Rare bird: MV Agusta 150RSS
“Buying the 150RSS took much longer than the actual restoration, quite the opposite of the normal situation. You might remember Phil Reeves, the BSA Bantam man, from OBA #17. Phil has been a friend for many years, and I’d often walk past the beautifully painted MV petrol tank that sat on top of a cupboard in his house. I’d admire it and ask him if he’d keep me in mind if he ever decided to sell the bike, either restored or as a restoration project. Considerable years rolled by, with the red and black tank still being the only part of the restoration that had been completed. Phil finally decided to part with the bike about 15 years ago, having a couple of other small MVs in his collection anyway (in residence with the “chooks”). I picked up the dismantled bike and headed home to start planning the restoration.
“I’d like to be able to tell colourful tales of years of scouring exotic locations for parts and of the many trials and tribulations of the mechanical restoration, but it wasn’t like that. You see Phil kindly volunteered to help me rebuild the engine and gearbox after I bought the bike from him, using new internals which Phil had sourced and which came with the bike. The painting, plating and rest of the assembly went smoothly and in only a matter of a few months I had a fully restored little MV. What few parts I did need to buy, such as sprockets, hand grips, decals and cables, came from the MV Agusta Owners Club of Great Britain and the Vintage Motorcycle Club of the UK. The UK seemed to be the place to go for parts for the small MVs in those pre-Internet days. You can forget it if you’re looking for a workshop or owner’s manual in English though, as all I’ve ever been able to find is the Italian versions. “There’s very little chrome plating on the bike, the guards and toolbox covers are stainless steel, which polish up very nicely. The only challenging task was the replication of the black crinkle finish effect on the “dashboard”. Even this wasn’t too difficult though, as I’d already had experience using a VHT spray-can finish on an MGB dashboard I’d done some years earlier. Akront rims were laced up to the hubs when I bought the bike, but again the correct Sanremo 1.6 x 18” alloy rims came with it. The Sanremo rims are astonishingly light, about half the weight of the Akronts. They’re also pretty fragile and needed re-rolling before using them in the rebuild, pot-holes are to be avoided at all costs. The seat, as is the case with all my “modern” bikes, was perfectly restored by Tony O’Connor of Eldorado Autos. Although the factory obviously took their bikes seriously, one of my favourite details on the bike is the original, yet whimsical, “emmevi” in cursive script stencilled on the back of the seat. When someone asks what it means, it’s always fun to explain that you need to say the word with typical Italian gusto, accompanied by much hand gesticulation – they soon twig as to the phonetic joke. “As far as riding the bike – it’s an absolute delight. It weighs next to nothing, and with reasonably high compression, a 5-speed gearbox and the rear-set pegs you soon succumb to the boy-racer in you (make that middle-aged racer in my case). The clutch is ultra light and I find the gearbox is slick and trouble free, with excellent ratios. One can only gather that the build quality of the time was very variable, given the negative road-test comments of the day regarding the gearbox. Once you get into the tight, twisty back-roads of the Adelaide Hills the urge to wind on the RPM and lean the bike hard over into the bends is irresistible. It’s in this environment, working the gears, testing the limits of the bike’s cornering and listening to the crisp note of the megaphone, that the bike and rider are in their element. A nick-name was assigned to my bike after the first “proper ride” in the hills with friends (including Phil). The MV model designation RSS stands for Rapido Super Sport, but I prefer the nickname coined that day – “The Flying Razorblade”!”
Owner Rob Elliot explains how a 150RSS came into his passion: