Talk Morgan Forums Community Vehicle Talk (non-Morgan) Someone was wrong on the Internet

Great find, you'll really enjoy this

Having a closer look at that engine, it displays a resemblance cosmetically at least with the 175cc OHC Lodola, which in itself was a departure from the trade mark Guzzi single parallel to cylinder cooling fins. The fact this Lodola was in production from 1956-66 nicely spans the date of your excellent find.

I wonder if it shares the OHC design where the cam chain sits within the cylinder and head castings.

The general resemblance to the Lodola had me fooled at first, I spent a long time searching for Lodola's looking like this, but it seems to be a completely different engine. The crank cases are the same rough shape but very different in detail. It's an OHV system, you can see what look like crossed over pushrod tunnels under the fins on the right side of the engine:

Moto Guzzi 350 Militare tipo IV by David Edmondson, on Flickr

I think that makes sense as military bikes seem to be more about robustness than high performance.

It also looks like they were thinking of putting the spark plug on that side then changed their minds after making the mould.

Lots to find out...

Ducatti has proved quite fruitful.

Thanks David. I saw the shape in the cylinder castings but thought it would place the cam too high to match pushrod tunnels.

Having been heavily involved in the marque in the past, would be interested to hear your findings.

I'll keep you posted.

The only other one I can find a trace of on the 'net is a 1957 Type III in the Guzzi museum. There is a picture of that one in the Colombo book, but I only found that after Peter's prompting that it is a prototype. The pictures are just past half way down this page. The bike is very different to mine and I think it may have something like the marching gear you mentioned as there is a cable operated arm near the gearbox which isn't the clutch, as that is under the oil tank.

The caption translates as" "These are three views of a vehicle that he never even saw the production line, the version was a study for the military use of a motorcycle derived from the Lodola, but with a displacement capacity of 350 cc, 4-stroke engine, light alloy head and cylinder, overhead valves, no other data are known."

Thanks again David. This picture in your link looks very similar to the 175cc OHC trail (regolarità) bike we imported from Italy.



Lovely engine until it seized late one night in the centre of London. We had another road going Lodola with the 235cc pushrod engine but in poor cosmetic state, so I just swapped the engine over to my frame to keep what had become a great little runabout. Nothing like as much power or fun though.

ETA: just found the museum model you refer to.



No mention of albero in testa so guess it is a pushrod engine. Picture also shows the cable operated lever you mention very close to gear selector.

From the Agostini archives; a set of archive photos from the factory that was given to the dealership.

It is most likely a 350 Militare IV° tipo 1959 (4th type). It may also be a slightly later type but the IV° tipo is the latest photo that we have. It may be a factory prototype because I can't find any reference to it being in production in any of the books we have. I did find a photo of an early prototype in one of the books but it does not mention them going into production. I am still investigating at the factory.

Quite a bit of unusual stuff was sold in factory cleanups but it may also be part of a small run of test bikes that went to the Army.

Below are a series of photos that will give you an idea of the evolution of the bike.


350 Militare II° tipo 1957


350 Militare III° tipo 1957


350 Militare IV° tipo 1959

Below is a photo of a Lodola Regolarita 235cc 1959 for comparison



Ultimately the military took the V7 Militare from 1967 and the Nuovo Falcone 500cc from 1970.

Now that I've looked at my bike and the type IV photo I see a few very minor details are different. For example the headlight shell is different, it doesn't have a speedometer and the speedo drive from the rear hub isn't there. These could be running repairs (bodges) over the last 60 years or maybe they made a few examples for trials to a slightly different spec.

I have requested documents through the Moto Guzzi archive service, though I think that is mostly aimed at more recent models.

After a little tinkering it lives!



Now to sort it out properly and deal with the bureaucracy of getting it registered.