MV Agusta 600 Four, the "black pig" of the Italian brand

2023 Author: Nicholas Abramson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-11-27 02:44

MV Agusta is a brand that is inextricably linked to the world of competition, but like all brands it also had a line of street bikes with more or less glory in its models. In this case the motorcycle you see is a MV Agusta 600 Four. It turns out that MV Agusta dominated the competition in the fifties and its owner, Count Domenico Agusta, did not want any rider who was not an official (and had not gone through the box) to have access to a motorcycle designed for the Italian brand. But at the same time he was compelled to take out a street bike with the quality of competition bikes. Count Agusta must have been quite a "special" guy and there are many rumors around him.

Be that as it may, in 1967 the MV Agusta 600 Four appeared on the market, but the motorcycle presented was not a sporty one at the time or what the markets expected. It was a 600 cc motorcycle, with four cylinders, DOHC and gear distribution. But there all their similarities with the world championships ended. Because this MV Agusta 600 Four was a huge bike and heavy, weighed down by a cardan transmission, and with cable-controlled disc brakes that slowed practically nothing. Such was the failure of the model that in the years it was in production, from 1967 to 1973, only 127 motorcycles were sold. And that is counting on the fact that some were bought and converted into 500 cc to compete. This is precisely what Count Agusta was trying to avoid.

The bike you see in the photos is the 11th of those 127 that were sold, and it is owned by Dorian Skinner, who restored the motorcycle at the request of the widow of its previous owner Alan Elderton. Alan was the president of the MV Agusta Owners Club of Great Britain. This particular motorcycle was the second of these to enter the US, and was used for the photos that illustrate the motorcycle's user manual. The name of Black Pig was earned by the motorcycles because all those sold were of that color, and the name of pig, perhaps they earned it because they are very high on the list of the ugliest motorcycles in history.

The technical data are not heart-stopping, even more so if we compare them with any current 600. The MV Agusta 600 Four "Black Pig" it produced 60 hp at 8,000 rpm (49.6 hp at 8,200 rpm according to others) It weighed 220 kg and with those toy brakes driving them was always a delicate job. That if, according to some evidence of the time, what needed to be large was, like the huge square headlight that presides over the front and that seems “stolen” from a 1950s Cadillac.

Luckily the next bike that left the Italian factory was the MV Agusta 750 S, which inherited the chassis and cardan transmission from the 600, but instead won the love of fans and is among the most beautiful motorcycles to come out of Count Agusta's factory. But this is another story.