and 4 Guzzi's. Watch out, they are addicting . Mike

I purchased a 750 S3 tank two months ago for my Jackal to a 750S conversion. Really hard to find parts like this in the states, I purchased this one from Germany. Something about the older bike lines and styling that Moto Guzzi still adds to their newer bikes. I guess thats why we are here on this web site! The Italian charm Mike

OK, Here is another shot: http://www.newenough.com/sidi_vertebra_2_air_page.htm A vented boot! Mike

I have been using the Bates boots since 1989. They are tight at first but once broken in you can wear them all day long. My first pair lasted 10 years, had be resoled twice, had the zippers replaced once. My 2nd pair has gone 4 years and now needs to be resoled. I wanted a replacement boot that has more ankle protection so I just ordered a pair of Sidi Strada Tepor Evo boots for the street and the Sidi Vertigo boots for the track. Check out: http://www.newenough.com/index2.htm Good luck, Mike

All, My insurance rates have actually been going down, is my accidentless record or my age . I have full coverage on all my bikes but..... I have been looking for insurance for my newly Ghezzi- Brian. I can only get liability insurance so far. The problem I am running into is that the bike does not have a 18 digit VIN and with out this the bike is looked at as a special construction bike. What does the Harley crowd do when they use a custom frame? Anyone have any ideas or where to go for full coverage? Mike with just liability insurance

Has anyone tried to remove the blistered paint from the engine. I recall RacerX used paint striper and then hit it with a high pressure water hose. I think the black paint under the blistered paint was uneffected. Anyone else try anything? Mike

Al, I pulled the owners manuels out to my bikes, my 00 V11 Sport came with 9.3 to 1 compression. My 03 Rosso Corsa came with a 9.8 to 1 compression ratio. I would say if your bike has the front crossover, then, it should have the slightly higher compression pistons. My 03 Rosso does have more low end torque than my 00 Sport. This could be from the front crossover and perhaps the half point higher in compression. Dyno results differ day to day and if you want high horse power readings on paper then have you bike dynoed on a cool day by the ocean at sea level. Air temps, humidity and elevation can change reading, or I should say, make your bike produce more horsepower. But most of you guys knew that by having your bike run really good on those damp mornings Mike

Joe, I was going to pull my transmission sidecover off and machine a larger pin to fix the oil leak and hopefully make the trans have fewer false neutrals. BUT after seeing the problem you had, I think I will get one from Guzzi even though it may take many months Mike

Good luck, Mike

Have the recall done. My 00 V11 Sport was at the shop for a transmission leak repair and they added dye to the transmission and took the bike out for a test ride so they could check the leak with a black light. Well, the trans locked up on the tech while out on a road test. Lucky he was going slow. The bike had to be trailered back. 3rd gear broke apart in three pieces and then wiped out all the other gears (in the shop for 6 months, Guzzi wanted the trans repaired and not replaced). This was before the recall came out and I am sure this is why there is a recall today. If you are traveling at speed and the trans comes apart internally, there is a great chance that the rear wheel will lock up and depending what you are doing at the time, chances are that you are going down. Pulling in the clutch will not do anything if the trans locks up. Just my thoughts, Mike

