po18guy

Always had a special place in my heart for the chrome tank Oily Enfield Interceptor. From the monstrous engine w/massive flywheels, to the jaunty angle of the mufflers to the cheeky little kick up at the tail of the seat...

Since cooling is an issue with LEDs, I did a little experiment with an "Infitary" fan-cooled H4 bulb mounted in a Kawi EX500 headlight. Forget which beams I used, but after 1/2 hour and then 1+ hours, the IR thermometer read 80ºF - with no physical airflow except the fan. I think that most of the car-type LED cooling features may be intended for those units which reside close to automotive transverse engine exhausts and heated radiator air. Being fairing mounted, the EX headlight essentially hangs in the air - lots of cooling. Those in a shell or bucket might warm up more, but I just did not see the heat issue on a bike. I would have used the undoubtedly HQ Japanese PIAA unit on the Goose, but the driver will not fit inside the bucket and I did not feel like boring holes into it.

Am thinking cooled intake charge more than any velocity increase. Cool air, like me, is dense. While I might make less cognitive HP, the bike will should make more. Reciprocal aircraft engines use cooled air to great advantage. Except for carbureted aircraft. Then, heat is your friend, as ice-makers should be confined to refrigerators, not intakes. Anyway, I am glad for theories.

Might be a bit of showboating, but am checking to see if red silicone turbo hose can be run from the airbox inlets to the cool air above the oil cooler, so as to breathe "not heated" intake air. Oh, and maybe some alloy velocity stacks to cap it all off.

Cool. Will look it up.

My recent Japanese experience has been with GPz500s/Ninja 500Rs. They were hot-rodded by Kawi with good-sized carbs and reasonable cams, 10-something compression/4-valve heads and ports about as large as can be done. Young fellows are always seeking that big boost - and it just ain't there. 5%, maybe close to 10% improvement with some free flowing cans, and air filter, a slight mod to the airbox and that is about it. They run about 53-54 HP at the rear wheel on dynos and given their relatively ancient architecture (in the Japanese world) dating to about 1985, combined with a long, whippy crank and thin cases and one soon finds the limits. I added WebCam (the old Webco) 245º cams, as one of my rockers ate the OEM intake cam. So much for infallible Japanese engineering and manufacture. Guzzis strike me as being more like an air-cooled slice of Chevy/Holden V8. Basic mods can net a nice boost, but there is real HP hiding in there if one cares to go in $earch of it. Looking at the airbox on my Ballabio, I see two snorkels poking out of it, but not running quite far enough forward to be entirely out of the heated air. Daydreaming, I see some red silicone car turbo hoses with perhaps short velocity stacks capping them. Probably no real boost, but they might look very cool. Q for the cognoscenti: Is there an air filter that is a good ompromise of both flow and filtration? Very familiar with K&N, but they tend to flow better than they filter. Uni makes a Guzzi filter, but only for some of the pre-V11s.

Looks like a mid-70s BMW R90S rreplica.

Bought a pair of PIAA LED 9003/H4 units a few years back. 23/23W draw. Problem on my Kawi is that they fool the reserve lighting device into thinking the bulb is out, so the RLD switches randomly from low to high. Bought a couple of the cheap 9003 LED units on eBay after examining the PIAAs. What I looked for are the separate driver, fan cooling (although not exactly necessary) and something like Phillips ZES chips. Those chips are some of the latest and three of four of them in a row basically duplicates the shape and positioning of the filament in the incandescent bulbs. Thus, the beam pattern will closely replicate that of the halogen unit. One pair has COB chips, which are very bright,and seem to throw a good beam, but not as precise as the ZES chips. Thing about these LEDs is that most can be rotated to achieve the best beam pattern. Some will give only two positions 180º apart, but others have a double silicone seal between the light unit and the H4 mount plate that is secured in the headlight reflector assembly by the wire bails. The only caveat here is that the OEM rubber sealing ring may have to be compressed to seat the light unit; said pressure possibly tending to cause the light unit to back out - thus changing the beam pattern. This requires a little garage experimentation and only time on the road will tell.

Since both are momentary switches, I could reverse the high beam flasher and horn, but that would leave me with a rather oddly actuated horn. This will require some pondering.

They do stand up just a bit. It is very close to the red used by other Italian makers. Am thinking of finding a close match and doing a wrap of the (removable) seat cowl. Maybe stripes or swooshes of fluorescent orange flanking the headlight in homage to the original 850 LeMans. Nothing permanent - just the vinyl wrap.

