Moto Guzzi Daytona
With Ian Falloon
During the mid-1980s Moto Guzzi had no official factory racing program but in the United States, ex-dentist Dr. John Wittner entered a modified Le Mans in endurance races with astonishing success. In 1984 and 1985 Dr. John’s Team Moto Guzzi won AMA/CCS U.S. Endurance Road Race Series championships, proving there was life left in the venerable Moto Guzzi V-twin.
Wittner had plans for a new frame and approached Moto Guzzi North America with the proposal to build a sprint racer for the Battle of the Twins series. In December 1986, Guzzi boss Alejandro De Tomaso flew Wittner to Italy.
De Tomaso was interested in a new chassis for the Moto Guzzi twin and was impressed with Wittner’s chassis ideas. Wittner then returned to America with enough funds to allow him to build the new frame and swingarm with floating final drive.
The new frame was heavily influenced by a Tony Foale design for Dick Wood of Motomecca, itself inspired by the later Aermacchi Ala d’Oro. Instead of Foale’s round spine, Dr. John used a strong rectangular-section backbone running between the “V” of the cylinders. Rigidity was ensured by connecting the steering head axis perpendicular to the backbone tube.
The backbone, which was also part of the engine breathing system, connected the steering head to a round steel tube mounted transversely across the swingarm pivot. This tube bolted to 13mm plates cut from aluminium sheet on each side that also located the swingarm and gearbox.
The swingarm employed cantilever rear suspension with a single Koni F1 shock absorber. Torque reaction was virtually eliminated with a floating final drive unit pivoting on the axle. Thus the driveshaft was no longer incorporated in the swingarm and featured an extra, exposed, U-joint.
To transfer torque reaction from the floating final drive case to a fixed part of the frame was an arm running parallel to the swingarm. This system of a parallel arm working in compression was not unlike versions by Arturo Magni and Fritz Egli.
The two-valve engine acted as a stressed member and bolted at the front by two triangulated steel tube structures that then bolted to the backbone tube. These triangulated structures used the upper engine mounts on the timing chest, the lower crankcase mounts being connected by a pair of aluminium plates.
For the 1987 series a modified two-valve Le Mans engine was installed in the new chassis and Doug Brauneck won the 1987 Pro-Twins championship. Dr. John’s Guzzi was now the most successful racing Moto Guzzi since the 1950s. At the beginning of 1988 Wittner took the 1987 bike to Italy where it was analysed by factory mechanics with the possibility of installing a four-valve engine in the new chassis.
The four-valve engine was the brainchild of Umberto Todero. Todero, had joined the company in 1939, a faithful pupil of Carcano and the final link with the great racing period of the 1950s. During 1986 the 63-year-old Todero designed a four-valve double overhead camshaft engine, but the engine was considered too tall by de Tomaso.
This was followed by a four-valve engine with the camshaft in the head, but not over the valves, and by 1987 this was being bench tested. Further development of Dr. John’s racer continued during 1988 and 1989 but as racing success proved elusive Wittner retired from racing to work in Italy full time on the production Daytona.
The Daytona production was finally displayed at the 1989 Milan Show but it wasn’t until 1992 that regular production began. It was an unfortunate delay. By the time the Daytona became generally available it was upstaged by the competition. In 1992 most potential buyers were tired of waiting. As such the Daytona never received the accolades it deserved, and remains one of Moto Guzzi’s most underrated models.
The four-valve engine was similar to Todero’s 1986 design with dimensions of 90 x 78 mm, and a 10:1 compression ratio. When first displayed it was intended to produce the Daytona in two versions, carburettor and fuel injection, but the prototype had twin Dell’Orto PHM 40 carburettors. carburettor version produced 91 horsepower at 7,800 rpm, with the Weber Marelli injected version (with 50 mm throttle bodies) providing 94 horsepower.
The chassis closely followed the lines of the racer. The spine frame and swingarm was identical but the aluminium engine mounting plates were now cast with internal webbing. Front suspension was initially Marzocchi M1R, and later White Power, with a Koni rear shock absorber.
The wheels were 3.5 x 17 inch on the front and 4.5 x 18 inch on the rear. Braking was by a pair of twin 300 mm front discs with four-piston Brembo calipers, and a 260 mm disc on the rear. Painted red and white to mimic the Dr. John bike, the first Daytona weighed in at 205 kg.
Styled at Modena, it had a race shop, hand-crafted, appearance. When it came to performance and handling the Daytona set completely new standards for a Moto Guzzi. The parallel arm locating the final drive was exceptionally successful at reducing shaft drive reaction and the four-valve engine, while only rated at 93 horsepower at 8,000 rpm, produced performance equivalent to Ducati’s 851.
Yet despite the excellent performance the Daytona somehow it failed to win the acceptance of the diehard Moto Guzzi enthusiast. Undoubtedly the introduction of the cheaper and simpler 1100 Sport hurt the Daytona and production only numbered around 1,000 between 1992 and 1995.