Just found this on the MPH site: Following is Mike Haven's article from the MGNOC Newsletter on Injection Set-Up for all Guzzis. Tuning the Guzzi EFI This system is an open loop type. It uses air and cylinder head temperature sensors. These are NTC, negative temperature coefficient. As they heat up the resistance goes down. The electronic control unit (ECU) is the brains of the outfit. I t sends a low current voltage signal to these temp sensors where it is “grounded” to a varying amount based on the temp. The throttle position sensor works in a similar way. More throttle angle, more voltage. The signal from ECU to these sensors is known as reference voltage. About 5 volts open circuit. The camshaft position sensor is an inductive type. It counts the teeth so the ECU knows where the pistons are in their stroke and the engine speed. So the ECU knows speed, load and temperature of air and engine. The big three. But not exactly how much air. So all this info goes into the ECU. It decides in an instant how much fuel to inject on the next cycle. Both injectors get the same signal. The amount of fuel is governed by the time the injector is turned on or open. This is the “pulsewidth”. .It's measured in milliseconds. Around 3 ms is normal idle pulsewidth. It is much more under heavy acceleration. In theory this is all great. These systems have had problems on bikes ,and not just Guzzi’s. Mainly because of cost or space limitations, there have been no provisions for measuring the actual induced air. It’s a calculated model at some elevation .A real air mass meter with oxygen sensor closed loop control would make for a bike that runs perfect.Not likely to happen. So lets make the most of what we have to work with. Any maladjustments can turn a great running bike into a sputtering pig. These are much more sensitive than carbed bikes. To start the setup you will need a very accurate way to balance the throttle butterflies. I have used mercury sticks, but really have been impressed with the convenience and precision of the Twin Max electronic balancer. Access to an exhaust gas analyzer is a boon. There are brass bypass screws on the TB’s. Turn them in counting the turns until closed. Write it down. Connect your balance meter/carb sticks and start bike. Ignore the fact that it runs worse than it did. The TB must be adjusted to a very fine degree of balance .Most models its done with a plastic thumbwheel under the left side TB. The most important part of the synch is to do it at 3000 rpm .This is where the engine moving some air. Hold throttle steady. Don’t worry about what it does at idle right now. After the synch is as good as you can get it, you can see if the base position of the throttle plates is close at idle. Disconnect the linkage from left to right for this step on 4 valves .There are stop screws under the TB if this needs adjustment. Then check the balance at just off idle. Set the bypass screws to the specs first. If out of balance adjust the brass air bypass screws. There are new specs for the air screws and TPS. See chart. The point here is to insure that both cylinders are getting the exact same amount of air. Because they are going to get the same amount of fuel ,whether its right or wrong. Since there is no provision in the system to measure the actual induced air the system is dependent on this basic fact. At the CO specs MGNA and EPA agree on it is not really set too lean to run right. If there is not air induced that is not part of the original equation. After all this balancing act is done you should have a fairly decent running bike. The next step is to check the idle CO. (Carbon Monoxide)This step requires the gas analyzer. It is adjusted by a screw on or in the control unit up until the 15m system. 