pete roper

Old Hi-Cam and New Hi Cam are very different beasts. One of the major differences is that the newer engine has a separate cooling circuit fed by a separate pump and that circuit, (Nor the lubrication circuit.) run a thermostat. The lubrication circuit remains very similar to the older 2V motors with the filtered oil being delivered to the main bearings and big ends but from there things change a bit. After the mains the front feed splits and some oil goes to the under piston spray nozzles and the rest goes up the front inner studs to the front cam bearing and cam end rocker pivots. The rear main feed then goes up the rear outer stud and lubricates the outer rocker pivots. Cam lobes and tappets are splash fed from oil spilt into a weir by the cam bearings. The cooling circuit is completely separate. Oil is delivered, unfiltered but pressure regulated to the cooler and thence to the cooling circuits in the head by external hoses. On the 1200's the oil goes directly to the heads. On the 1400's it is delivered to a large gallery in the wall of the cylinder and then flows around large, cast in, galleries in the heads. The 1200 and 1400 cooling systems are completely dissimilar and is one of the reasons building a 1400 motor to put in a 1200 bike is not a task of simply bolting on the bigger cylinders and pistons. It is this lack of thermostat that is the main contributor to the gross over cooling the new 8V's suffer from. In anything other than 30*C+ ambient temperatures it's actually quite difficult to get the oil hot enough to sublime water out of it! At least it is unless you are stuck in traffic or thrashing the bejasus out of it! I can't remember offhand if the Bellagio has an oil cooler but if it does it, along with the other 2V bikes of the period, does have a thermostat. In reality it is unlikely that any big block Guzzi, with the exception of 'Old' Hi-Cams maybe, is going to cook itself in traffic. Let's face it the engine was originally designed to sit idling in summer traffic in Milan with a fat copper sitting on top of it. The cylinders are grotesquely over finned but that doesn't mean getting so hot is good for it and clearances for things like piston to bore and ring to piston have to be a lot sloppier than they would be with acliquid cooled motor. As for the bike Phil referenced? That was an 8V Griso that belonged to a customer who had started the bike and then left it to 'Warm up', truly an unnecessary thing, and claimed he had been 'Distracted', (I think by his missus asking for a length of the 'Veal Dagger!') and by the time he got back to it it had stopped and wouldn't re-start. The tank vent wasn't working and when he opened the tank it blew five litres of fuel over the red hot engine and garage! It was lucky his house didn't go up! When I got it to the workshop and lifted the tank I found that the pressurised tank had swollen so much it had pressed the spigot of the fuel pump against the reservoir cover for the cam chain tensioner on the right hand cylinder and melted it to a blob, it must of been seconds away from bursting when the engine stopped and it only stopped because the phase sensor expired from overheating! If it had burst the engine would of stopped but the pump would of kept running for four seconds! Quite enough to spew enough fuel out onto the superheated engine to cause a calamity! There was a shit-tonne of good luck involved there. The bike was in his garage under his roofline. It could of got very nasty! When I stripped the engine I was actually amazed by how little damage I found! Everything was still within spec! From memory it got rings and a set of valve guide oil seals. That was pretty much it! It's now living in Townsville and continues to run like a freight train. They really are very hard to kill!

Liquid cooling is great! Well past time for it! Just don't say that to the corn cob pipists! They'll have an instant aneurysm and spray you with phlegm and faecal matter as their brains melt!

