Guzzi V7 Sport - finished finally!

[garauld]

Well, after most of this spring and summer tearing apart, refinishing and reassembling, it's finally back together in time for... snow.

At least I can start making racks again...

 

[BkrK12]

She is very, very pretty and she's the color motorcycles are supposed to be.

 

[HotRodZilla]

WOW...That is beautiful. Do you have any "before" pictures?

 

[airboss]

:w00t: nuff said?

 

[garauld]

-yes, here's some before pics. It had been setting in my basement since 1992. It was time to work on it...

btw, I painted it Torch Red. You need sunglasses (cheap ones) to view it in the sun... :huh:

 

[rushes]

Beautiful!

I think you should sell it...

To me.... :thumbsup:

 

[JT 384]

Well done!

 

[kebo123]

Very nice work!

 

[kaitsdad]

Beautiful !! Gary, I'm absolutely gobsmacked !!

And I'm sure you've noticed, but did you see how the cylinders are at a funny angle? Is that correct? Did it fall over, or sumptin?

 

[Checkswrecks]

Very very pretty!

With those drums, what year is it?

 

[wheatonFJR]

WOW.

 

[charismaticmegafauna]

Very very pretty!

Yes, very pretty -- he's to be commended...

With those drums, what year is it?

(if I may intercede...?)

Early '70s.

Look at the front brake -- 4-leading shoe -- actually, twin - double-leading-shoe (about as good as you can get with drum brakes -- if you can get all 4 of the shoes to touch in harmony?).

Guzzi brought-over the first of those, generally, bikes in the late '60s -- I attended a "tech school" at the importer (Berliner, Hasbrouck Hts. NJ) in '66 (IIRC?) when the first two V-7s in the country just returned from a 4-corners ride (by company test-riders) to prove their worth.

A couple years after this bike ('74?) disc brakes (front) arrived on a similar bike.

 

[Niehart]

That, Gary, is some good work on a good bike.

Can't wait to see what the 1980 WR390 looks like in red. :lol:

 

[dcarver]

Mad skilz, yes!

 

[garauld]

Yes - it's a '74. Interesting story on this bike. I got a call from a friend in '77 who was working at a bike shop in Boston - says there's a nice Guz that had a front end incident with a car, but not too bad. I ended up buying it and fixing it up as shown in the "before" photo - a lot prettier of course. I took it to a MMA bike show in '78 and won first place in the racer class. I beat out my good friend Albert and his fancy custom MV Agusta - we both figure I won because mine had more chrome than his even though his was far more technically sophisticated. Anyways, I rode it for a good number of miles and sold it off to another friend around '83. He rode it for a while, got into financial difficulties in '92 and sold it back to me. And there it sat until last fall, when I started to take it apart. Yup, it's a bit tricky getting all 4 shoes to hit evenly. They work pretty well when set up however. The wheels are very heavy because of all the metal there.