99/up.These require a PC and the Marelli software to do the screw turning electronically. Richening up the bike get rid of flat spots or running faults is rarely the answer. The screw or PC only has effect at idle and just above. See specs chart for your model. The above applies to all but the Quota ES. Poor old Quota, it got a bad rap because of the fact that most of them run bad as delivered. This is again due to an air imbalance. Not a lean condition. Fixing it is a little more work but it can transform a bike from insufferable to quite nice in a short time. The unique( to MG ) single throttle is actually another automotive part. It looks like the base plate of a Weber 2 barrel carb. The butterflies are geared to each other by a pair of arc gears. One of these has a screw that holds it in relation to the shaft that it turns. This is the one for the left side. The TPS is on the shaft for the right side. See where the problem lies? The Weber factory claims that these are set on a flow bench and are perfect. NOT. The earlier method of providing a “balance “ was with the bypass screw on the right side of the TB. It should be closed lightly and never be opened again. Ever. Now the fun starts. Gain access to the screw on the front of the left side gear. A 7 mm socket on a flexible handle will get to it. Then connect balance meter and run bike at 3000 rpm. The more precision you can muster ,the better your bike will run. Perfection is acceptable. After this the idle should be in balance on its own. If not , tough. Leave the bypass screw alone closed. Set TPS and CO. A note on TPS. There are many methods floating around. The specs provided are intended to be used on a bike that has all throttle linkage in place,at idle. Live running measurement. Bad Gas mileage on cold days I have had complaints of bikes that give very poor gas mileage when its cold 40 F and below. I haven’t tested it yet but I think that because of the limitations on temperature control inherent in air cooled motors that this is something the designers just didn’t deal with. Since there is no thermostat to regulate the temp, the fins are designed to keep the engine temp in control under normal, for motorcycling, air temps. The EFI air temp signal has a very minor effect on the overall pulsewidth. Bosch says 5% of the input control is air temp.So the engine temp sensor is telling the ECU that its still cold and needs the additional fuel. Thus the poor mileage when riding in cold temps and back to normal when it warms up again. I have heard of swings of lows 30's to low 50's on the same bike , same conditions , different days. So I am developing a way to have a false warm engine reading available to switch on when the bike is ridden on cold days. Should be ready for beta tests soon. Volunteers? Mike Haven - mphcycles@sbcglobal.net http://www.mphcycles.com 16510 Park Row Houston Texas 77084 (281) 579-8885 - (281) 579-9035 (Fax) And here are some TPS specs from the MPH cycles site: DEGREES VOLTS 2002 California Stone 3.4 0.501 3.6 0.524 Anything below 4 degrees open ECU considers bike to be at idle (as seen by 'flag' on diagnostic program) 3.9 0.567 Anything above 80.5 degrees open ECU considers bike to be at WOT (as seen by 'flag' on diagnostic program) 4.1 0.579 No diff in voltage noticed when bike was running 4.8 0.657 bike idles at 1175 rpm, 3.6 degrees throttle opening, -5 fuel trim 5.9 0.773 bike runs real damn good 6.5 0.836 8.5 1.055 9.1 1.121 10.4 1.258 11.7 1.392 12.2 1.438 13.7 1.609 15 1.743 15.7 1.812 16.3 1.874 17.2 1.964 18.7 2.12 19.4 2.2 21.8 2.46 22.9 2.57 24.7 2.77 26.2 2.93 27.7 3.08 29.7 3.3 31.7 3.38 33.8 3.45 35.2 3.47 36.6 3.51 38 3.56 39.4 3.6 41.5 3.66 45 3.76 47.1 3.81 49.9 3.9 Centauro Chart 53.4 55.6 57.7 61.2 64 67.5 69.6 72.4 74.5 77.3 79.5 80.9 83.7 84.4 4 4.05 4.11 4.2 4.28 4.37 4.44 4.52 4.58 4.66 4.71 4.75 4.84 4.86 1.7 0.311 2.1 0.365 2.5 0.408 3.6 0.515 5 0.67 10 1.203 20.1 2.296 40.1 3.59 82.3 4.76 So it looks like the voltage should be aprox. .5 volts or just a little more with the bike running at idle with the fast idle lever off. Mike