Nope. It is a completely new design. Gone is any semblance of a familial construction with generational change. The only thing it has in common with the old powerplant is the fact it is a V twin, it's not even a 90* twin I don't think? It'll be running balance shafts or weights of some sort I'm pretty sure. The clutch no longer resides behind the crank and in front of the gearbox, the cylinders are cast into the upper crankcase so it no longer has barrels per se. It utilises double overhead cams and downdraft induction. The list of dis-similarities is almost endless, it bears no resemblance to any previous Guzzi twin. At the end of the day the fact that muppets and dingbats insisted, probably still do, on sticking Cali 1400 motors into Tonti frames with all of the inadequate transmission componentry right through to the back wheel and then throw carburettors on these pieces of munt and can get away with it clearly indicates a familial timeline. With the V100 that lineage is irrevocably severed. if you look at the Hi Cams, both 'Old' and 'New' you will see that the two to one reduction for the cam drive is achieved by simply repurposing what was the camshaft in early motors before running a 1 to 1 drive from the dummy shaft to the camshafts. Even the MGS-01 utilises a truncated version of this drive to allow for stroking of the crank, (And one assumes a minor weight saving?). What the V100 uses I'm not sure but it will either be a single chain to double tooth sprockets on the cams or a 1 to 1 chain to idler shaft with 1/2 speed gearing to the cams. Both systems completely different to anything previously used. Nope. The 'Big Block' as we knew it is gone. Get out your handkerchiefs and wave it off into the sunset of its well earned retirement. The V100 starts a brand new, but much shorter, chapter for Guzzi under the stewardship of Piaggio. I just hope the wait was worth it and the direction they are heading is worth going in.

Bellagio is probably the best 2 valve engine built but the 8V is without a doubt superior in every way apart from fuel economy and perhaps smoothness. Having said that the 1400 motors are ridiculously smooth! While it has been done putting the 8V into the quasi Tonti frame of the Bellagio would be a foolish move. In the same way that some people insist on bolting an old five speed onto the 8V and sticking it in a Tonti frame the simple fact is the frame isn't designed to handle the output of the motor. A decent Bellagio makes about 70RWHP, a V11 makes about 76. An 8V 1200, even with the stock factory mapping which is far too rich at the top end, makes 96 and with a decent map will make 'About 100' with a big boost in torque all the way through the rev range. Once rollerised all the 1200's are effectively the same motor and despite their differences in intake and exhaust designs can all be made to make the same figures or close to. Whether one prefers the Griso, Sport, Norge or Stelvio they are all much of a muchness in terms of performance. In my opinion the 1200 8V was the pinnacle of the engine's development. What machine it's in isn't really an issue. Others will probably choose to differ. I'm not going to argue. Oh, and Chris? Next time you're up take the Green Horror out for a flog. Gearing it down, even a tiny bit, has improved it even more IMO. Even with my gargantuan carcass on it I keep lofting the front wheel unintentionally pulling away from the lights! Not bad for something with the wheelbase of a supertanker with what resembles a hippopotamus riding it!

Errr? No. 1100 Sport and then the V11's use a solid swingarm but the bevelbox itself is free to move on the rear wheel spindle. The CARC bikes use a reactive bridge within a solid casing that moves in relation to swingarm on what are effectively the wheel bearings within the case that support the crownwheel and pinion. With this new swingarm it just seems to be a rigid arm with a bevelbox bolted to the end but there is no tether rod to transfer the torsional forces to the frame of the vehicle meaning that as the pinion tries to climb the crownwheel it will exert an upward force on the arm. That makes the suspension unable to remain compliant and prevents it doing its job. Likewise on downchanges the tendency will be to compress the suspension and unload the rear tyre leading to tyre hop and loss of traction.

Bloody difficult to add a bolt-on reactive drive Chris......

My guess would be shim and bucket as that is the usual Piaggio MO.

VA 10 was 80* I think. While I think this new engine owes little to the VA 10 I could be wrong. Apparently the VA 10 vibrated so badly they could barely keep it on the test bench. That would never fly, not then, not in 2021.

Not seeing any Centy in it. seeing some closer pics there are some nice things from a technological standpoint but it's still butt-ugly. Hopefully they'll do what they did with the CARC bikes and launch the next model that looks prettier in a year or two.

More pictures released. can't be bothered trying to copy them. https://wildguzzi.com/forum/index.php?topic=112212.0 I can't believe they've managed to make something so hideous! The V85 was bad enough. This thing looks like??? I dunno? A grab-bag of every styling disaster from most manufacturers in the last 30 years! What was that awful thing Ducati made? The TL 650? It looks like one of those that's been stuck in a pencil sharpener and sprayed with silage!

I guess I'm luckier than you.....

