Cars and bikes I’ve come across in my travels

Paul Marx said:
Guzzzi V twins sell.
Laverda twins sold.
Laverda triples sold less then stopped selling and the company went bust.
Paul
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I
Paul Marx said:
Laverda made a reliable big twin in a market place dominated by badly built British twins.
The macho image was there a long time before the English speaking world discovered that the marque existed. The marque winning endurance races which was a mainland European speciality.
Then Honda and Kawasaki arrived explaining to Laverda that it wasn't going anywhere with it's triples, Godier Genoud or RCB anyone whilst Norton tried to last with a much modified twin.

Guzzi kept on selling motorcycles to motorcyclists.

Paul
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And yet, Suzuki and Kawasaki both hit the ‘big bike’ market with … triples.

Then later Yamaha slipped the four stroke triple into the market.

Then Triumph, and and and
 
I don't think the Laverda twin owes that much to the Honda design. Although outwardly (and internally) quite similar, they are very different beasts, with different engineering approaches in several areas and appealing to entirely different groups of riders. I reckon Massimo just recognised a solid basis when he saw one, it being so very different from the out-dated stuff the Brits were still churning out! One also has to keep in mind the situation of the italian market at the time. With horrendous tariffs on imports, the Honda "originals" will have been almost unknown in Italy at the time. Laverda was competing directly with Guzzi, Ducati and to a lesser degree Benelli, at the time the Jap offerings were slow to emerge. The world market was only slowly opening to the italian industry, hence the unveiling of the Lav twin at Earls Court instead of Milan. Of course the Honda 750/4 then made a huge impact, turning the entire industry on its head and having every manufacturer scrambling to produce something competitive. Reckon Laverda did rather well within the italian industry, being the only manufacturer to throw an entirely new design into the melee. Ducati simply pimped its existing bevel models even further, Guzzi introduced a new chassis for their irrigation pump engine. It took Allejandro de Tomaso to revamp the Guzzi and Benelli line-up and introduce the Sei and other smaller multis. But even these were never truely competitive due to high showroom prices compared to the japanese marques. It took Ducati quite some time to catch up, they were under recievership in the early 70's.

It says a lot that it is Laverda twin and triple models of the 70's-80's that are so often to be seen on the roads these days (in Europe at least) compared to the other italian marques of the time. I rarely ride out at the weekends without coming across another Laverda. The big exception of course is Moto Guzzi, they somehow managed to stay in the picture despite their (imo) rather mediocre products. But even the once-so-popular LeMans models are becoming pretty rare sights. When did you last see a bevel Ducati being ridden in anger? Or a Sei?

I have long considered triples to be the ideal compromise between a twin and a four, offering the grunt of a twin and the power and comfort of a multi. Apparently, many manufacturers have come to much the same conclusion, with modern triples offering what many, if not most, riders actually want. Even parallel twins are experiencing a renaissance, with liquid cooling, 270° phasing and balancing systems giving them a whole new lease of life. Maybe manufacturing costs play a (not inconsiderable) role as well... we might even live to witness the disappearance of fours. ;) It seems their remaining forte is the super-sports niche.

piet
 
chrisk said:
I

And yet, Suzuki and Kawasaki both hit the ‘big bike’ market with … triples.

Then later Yamaha slipped the four stroke triple into the market.

Then Triumph, and and and
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Nothing to do with the number of cylinders.
Any of the Japanese companies could afford to develop an engine, single, parallel twin, V twin, triple, 4 cylinder, 6 cylinder, two stroke, four stroke and had the commercial department to sell it. And could afford a failure.

Laverda couldn't and should have kept out of that game. It's common practice to say that Massimo Laverda saw the need to beat the British on the American market and he'd understood that the motorcycle was to become a plaything.
He didn't understand maybe that Laverda couldn't play that game or if he did, Laverda failed.

Paul
 
Selling any high-end luxury item isn't easy, but I guess Ferrari sold a few cars in the USA, that would be an interesting comparison. Did they fail or succeed and what did they do differently, my understanding was there were some shenanigans with Laverda Distribution there.
 
Vince said:
Selling any high-end luxury item isn't easy, but I guess Ferrari sold a few cars in the USA, that would be an interesting comparison. Did they fail or succeed and what did they do differently, my understanding was there were some shenanigans with Laverda Distribution there.
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I reckon had Ferarri not been able to remain established in F1, they would have disappeared decades ago. It took several suitcases of Agnelli/Fiat money to keep them alive.

piet
 
Vince said:
Selling any high-end luxury item isn't easy, but I guess Ferrari sold a few cars in the USA, that would be an interesting comparison. Did they fail or succeed and what did they do differently, my understanding was there were some shenanigans with Laverda Distribution there.
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Laverda were never a high end luxury item, they just became expensive when they couldn't keep up price wise with the Japanese competition. They were small town hand made motorcycles in a world where automation had stepped in. Owing a lot to the farm machinery heritage.
They fared better price wise with the 750s than with the triples.
Slaters who were obviously astute businessmen sold the luxury image with the "Lamborghini of motorcycles" jingle to sell their expensive products. Again, that's in the English speaking world, elsewhere, they were just expensive, cashing in on the endurance racing heritage in mainland Europe.

