Smaller, not further away
From a distance you could be easily forgiven for mistaking a Moto Guzzi V50 for a Moto Guzzi 850 T3. The styling cues and mechanical basics that engineer and designer, Lino Tonti, brought across are all present in the newer, but smaller bike. In the new engine, Guzzi retained the tried and tested formula of a 90-degree V-twin, longitudinally mounted pushrod engine ahead of a large dry clutch, five-speed gearbox and shaft drive. It was designed from the start to be used in multiple capacities and a 346cc, the V35, would also be available.
As you get closer, the differences of the new small block are clear. It’s a much lower, shorter and slimmer motorcycle, most noticeably at the bars, seat and tank. Unlike the bulging round cylinders of its bigger brothers, the diminutive angular rocker covers of the V50 barely peek out below the tank. Despite these apparent similarities with the big Guzzis, and surprisingly for a factory that tended to play safe making incremental changes, in 1977 the V50 was an all-new motorcycle, right down to the all-new horizontally split crank case that bolts around the crankshaft.
Uniquely on the small blocks, the combustion takes place not in the