On the injectors used on V11's and CARC bikes the o-rings are a standard Bosch injector seal. I just buy them from my local *Better* auto parts joint in Canberra. Just take the injector in and brandish it at the parts interpreter. If they gurn vacantly at you and ask "What's it out of!" Try to resist the temptation to bury your index finger down to the third knuckle in their eye socket, thank them, leave, and go and find a real parts shop where they pay decent enough wages that the staff don't spend half of them on clearasil and wet-wipes.

Better.

Your Guzzi has a Differential? Why? Is it a trike?

While I won't be buying one there is a lot to like about the new RE range. I'm a big fan of SOHC motors, especially for road bikes, and I keep hearing good things about the twins although I haven't ridden one. If they put that delightfully simple engine in a more modern chassis I'd really be sitting up and taking notice. As it is, despite my lack of desire to purchase another motorbike I'm severely tempted to purchase a Himalayan to do a lap of Australia on. I'm hearing nothing but good about them from people who don't want to go fast and if I'm doing a lap or figure of 8 around Oz it won't be fast. The price is very hard to go past, they appear reliable, parts are cheap. What's not to like. Like Phil I have much faster and more capable bikes for eating miles or acting the goat on. Something that will plod along at the legal limit and won't have a cow if pointed at some dirt highway while being able to carry one fat bloke and the stuff he needs sounds just about ideal.

Yes.

If you are seriously interested in a 'Special' Daytona I have a friend in the US with a Daytona RS. Like all US RS's it's an 'A' kit bike but in all honesty they are a much happier thing than the 'C' kitted bikes. You also get a variety of improvements with the RS package, broad sump, better pork chops. Anyway I'm pretty sure he'd be willing to sell it to the right parson at the right price. He only ended up with it because it's previous owner sold it to an Australian who only after he'd bought it found he couldn't import it here. So it was bought as a 'Mercy buy'.

Until I see more and better pics I'm not ruling anything in or out. Really need to see some exploded parts diagrams to see what's going on.

Riley also used a Hi-Cam design. It's actually a good, if limited, design.

Yeah, we're locked down solid too. Trez boring.

Get rooted! Actually if you wanted me to make a list of the things that shit me about the 8V we could start with the shitty plastic oil pump gear and move on from there. How about a crank with no sludge trap that they sold as being '30% stronger'? My fat, pimply arse! It was just a way of saving a machining operation. I could rail on for hours but there's no point. It's still a magnificent engine, way better than the 'Old' Hi-Cam but it's not without faults and some of the penny pinching shits me to tears!

Look, Phil, I agree, it offends me as well, but it's the way it is. Us going puce with disgust and rage over it won't change the minds of the scroll beetles at Piaggio. one of the things that shat me off big time with the 8V big block was that they used a pressed in bearing for the front main. If you bugger your front main you're supposed to get a new crankcase! Luckily though the actual case casting retains all the mounting bosses etc. for a replaceable bearing and the depth of the front main and journal/bearing dimensions haven't changed from earlier engines so although it will require a bit of buggering about I'm pretty sure an earlier, replaceable, front main could be fitted. Both case and bearing housing will need machining, (You need to have a gallery in the outer edge of the bearing housing to allow the oil for the under piston sprays to circumvent the bearing housing.) but as long as you get the measurements correct it's entirely doable. It's the reason I still have my original crankcase still. Once I'm retired I'll actually get around to doing it. My bike might even end up with its original engine number back!😆😎

Lots of Piaggio products use a pressed up crank Phil. My Mana has the same set up. I really never give it a moments thought.

How many people wear out a motorbike nowadays? While I too am not fond of the throw away concept the fact is that as long as the components are essentially recyclable it makes a lot of sense. Having just given my Griso a 140,000 km freshen up I see nothing that can't be repaired. Whether it will be possible due to parts availability in 20 years time is another matter but that won't matter to me......

I've had two doses of AZ, no side effects apart from the penis falling off thing but I managed to stick it back on with gaffer tape and blu-tac. It doesn't get much use nowadays anyway. Annoying side effects of the magnetism, I ended up dangling off the diff housing of a Land Cruiser on a hoist by my head at work and they had to pry me off with a crowbar......