Paul
 
Ok not high-end, just expensive and it's well water under the bridge but where is the market most amenable to expensive things but in the US of A and who spent time observing just that motocycle market before diving head first into it after university so I heard. It's a shame it just didn't happen in a big enough volume. It would be fascinating to get the Ps and Qs on what happened there. They sold bikes in a lot of countries but apparently not so much there.
 
Vince said:
Ok not high-end, just expensive and it's well water under the bridge but where is the market most amenable to expensive things but in the US of A and who spent time observing just that motocycle market before diving head first into it after university so I heard. It's a shame it just didn't happen in a big enough volume. It would be fascinating to get the Ps and Qs on what happened there. They sold bikes in a lot of countries but apparently not so much there.
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Certainly somebody with some insight into the marketing history of the marque in the US would be interesting but if the world's fastest production bike helped sell in the UK, what sold in the US was 1/4 mile times, so Laverda was out from the start.
The market is amenable to expensive things in Saudi Arabia, not the US.
 
pf1 said:
The twin is a Honda CB77 rip off, you just can't stand to admit it Paul.
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Not really Pat. A little bit... maybe. Somebody once said copying was the highest form of flattery.

Different starter, ignition and generator lay-outs, along with many smaller details. The big thing in common is the exterior of the engine and using it as a stressed member in a backbone frame. With that in mind, there's not too many options on how to integrate an engine nicely, Honda nailed it. The general layout of the CB twins peaked at 350cc.

Technically, the biggest similarity imho are the cast iron combustion chamber skulls.

Had Laverda designed the cooling fins and cam end covers differently, I reckon nobody would accuse it as a rip-off.

piet
 
Well it sure looks very much like the little Honda scaled up to me and I have had quite a few. Alright there are differences but there are also too many similarities for me to believe otherwise. The Honda cylinder head casting is a weird design in its own right and the Laverda is more or less a scaled up version. Doesn't bother me because I like both of them and the little Honda is a real gem. Needs five gears like the Laverda though but aren't some of the weak point of the Honda gearbox incorporated into the Laverda design?
Anyway, I just like to put Pauls nose out of joint ;)
 
pf1 said:
Well it sure looks very much like the little Honda scaled up to me and I have had quite a few. Alright there are differences but there are also too many similarities for me to believe otherwise. The Honda cylinder head casting is a weird design in its own right and the Laverda is more or less a scaled up version. Doesn't bother me because I like both of them and the little Honda is a real gem. Needs five gears like the Laverda though but aren't some of the weak point of the Honda gearbox incorporated into the Laverda design?
Anyway, I just like to put Pauls nose out of joint ;)
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When the stock of 750 engine parts has all but dried up, there'll still be plenty of gearbox parts around.
Piero Laverda said, he does, that they had a huge stock of 750 gearbox parts because they never broke.
(Not quite true from my experience)
Paul
 
pf1 said:
Well it sure looks very much like the little Honda scaled up to me and I have had quite a few. Alright there are differences but there are also too many similarities for me to believe otherwise. The Honda cylinder head casting is a weird design in its own right and the Laverda is more or less a scaled up version. Doesn't bother me because I like both of them and the little Honda is a real gem. Needs five gears like the Laverda though but aren't some of the weak point of the Honda gearbox incorporated into the Laverda design?
Anyway, I just like to put Pauls nose out of joint ;)
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Of course it’s a copy- thats why it’s one of the best Italian twins. The bits that weren’t copied, like the oil pump, were probably beyond Laverdas capability, the belt driven dynamo might have been aimed at Police contract .They copied a 1960 Honda and it didn’t appear until ‘68 - already old hat. Yamahas XS650 ran from ‘69-‘79 and sold in big numbers buteven Yamaha left twins alone until they became fashionable again. I love my GT but have no real interest in the triples- I don’t like the sound a 180 triple makes, sounds like a four with a leg out of bed.
 
The Sock said:
Lotus is an acronym: 'Lots Of Trouble Usually Serious'
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You know.....when I bought my Laverda in the eighties and my Ducati a few years later everybody told me exactly this: you will be in constant trouble...... you will be working on it more than riding it...... you will be constantly waiting for parts...bla bla bla..... I didn't have any more issues with my bikes than all the Jap riders who told me I would.
Now the bikes are gone and I own a Lotus. Same story: everybody knows how bad they are. How badly they brake down all the time. Nope. Not true for me. I guess I'm a lucky bastard.
One thing is for sure: Lotus as well as Laverda you don't see on every corner and both are plenty of fun and character....
 
dothebeat said:
You know.....when I bought my Laverda in the eighties and my Ducati a few years later everybody told me exactly this: you will be in constant trouble...... you will be working on it more than riding it...... you will be constantly waiting for parts...bla bla bla..... I didn't have any more issues with my bikes than all the Jap riders who told me I would.
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A mate had a Bultaco Metralla back in the day, no end of every kind of trouble. Felt guilty selling it to some poor unsuspecting joker. Met the bloke a year later, ready for the abuse, but the guy loved it, never a moment's trouble. Bikes have personalities.
 
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