Zanè Laverda 650/668/750 Twins – The Other, Other Italian Middleweight

Laverda 750 S Formula

The vaunted Laverda marque needs little introduction. But I suppose we need to address why a whole series of production Laverdas would warrant an OddBike profile here on Bike-urious. Laverda has long been a fond topic of mine (see my exclusive V6 history on Silodrome.com) and the company has a long and proud history of producing fine Italian sporting machines, Odd or not.

Laverda 650 Sport

There is, however, an entire generation of Laverdas that has been largely forgotten in recent decades: those produced at the Zanè factory through the 1990s. It is time to rectify that and introduce you to the last, and perhaps best, Laverdas that preceded the marque’s descent into irrelevance as a zombie brand punted into a dark corner of the Piaggio Group’s closet.

(Incidentally, for some first-hand experience with building and racing Laverdas during their golden era of the 1970s, I highly recommend you watch my conversation with Kenny Austin on the OddBike YouTube channel. Kenny’s first Laverda was a 750 SFC, to give you an idea of his fascinating history.)

Laverda 750 Super Sport

To understand the Zanè era of Laverda we need to go back to the late 1970s, to the tail end of the Breganze factory’s heyday. Following the success of Laverda’s 650/750 parallel twins and 1000 triples, a new, modern, mid-displacement twin was developed to offer a lighter, more nimble machine in the lucrative middleweight category.

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Laverda 750 Super Sport

Interesting Links:
Zane Laverda Photo Gallery
Laverda V6 History on Silodrome.com
Kenny Austin interview on OddBike YouTube
Tuning Weber-Marelli Fuel Injection on OddBike YouTube
Moto-Guzzi MGS-01 on OddBike
Laverda 668 technical/service information
Bought on Bike-urious: Laverda 750S Caraneta Part I 
Bought on Bike-urious: Laverda 750S Caraneta Part II
Sport Rider review of the 650 Ghost
BreganZane.com

Laverda 750 S Formula II

Laverda 750 Brochure

Wait... WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?

OddBike Stories - Ken Austin, Uncut

The full-length OddBike Stories video interview with Ken Austin of Kenny's Tuning. Ken shares his thoughts on the motorcycle industry, his career racing Laverdas and Suzukis and his techniques as a racer, and his race tuning experience in Canadian Superbike and AMA events across Canada and the United States.

A self-taught mechanic and skilled tuner who has spent more than 40 years working in the motorcycle industry, Ken is a natural story teller and his experiences are fascinating. It was difficult to select just a few points to share in the edited version of our interview, so I chose to present the full-length version here for the benefit of those who want to know more about Ken and his work. It's well worth a watch!

OddBike Stories - Ken Austin, Kenny's Tuning

This marks the first foray of OddBike into the video realm, the opening installment of a series called OddBike Stories. 

Stories will showcase interviews with motorcycle personalities you might not know, but should. They will be the underdogs, the innovators, and the quiet geniuses who probably won't get any mention in the mainstream motorcycle press. 

It will be a place where the most interesting people you've never heard of can share their experiences.

Each episode will be presented in two formats: a condensed version edited into a 15-20 minute video, and an uncut version featuring the complete interview for those who want to learn more.  

Our first Story presents Ken Austin, an independent motorcycle tuner and mechanic based in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Ken works independently at Kenny's Tuning, a home-based shop where he applies his considerable skill as a mechanic to work on a wide variety of bikes.

Ken caters to discerning riders in Alberta who have learned of his skills through word of mouth, but his reputation as a superb mechanic didn't come out of nowhere. He is one of the most intelligent and inquisitive tradesmen you'll ever meet, and his skills have been hard won through decades of experience as a mechanic, motorcycle/sailboat/mountain bike racer, and CSBK/AMA race tuner. His story is fascinating and I'm proud to present Ken as the subject of our first OddBike Story.

Laverda 1000 V6 - The World's Fastest Laboratory

Image Courtesy Cor Dees Laverda Museum

As I’ve said on Silodrome before, if you want a quick ticket into the Motorcycle Hall of Fame (in the hearts and minds of motorcycle aficionados, anyway) you must build a six-cylinder machine. Nothing is quite as technologically impressive and magnificently superfluous as stuffing far more cylinders than are necessary to do the job into a contraption that is far too small to properly accommodate them. You can easily attain the power you need with a far simpler and lighter four. But fours have become so boring, so conventional, and hardly meriting of the breathless praise of us enthusiasts/bloggers.

Most people are familiar with the Honda CBX1000, and perhaps the Benelli Sei that preceded it as the first six-cylinder production machine. These flagship models book ended the 1970s, a heady time when progress in motorcycle design began to accelerate towards modernity with a series of impressively over-engineered rides that would become the genesis of a new era of performance and complexity. Where the automotive world was mired in the malaise of the gas crisis and smog controls, development in the motorcycle industry was fast and progress was being made in leaps and bounds, spurred on by the quality and innovation shown by the Japanese manufacturers who set about obliterating the old marques on the street and track.

Image Courtesy Cor Dees Laverda Museum

It was during this heyday, in the period between the Sei and the CBX, that a well-respected Italian marque came up with the hare brained idea of hiring an automotive engineer to design an advanced V-6 engine that would blow away the competition on the track and offer the tantalizing possibility of being slotted into one of the most powerful and exclusive road bikes the world had seen up to that point.

This week, I present the legendary Laverda V6, the only vee-six powered motorcycle, and one of the most notable machines to roll out of the Breganze works.

Read the rest on Silodrome.com