Craig

Plan C is to fit a speed sensor to the wheels, I just want the extra resolution at low speeds you get by coming off the transmission.

I found a right angle drive on eBay that should obviate the need for heroics with the electrical side. It has the same 7/8-18 threads as the GM sende so I still need to machine an adapter. Plan B is to modify the speedo cable to drive the new sender.

My ITI odometer gears stripped out and I can't find any way of repairing it. I would like to keep the bike somewhat saleable, which means replacing with a bike speedo won't cut it. The plan is to use VDO 80mm Speedo and Tach. The instruments should fit in the gauge cluster without too much persuasion. The trick will be to interface a hall effect drive to the bike. The first attempt will be a GM Hall effect drive available from many places. In this case eBay $20 shipped. The first problem is to adapt the threads. The GM sender is a female 7/8-18" thread, which is very unusual. Luckily I have a lathe and a modicum of machining skill, so I will machine an adapter. The bigger problem will be fitting the sender and associated wiring beneath the throttle linkage. There is very little room as this picture shows: When the throttle is wide open the fitting only clears the top of the sender by 1mm or so. Once I have the adapter machined I will cut down the skirt around the connector pins and solder leads directly. This will allow me to increase the clearance by 10mm which should be plenty. I will put a weather pack connector closer to the meter to allow for disconnection later. This has been done on a different model of Guzzi, and was documented here. Luckily for him his speedo drive was further aft and only interfered with non-moving parts.

The Veglias, apparently, aren't that much more reliable than the ITI's.

I ordered the VDO Viewline Onyx Speedo and Tach from them yesterday (I have used them several times in the past with good experiences). I considered using a 3.125" (80MM is what the originals are) speedo, but there was no 3.125" tach with an 8K range. So I went with the 3-3/8 with LCD displays, so I will get a clock too!. I will have to ditch the rubber gasket between the rear plastic gauge cover and the gauge ring. I am going to adapt a GM speedo sensor to the transmission. It will take a few weeks to clear my schedule to do the work, but I will take detailed pictures with what I come up with. Tonight I need to pull the speedo cable and measure the threads. I am hoping I can machine a thread adapter between the MG metric thread and the 7/8"-16 thread the GM sender has. If not I sense a JB weld solution coming on.

This thread at Guzzi Tech indicates the Acewell isn't compatible with the VDO.

I am going to adapt some 3-3/8" VDO gauges. I like the bike and I don't want to ghetto it. I have plenty of fabrication expertise. When I fix it I want it to stay fixed, and salable. I will keep detailed notes and post them on my BLOG. I kind of don't feel like something is mine until I have done serious work on it, so this might just what the doctor ordered.

Did you talk them into working on yours? They told me they wouldn't touch our Veglia knockoffs due to multiple problems getting them right. They did a great job on my slash 5 speedo, though. They did refer me to a guy I think the name was North Hollywood Speedo who said "I dunno, send it in and we'll take a look". Haven't gotten round to that yet. Just heard back from them that they can't get repair parts. I am looking at doing a real gauge replacement with an Autometer or VDO.

My Ballabio odometer/trip meter gears stripped last week. Based on a recommendation from the forum I packed up the speedo and shipped it off to Palo Alto Speedometer. Today Hartmut informed me that he can no longer get the repair parts to fix the ITI odometers. He called around several places in SoCAL and cannot find the parts. He is returning my speedo to me. Any ideas on what to replace this with? I really don't want to run around with no indication of miles on the tank. This was on Guzzi Tech some time ago.

When mine broke I had to disassemble the speedometer to get the broken bits off. After seeing how crappy the stock knob is, I decided to make my own. No troubles since. Beautiful work. When my speedo gets back from Palo Alto maybe I'll make one myself. I haven't had a good excuse to use my lathe in a while.

Just in case there is a difference my Speedo is the black face ITI model.

I just did this. There is a very small phillips head screw that keeps the reset knob from pulling off. It is normal thread. Insert a jewelers screwdrive in and remove the screw.

Perfect, thanks. I am always willing to pay for good work. Especially when I can't do it myself, which appears to be the case since I can't find internal parts listed for this device.

Riding in to work this morning, I noticed the ODO and Trip meter both failed on my 04 Ballabio (9200miles). Speedo works fine. Searches indicate I have stripped plastic gears in the speedo. I couldn't find any mention of a repair, it looks like I have to replace. Where is a good source for parts in the US? I looked at mgcycle.com but they didn't list the part.

My bike's name is Gretchen, and I really thought her previous owner was going to cry when I left. Seriously, he was really emotional about it. After a few hundred miles on her I can understand why.

I am a bit concerned about the mileage but since most of the riding I have done has been at 100F+ I am going to wait until it is cooled down. This bike has a PCIII USB and Mistral silencers. I am not sure of the tune. My avatar is a Brunton SuperStalker that I built a while back. If you are interested there is lots of info on my wordpress page: enderw88.wordpress.com

My recently purchased 04 Ballabio runs beautifully. The only "problems" I want to deal with soon are the malfunctioning high beam indicator light and low fuel level indicator. I recently filled up at 126 US miles and put in 3.749 US Gallons. I think I should have seen a low fuel light. So, either the bulb is burnt out or there is another problem. Is their a "lamp check" method that tests the bulb circuit, or do I need to pull the lamps and check them the old fashioned way? I don't generally worry about low fuel lights and use the ODO. But this is only my second fillup I am trying to not to experiment on running out of fuel. Is the low fuel light a known weakness on the bike? Likewise for the high beam indicator lamp.

That's Perfect!

New guy in Arizona. I purchased a 2004 Ballabio a few weeks ago and I finally got around to taking pictures. Previous Owner named her "Gretchen" and it seems to fit. She has PCIII with M4 CF exhaust and is extraordinarily clean with only 9100 miles. I have noticed the oil pressure light come on a few times under heavy acceleration so bought a Roper Plate off the classifieds over at Wild Guzzi. I need to preventatively replace relays and figure out why the low fuel light and high beam indicators won't work. I started out looking for a Triumph Street Triple, but when I saw this and rode it I had to have it... I am not so wild about the color and may respray to a blue ('Azurro' has a nice ring to it in place of Ballabio). Has MG ever sold a blue bike?