Back to Moto Guzzi specials

 

A while ago I posted a couple of articles about these great Italian bikes that somehow manage to combine a feel of mechanical brutality with a good degree of refinement and mechanical efficiency. Ok, so put more simply, I should perhaps say that I like the looks of these machines, and still regret having sold my Le Mans Mk 1 years ago.

 

Several custom builders, in Italy, Australia, the USA and Germany (and probably other places too) work on ways of making this apparent paradox both more aesthetically convincing and more potent by lightening the machine up all around and tweaking the mechanical parts. In fact, from the mechanical and dynamic side, it mostly comes down to the old Colin Chapman (of Lotus fame) adage of just "adding lightness".

 

Here are a few pictures to show what I mean. They include quite a few of the machines produced by the excellent Axel Budde, who works in Germany and specializes in Guzzis. In case you were wondering what to offer me for Christmas, this should give you some ideas....

 

This is a special from a Daytona base. Remove the silly pipe-wrap and you have a pretty nice machine.

 

 

A rather more elaborate and futuristic effort from a more recent Guzzi model, the Griso

 

 Now we get down to a series of pictures of machines based on the earlier Le Mans model. The above version is quite close to the machine I owned back in the late 70's/early 80's

 

And the ones below are all by Axel Budde. See what I mean?