VOL. 50 ISSUE 23 JUNE 11, 2013
BY ALAN CATHCART
PHOTOGRAPHY BY KYOICHI NAKAMURA
F
or the past quarter of a
century Umberto Borile
has labored to create a
series of single-cylinder streetbikes bearing his name, powered by his own air-cooled single-cam four-valve engine based
on the World Championshipwinning 500cc GM Speedway
motor. Until recently, Umberto
effectively constructed each
handmade example himself in
his one-man workshop, which
resulted in expensive prices for
what were basically freshly minted masterpieces. No two Borile
bikes have been the same.
The Borile
Scrambler:
Paying tribute
to Ducati's
classic 1960's
Scrambler.
P63
But now the Moto Borile
marque, which made its debut in
1988, has been restructured on
a more commercial basis, with
Umberto entering into 50/50
partnership with the Bassi family at the end of 2010 to form a
new company - Umberto Borile
& Co.
Hence the new Borile B450
Scrambler, an unashamed tribute to Ducati's classic 1960s
street single of the same name
by a man who used to own one,
powered by an all-new purposebuilt fuel-injected 452cc desmo
motor, with belt drive to the single overhead cam.
The powerplant has been
concocted by taking the rear
98mm-bore cylinder off an aircooled 1100DS desmodue Vtwin engine, and matching it to
a 60mm-stroke Borile crankshaft housed in a specially built
crankcase. There'll also be a
365cc option in the future, obtained by using the 88mm-bore
cylinder from a Monster M696.
This new motor has been developed with Ducati's active approval and the company is even
supplying the parts needed for
series production of the engine. And there are plans for a
future Ducati-engined Borile Vtwin motorcycle, employing the
Monster M696 desmodue motor mounted in a special frame,
with the engine rotated forward
and downward to make room for
the extra front-wheel travel over
bumps.
