Dead battery and blinker trouble!? The baptism of fire for classic Italian motorcycles has finally arrived [Moto Guzzi V11 Sport Owner’s Report Vol. 4]

I’m becoming more and more fascinated by the Moto Guzzi V11 Sport

Since taking delivery of his beloved Moto Guzzi V11 Sport in November 2024, he has not had any major problems and is very pleased with the unique character of its air-cooled, vertically mounted V-twin and shaft drive, which is unlike any other motorcycle.

This bike is simply fun to ride. At low speeds, you can feel the strong pulsation along with the thick torque appropriate for the displacement, but as the rotation speed increases, the vibration subsides and the bike revs up smoothly to high rotations. It feels like riding a Harley at low speeds and a Ducati at high speeds.

It is said that the counter torque of the vertically mounted crank makes it a little difficult to lean into right corners and that it turns smoothly into left corners, but once you start riding, you don’t feel that it has any particular characteristics. It is true that the feeling is slightly different on the left and right banks, but that is just one of the things you can enjoy about this bike.

One of the few weaknesses of the V11 Sport is its fuel economy, which is around 11-13km/L in city driving and 13-15km/L on the highway, which is only about half the fuel economy of the ZX-9R I rode before this bike. What’s more, it requires premium gasoline. In this day and age of rising gasoline prices, this fuel economy is a bit disappointing. The fuel mixture feels a little rich, but because it’s an injection system, there’s no way to adjust it, so it seems like I’ll just have to give up on improving fuel economy. The latest V7 and V85TT models are said to get around 22-24km/L, which is quite the envy for owners of older V11s.

A dead battery suddenly occurred at the Tokyo Motorcycle Show!?

But that’s just how classic Italian bikes work…

So, I was generally satisfied with the Moto Guzzi V11 Sport except for its fuel economy, but I ended up getting a little taste of Italian cars.

First, at the 58th Tokyo Motorcycle Show held at the end of March 2025, I returned to the venue to take some photos that I had forgotten to take during my interview. I headed there in the V11 Sport.

When I arrived at the Big Sight venue, there was a long line of motorbikes waiting to enter the parking lot, and I lined up at the end of it. However, as I drove slowly with repeated stop-and-go maneuvers, the V11 Sport’s idling became increasingly unstable, and by the time I entered the parking lot, it seemed to have developed a power generation problem and stalled.

I frantically pushed the starter button, but the electric starter was too slow to start the engine again. Then I suddenly remembered that in old Italian cars, the generator doesn’t generate enough power at low revolutions, so if you keep idling for a long time, the engine will stall due to lack of power.

He has owned many Italian motorcycles and cars, and currently owns a 1967 Alfa Romeo 1300GT Junior. He always knew it was common knowledge that carburetors from the 1960s and 1970s could not generate enough power at low RPMs, but he never imagined that this was also the case with fuel-injection motorcycles from the 21st century.

However, although my V11 Sport is not that old, being a 1999 model (although it is 26 years old…), the basic design of the engine and other mechanisms dates back to the first V7 from the 1960s. In other words, it has been using old mechanical designs with repeated improvements. In other words, there are still parts that must be treated the same as old cars. By the time I realized, “Oh, this is an old 1999 model!” it was too late.

After finishing the interview, I returned to the parking lot and, in the hopes of getting the best result, pressed the starter button on my car. Fortunately, perhaps because I had let the battery rest for a while, the engine started. So I pulled the choke lever (the V11 has a choke lever even though it is an injection engine), increased the engine speed a little, and headed home.

However, due to an urgent business matter, I parked my bike once more, and when I returned to my beloved bike after taking care of my errands, I found that, as I had feared, the V11 Sport’s battery had died for the second time. This time, no matter how many times I pressed the starter button, the starter motor would not turn, so I gave up and decided to call the Japan Automobile Federation (JAF) for help.

Since this incident, I always make sure to bring a portable battery with me when I’m in places where I expect traffic jams or when I’m on a long trip.

This time the blinker isn’t working!? The cause is the fuse…

Then, on June 1, 2025, he experienced a second problem. That day was the day of the regular “Morning Meeting” held on the first Sunday of every month at Riders Cafe Racer in Kashiwa City, and he was riding along a prefectural road early in the morning with his girlfriend, who rides a GSX-R1000 (K4), to attend.

