Moto Guzzi 850 T3

Moto Guzzi 850 T3

Hal Wiley found this Moto Guzzi 850 T3 in a junkyard in Trenton, NJ, in a very sorry state. It’d been sitting outside for ten years, but he saw its potential immediately and trailered the bike home. After a complete tear down, Hal began cleaning the usable pieces. The aluminum parts were all bead blasted—except the block—and the Tonti frame was sandblasted and painted. After tearing down the engine, Hal got a pleasant surprise: “You could still see the cross hatch marks in the cylinders after 55,000 miles,” he says, “and the advice I got from an experienced Guzzi mechanic was ‘put it back together and run it’. So with nothing more than a new timing chain, gaskets and seals, the engine was back together sitting on the bench in fairly short order.” It turned out that the original 30mm Dell’Orto carbs had been swapped out for a set of 36mm Le Mans items, so these were retained and rebuilt. “The exhaust changes every year,” says Hal. “Right now it has the stock downpipes with a custom larger tube crossover, and EMGO shorty mufflers.” Hal got the gas tank and fiberglass cafe seat from eBay, cut down the stock stainless steel rear fender, and modified a smaller plastic front fender from a Moto Guzzi V50. “I wanted a different look, so I managed to find a set of Lester wheels, which were a popular add on in the 70s and 80s. The Lester rims also give a slightly wider width to suit the Avon Venom tires,” says Hal. “The body parts were painted gloss black … I broke down and spent a little money towards the end of the project, and bought Tarozzi rear sets and a Tarozzi fork brace, and Tomaselli headlight brackets.” It’s a great result but Hal still isn’t satisfied; he’s planning an upgrade to 1000 cc cylinders, with a lightened flywheel to help the engine spin up even faster. It’s almost too much of a good thing. [Check out the full build details and more pictures here.]