Moto Guzzi V8

The Moto Guzzi V8, also called the Otto Cilindri or Otto, was a Grand Prix racing motorcycle designed by Giulio Cesare Carcano for the Moto Guzzi works team from 1955 to 1957. Its water-cooled 500 cc V8 engine had double overhead camshafts and one carburettor per cylinder, produced 78 horsepower at 12,000 rpm, and weighed only 45 kg within a 148 kg machine. It reached 275 km/h, a speed that stood in Grand Prix racing for about twenty years. Tyre, brake and suspension technology lagged behind the engine, several riders crashed, and the bike proved complex and expensive. It remained undeveloped after Moto Guzzi withdrew from racing in 1957, and two examples of the engine are kept in the Moto Guzzi Museum at Mandello. It followed the two-stroke Galbusera V8 of 1938.