OK, A few years ago, 2001 to be exact, I was fighting the stalling coming to a stop sydrome. TPS adjustment, throttle sync., valve adjustment, larger valve adjustment and the problem went away. I used the FIM Unimap way to adjust my tps as follows: "We use the following sequence to correctly align all parts of the induction system. This sequence is essentially the same as the factory recommended sequence: Set the Throttle Position Sensor on the throttle shaft. To correctly do this you must: Completely back off the idle stop screws on both throttle bodies. Use the Mathesis tester or a Digital MilliVoltMeter to read the throttle sensor voltage. To do this you should tap the butterfly with your finger to ensure that the butterfly is completely closed against the body. Then you turn on the ignition and measure the voltage on the throttle sensor: P7 or P8 ECU: Pins 11 and 17. 1.6M ECU: Pins 16 and 30. 1.5M ECU: Pins 22 and 11. If the sensor does not read 150mV Plus or Minus 2mV then you need to adjust it: Slacken the lock screws on the throttle sensor using a screwdriver or 7mm socket. Carefully move the sensor whilst reading the voltage. Retighten the lock screws a little at a time, each time reading the voltage and adjusting the sensor. Note that you should probaly overshoot the reading by about 5mV on slack screws, because when you tighten them the reading will change by about 5mV. Repeat until perfect. This takes a lot of practice. The factory manuals specify +/- 5mV but we feel that this is not accurate enough. many owners will attest to the difference in performance when the sensor is set perfectly. Re-set the throttle stop screw (or screws) so that the engine idles at around 1200 rpm. This is not a final setting for the stop screws, merely a step in the procedure. Typically this will produce a voltage of around 300mV on the TPS. This value is completely arbitrary and is not important. Many people misunderstand the factory manual in this regard and will try resetting the TPS until they get 1200 rpm idle and exactly 300mV on the sensor. THIS IS WRONG !!!. The actual voltage on the sensor at idle is irrelevant to correct sensor positioning on the throttle shaft. Trust Me !! Synchronise the Butterflies: Close the airbleed screws completely by adjusting CLOCKWISE. If you don't do this then the throttle vacuum will still reflect any air passing through the bleed channels and the butterflies will not be perfectly synched. Attach vacuum guages to the manifold port on each cylinder and run the engine. Adjust the throttle butterfly link shaft until vacuum is identical. Rev the engine and confirm that vacuum tracks on both cylinders throughout the throttle and RPM range. Re-adjust the link shaft until satisfactory results are obtained. Do Not adjust the throttle link shaft after this point.!! Set the IDLE Balance by adjusting the airbleed screws counterclockwise and confirming that the vacuum is identical for both cylinders at idle. You can rev the engine and observe vacuum tracking through the rev range, and then observe idle vacuum restabilising. NOTE Since the airbleeds are designed to iron out any irregularities in the throttle's function, by their nature there is no default setting, unlike the idle screws on a carburettor. If anything the default setting is fully closed. Airbleeds can also be balanced using a 2 channel CO meter. In this case, just adjust the bleeds until both cylinders have the same CO. Adjust the IDLE Mixture. Finally you get to set the CO Trimmer ! This will affect both cylinders by the same amount, so you need to set the airbleeds first. A typical CO figure for idle is 4% to 6%, but automotive regulations usually specify a CO of under 1% to meet emmissions standards. A V-twin will idle very poorly if the CO is set below 1%, so if you are really bothered try a setting of about 3%. Note that you may need to finesse the airbleeds at this stage. Adjust the IDLE RPM. Set the idle rpm at the manufacturer's figure (usually 1100 - 1200 rpm) by adjusting the throttle butterfly stop screw (or screws). We recommend 1200 rpm for Ducatis and Guzzis, possibly 1500 rpm for Ducati 996SPS models. Finally, note that the last three steps are usually repeated until an acceptable balance of Idle Balance, Idle Mixture, and Idle RPM are obtained. This is normal. Do Not adjust the throttle synchronisation link shaft once it is set in the early stages. If you do this now, you will need to go through the entire sequence again. So hopefully you will have an engine which now idles, accelerates, and delivers full power faultlessly. Again, if you are not confident about all of these steps, then we suggest you use a dealer who has the skills and equipment. It is not worth adjusting the CO trimmer unless the entire sequence is followed without skipping any steps. OK, my 00 V11 Sport now reads .298 MV. with the throttles closed (runs great) while my other bikes are at .463 MV and .643 MV (also run great). I have not adjusted the TPS on my other bikes or even checked the voltage till now. What I am getting at is to use a powercommander map made by a tuning center, the map adjustment is very critical. Your TPS voltage needs to be as close as possible to the original bike the tuning center made the map for on the dyno. It also seems that most bikes have a stock voltage of .5 MV or more. And as a last note, I read somewhere that the timing is also controled by the TPS . So what voltage does your bike have? Sorry to make you all think, Mike

Jason, I would leave the fairing on, you will need all the wind protection you can get with the higher bars. You have been riding a long time, so I do not think you will misjudge any turns (this is where age comes into play, I have scared myself plenty of times when I was younger and now I know my limits). Have fun, stay loose, breath in, breath out, be smooooooth. Mike

Steve, Time for a new bevel drive. The older ones had the problem of the end cap coming off and spitting out the gear. I think the newer ones have the cap staked in better. I had to wait for months for a new bevel drive two years ago and after the drive was replaced, the speedo went out . Try MPH for a replacement drive, I bet they have them in stock. Mike

Only with one eye Mike