While it would work, there is still the underlying problem of excess voltage or excess resistance. I forget if you have checked battery and alternator voltage/amperage?

Thank you very much! Your greenie is likewise very nice. It was a garage queen. 4500 miles in 15 years. a quick Meguire's tech wax and what you see is what I got. Here's a close up of the tank. They got the paint right! Danged horn button! Clearly, Italian riders use the horn far more than they use their signals. Horn and signals need to be reversed, but I see no way of doing that. Maybe Euro-spec switches made more sense, unless these are Euro-spec. Still twiddling with bits here and there, to get it just right. Shift-lever adjustment is my latest hair-puller.

How do the wires themselves look? Would almost bet that it is a Chinese fuse holder. For some reason, their materials do not seem to be up to spec. Has anyone tried a Mosfet regulator? Over on the Kawi EX500 forum, they are the solution to fried rectifiers and cooked batteries. Even though Guzzi puts the rectifier (at least on my bike) right up front in the cooling air, they do need to shed a lot of heat. The Mosfet regulation seems to avoid that.

Knowing Guzzi, there may be a different offset due to different forks used, but I am just guessing. I believe they are all 320s and the bolt circle is the same, but offset can make a difference.

That apparent word is that the discs with the circular cutouts in the carriers tended to warp. Total guess here, but the later V11 units with the triangular cutouts would most likely retrofit. Here are some brand new gold series Brembos at a good price, considering they are coming from Italia. Also, there are quite a few used later V11 discs on eBay. https://www.ebay.com/itm/Brake-Disc-Floating-Brembo-Front-Moto-Guzzi-V11-Ballabio-1100-2003-2006/362487814082?epid=18025840829&hash=item5465f517c2:g:VmAAAOSwNqRb7Zz2 A pair of Sifam(?) from Italy, for '97-'00: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Pair-Front-Brake-Discs-Motorcycle-Moto-Guzzi-V11-Sport-1100-1997-1998-1999-2000/383113170577?hash=item5933530e91:g:NHUAAOSwvvVc6QhR And EBC listings - they do specify left or right in the listing, so there must be some difference. https://www.ebay.com/sch/177922/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=ebc+discs+guzzi+v11 A set from an '02 LeMAns with 18K miles: https://www.ebay.com/itm/2002-Moto-Guzzi-V11-Front-Left-Right-Brake-Rotors-Discs-OEM/254255897491?fits=Model%3AV11&hash=item3b32d51b93%3Ag%3AT3QAAOSwNINc-VZe%3Asc%3AUSPSPriorityFlatRateBox!98022!US!-1&LH_ItemCondition=4

Here are some pics of the Ballabio fairing and mounts.

Well, let's hope it is still available, since the thread is from 2011-2012.

Was actually considering wither a Duc 937cc SS or an Aprilia Shiver 750/900. Aside from cost, both are nearly as heavy as a V11. The Aprilia in particular has always been a disappointment. They do so amazingly well with their Milles and Tuonos and such, but when it comes to the smaller bikes, they avoid taking them to the fat farm.

Precisely what I was thinking. Givi is good stuff, but you pay for it. Sadly Givi offers nothing in their current lineup for the "ancient" V11. http://www.giviusa.com/my-motorcycle/moto-guzzi However, I'll bet a call or email would net something usable.

Guzzis have come both with fork-mounted and frame mounted fairings. Since Guzzi has long had a wind tunnel, and since there were some claims of high-speed instability on the early (short) V11s, one prospect may be that they removed the fairing's influence upon the steering and mounted it to the frame so that any force produced by the fairing would be fed to the frame rather than the steering. Just a guess.

Not that it would directly help, but if you need pics of the Ballabio setup, let me know.

The mount holes appear to be in the correct position for a Ballabio. The left-right adjustment screw relief hole as well. It appears to have 5 windshield mount screws, which is consistent with a Ballabio. Also depends on the original color. If it was red and the silver sprayed over, it might just from a Ballabio. If it was silver and the red sprayed over, well all bets are off. As to the frame mount used on the Ballabio, MG went to an awful lot of trouble to design and cast up/machine the rather massive frame mount, which also holds the signals. But that mount, by itself, was deemed to be insufficient, as a V-shaped tubular mount extends from that cast mount up to the center windshield screw on each side, to steady the top of the screen.

No muffler, that is a reverse cone megaphone on the Wildcat Scrambler. What I did not know was that Parilla used the Gran Sport road racing motor in the Wildcat. Some noise and some fun!

OK, thanks! CBX stuff will go for sure, as many of them are now in restoration.

Fast sale! Any other parts that you can identify?