When I turned left at an intersection, my girlfriend behind me told me that my turn signal wasn’t working. I thought it might be a burnt out bulb, but on closer inspection, none of the front, rear, left or right turn signals were working, so that didn’t seem to be the case. I was about to arrive at the venue, so I decided to check it there.

I parked the bike in a parking lot and checked the turn signal lamp, but the bulb was still there. When I left home, the turn signal was working fine, so I thought the fuse must have blown, so I removed the seat and accessed the fuse box.

It turned out that the 30 amp main fuse had melted into a sludgy mess. I removed the fuse and checked the internal wires, but they were not broken. I had a spare fuse, so I cleaned the contacts and replaced it with a new one. The blinkers started working again, so I decided to just keep watching.

After a short 25km ride around Lake Teganuma with the other participants, I returned to Riders Cafe Racer and checked the fuse I had just replaced. I discovered that the fuse I had just replaced was about to melt again.

Electrical problems pose a risk of vehicle fire, so it’s dangerous to take them lightly. Kei, the CEO of “singlebigk” and everyone’s big brother, saw what was happening and advised me, “This isn’t good. It will be too late once the bike catches fire. You should contact the shop where you bought it immediately and have it inspected.”

So I called CLUB CIRCLE in Edogawa Ward, where I bought the bike, and decided to have them check the problem.

Cleaned the fuse box and waited to see what would happen… but the problem recurred

From Riders Cafe Racer, I headed straight to CLUB CIRCLE and asked mechanic Yamada to inspect the problem. “Could the problem be caused by poor contact in the fuse box contacts, causing overheating?” he said, cleaning the fuse box and adjusting it so that the fuse was properly inserted. “If this doesn’t work, we’ll come up with a repair solution, so try riding it in this state for a while,” he said, so I headed home in my V11 Sport that day.

After that, he was able to drive the V11 Sport without any problems for a while, but three weeks after the repair, the blinkers started not working again. Thinking that something was wrong, he opened the fuse box and found that the fuse had melted again.

So I called CLUB CIRCLE again, and Yamada told me to bring it over right away. When I showed him the melted fuse, he said, “This means the fuse box is completely ruined.”

Moto Guzzi is one of the older imported motorcycles that has relatively good parts availability, but it is still unclear whether new fuse boxes are available in Japan, and if they are not, they will have to be ordered from the country of origin. In that case, it will take a considerable amount of time for the parts to arrive, and since parts for older motorcycles are often priced at a low price, it is unclear how much the repair will cost.

There was a tour sponsored by CLUB CIRCLE next week… This is a bit of a problem, I thought to myself with a worried look on my face, but he just smiled and said nonchalantly, “It’s okay. There’s nothing to worry about. I’ll figure something out.” In the end, the V11 Sport was left in his care.

Repaired by rewiring and using a board fuse…how much will it cost?

Five days later, Yamada called to say, “The repairs are done. Come and pick it up.” When we arrived at CLUB CIRCLE, Yamada said, “I’ve repaired it with my own parts. There shouldn’t be any problems now,” and removed the seat from the V11 Sport.

At his urging, I looked under the seat and saw that the wires had been taken out of the fuse box and connected to an old-fashioned flat fuse on a plate fixed to the frame to replace the faulty main fuse. “This time, we used an old-fashioned plate fuse due to space constraints. This shouldn’t be a problem,” he explained to me as he carried out the repair. “Try riding it like this for a while. If there are no problems, just wrap the flat fuse with insulating tape and the problem will be solved.”

When I asked how much the repairs would cost, he said, “Well, I guess. For now, I’ll leave you 61 million yen for materials and labor.” (Obviously, I was just kidding. I actually paid 6,100 yen.) I was really relieved that the repairs were done for much less than I expected. What’s more, there have been no further electrical problems related to the fuse box since then, and I was able to participate in the following week’s tour as planned.

When maintaining an old imported bike, the presence of a professional shop like CLUB CIRCLE that can respond flexibly when a problem occurs is truly powerful. It is thanks to this shop that I, a poor writer, am able to maintain my old Moto Guzzi.