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Just picked up this funny little publication- it a dual Honda CB125 / Laverda 650/750 manual- why you would want two unrelated motorcycle manuals only a French publisher would know?. Anyway it appears to be a factory reprint with a bit of history and loads of quality pics- found it in a box of old magazines for the princely sum of £2.
 

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Exmoor beast said:
Just picked up this funny little publication- it a dual Honda CB125 / Laverda 650/750 manual- why you would want two unrelated motorcycle manuals only a French publisher would know?. Anyway it appears to be a factory reprint with a bit of history and loads of quality pics- found it in a box of old magazines for the princely sum of £2.
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Maybe it's that old Laverda/Honda CB77, 'brother from another mother' canard.
 
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For the first year or so after seeing pics of the Laverda twin , I assumed that Honda built / supplied engines for Laverda to fit in their bikes ( I was young and a bit clueless ....... Now I`m old and ...... never mind ..... ) ......

Not sure how much of a technical crossover exists ................. Apart from the appearance thing , and Massimo reckoning American riders moving up from the CB 72 /77 series would flock to something that looked familiar , but with better performance ..... ( just ) ........

( Sorry SF owners , only joking ..... :giggle: ...... ) ........
 
It kind of backfired, being an individual is a good thing. My cousin saw my Atlas for the first time yesterday and did the usual comment, it looks like a DR Suzuki it being Suzuki Blue and the OR on the seat looks like DR.
 
rocketonarail said:
For the first year or so after seeing pics of the Laverda twin , I assumed that Honda built / supplied engines for Laverda to fit in their bikes ( I was young and a bit clueless ....... Now I`m old and ...... never mind ..... ) ......

Not sure how much of a technical crossover exists ................. Apart from the appearance thing , and Massimo reckoning American riders moving up from the CB 72 /77 series would flock to something that looked familiar , but with better performance ..... ( just ) ........

( Sorry SF owners , only joking ..... :giggle: ...... ) ........h
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The bits of the 750 engine that weren’t lifted from the Honda were the Clutch, oil pump and centrifugal oil filter- hence the heavy clutch, merely adequate oil pump and no cleanable centrifugal oil filter! I always wondered why Honda didn’t go to 650/ 750 with the Black Bomber 450..anyway probably best they didn’t.
 
Tippie said:
A mighty piece of gear, but it had been overlooked on almost all of them that came in for a service and was completely full, and a messy job to clean.
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I used to enjoy scraping the metallic sludge out, screws on cover plate were always way tight! Pretty much across the board on early Hondas until the paper filters. I did my apprenticeship at a Honda main agent So grew up with those and the French Souriau engine diagnostic rig and rolling road!
 
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M & T Nessie caught in the alltogether ........ Mike Tomkinson reckoned the main thing holding the Laverda triple back was the bicycle ancestry frame , so the obvious solution was to throw the frame as far away as possible , and get Jack Difazio to nail some of his weird stuff directly onto the engine ....

I don`t normally like to comment on things I know nothing about :) ( Difazio hub centres and endurance racing in this instance ) ..... but .....

Looking at it ...... Why is what looks like a heavy lead acid battery positioned right up in the air like that .... not exactly mass centralisation is it ? ...
...... and is that a bloody great generator being driven off the crank ? ....... If it is , why have a heavy battery in the first place ..... in fact , if a BTZ triple will function quite happily without a battery , then why bother with a battery and giant generator anyway ?

You`ll need something to power the lights of course , but wouldn`t a small battery tucked away in the seat hump , either replaceable , or charged from a BTZ generator mounted coil do the job just as well ? .......... And you could always keep a charged up 12V battery in the pits to hook up to the starter motor if and when the engine had to be stopped during refuelling and so on .......

Just my thoughts when looking at it ........ with all that weight saved by dumping the battery and giant generator , the extra speed down the straights might mean you would no longer need the bar end mirror any more either .......

I remember a road going 1200 ( at least it had a 1200 tank anyway ) triple with a Difazio front end attached to it ..... is it still around ? .....
 
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That looks to be a road going bike to me, not endurance prepped, hence the normal bike headlight and stuff. It has to be remembered what era the bike was raced in, and how development has changed over time. Many of the ideas use on this bike were at the forefront at the time and many have not ended up surviving over time. Compare this bike to what was sold in the showrooms of the time.
 
rocketonarail said:
View attachment 85150

M & T Nessie caught in the alltogether ........ Mike Tomkinson reckoned the main thing holding the Laverda triple back was the bicycle ancestry frame , so the obvious solution was to throw the frame as far away as possible , and get Jack Difazio to nail some of his weird stuff directly onto the engine ....

I don`t normally like to comment on things I know nothing about :) ( Difazio hub centres and endurance racing in this instance ) ..... but .....

Looking at it ...... Why is what looks like a heavy lead acid battery positioned right up in the air like that .... not exactly mass centralisation is it ? ...
...... and is that a bloody great generator being driven off the crank ? ....... If it is , why have a heavy battery in the first place ..... in fact , if a BTZ triple will function quite happily without a battery , then why bother with a battery and giant generator anyway ?

You`ll need something to power the lights of course , but wouldn`t a small battery tucked away in the seat hump , either replaceable , or charged from a BTZ generator mounted coil do the job just as well ? .......... And you could always keep a charged up 12V battery in the pits to hook up to the starter motor if and when the engine had to be stopped during refuelling and so on .......

Just my thoughts when looking at it ........ with all that weight saved by dumping the battery and giant generator , the extra speed down the straights might mean you would no longer need the bar end mirror any more either .......

I remember a road going 1200 ( at least it had a 1200 tank anyway ) triple with a Difazio front end attached to it ..... is it still around ? .....
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Wow......looks like a train wreck.
 
Tippie said:
That looks to be a road going bike to me, not endurance prepped, hence the normal bike headlight and stuff. It has to be remembered what era the bike was raced in, and how development has changed over time. Many of the ideas use on this bike were at the forefront at the time and many have not ended up surviving over time. Compare this bike to what was sold in the showrooms of the time.
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I was thinking it may have been used on the road , but not sure if any were produced in that form ...... the Laverda powered version may have been unique , but I`m not absolutely sure ........ Tail light seems to be a side mounted endurance race type ( or maybe it`s an indicator ! ) ....... the Laverda powered bike had two large headlights , can`t quite make out from this photos angle if there are two there ...... when M & T dumped the Laverda engine and went Kawasaki , I guess a new Nessie was built to suit the new engine , so the original triple powered version may have ended up on the road , maybe this photo was taken after it was no longer being raced ....... I think this bike ended up being put back together and auctioned a few years back .......

BTW ... the original Laverda Nessie was raced on occasion by ex Norton development engineer Norman White , and also road / sand racer , and 1990`s Castrol Honda World Superbike Team manager Neil Tuxworth .......
 
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