Bimota Forum

[jonoft]

Having recently retired I have found time to count the Bimota brochures left in stock. I have 336 Range -98, 190 Range -99, 144 Range -00, 130 SB8R, 60 DB4 and 5 Vdue. 865 in total. I bet no one in this Forum have got more!

If I sell 5 a month on Ebay, which probably is an optimistic number it will take me 14.5 years by which time I (statistically) will be (almost) dead. Brochures are not that hot anymore, info and nice pics are all on the Internet. However, there are still some (weirdoes ) collecting so I will give it a try.

Now, I paid Bimota between 800 and 2000 Lira for brochures. Sounds like a lot, but it was not. But since the number of brochures handed out where I00 per bike sold I did spend quite a lot of money on brochures. I now plan selling them for a lot more than I paid and maybe make the profits I never made selling the bikes .

No other importer ever sold more bikes a year compared to the total sales in a certain market than me, and no one bought more brochures compared to total sales either. I also believe no one know more than me about the ratio of sales versus number of brochures handed out versus the success/lack of success of a model .

I am not going to enter any discussion about the Vdue due (sic) to my weak nerves, but what I can say is that of the five hundred Vdue brochures I have only 5 left. Of the highly successful SB8R (the best in number of sales in my market) I have 130 left of a thousand brochures .

PS Statistics: I sold 5 Vdue and bought them all back within two months. My market share in Norway was 0.25%, Germany came second with 0.1% and Italy even less. On average I sold 12 bikes a year to get a seat next to the CEO of Bimota, the German importer that sold 200 a year sat next to me .

[brian]

Very interesting numbers. Thats a lot of brochures!

I think i have brochures for most of my bikes, but not all. I used to love looking at brochures of new bikes, it's just not the same anymore with the internet overload now.

I remember when i ordered my first brand new bike and had to wait for 3 months to take delivery of it... I completely wore that brochure out flipping the pages every day, drooling on the pages, wishing it would turn up soon
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'99 DB4 #104, '96 SB6 #1165, '94 DB2 J #652, '99 DB4 #088, '08 VTX1800, '93 ZXR750R M1, '95 ZXR750, '95 ZXR750 Race Bike, '94 CBR400rr NC29 Race Bike, '94 CB250, '49 BSA C10 250, '61 BSA A10 650, '89 ZXR750, '91 Ducati 851

[brian]

@Jonoft... I don't suppose you have a DB2J (Junior) brochure?
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'99 DB4 #104, '96 SB6 #1165, '94 DB2 J #652, '99 DB4 #088, '08 VTX1800, '93 ZXR750R M1, '95 ZXR750, '95 ZXR750 Race Bike, '94 CBR400rr NC29 Race Bike, '94 CB250, '49 BSA C10 250, '61 BSA A10 650, '89 ZXR750, '91 Ducati 851

[jonoft]

Sorry Brian, but no. I sold most of my Bimota memorabilia on ebay years ago including a rare leaflet for a Carrozzeria by White House modified Tesi 400. Having visited the Bimota works in the summer of 1976 I met with Tamburini again at the IFMA fair in Cologne later that year. I got a canvas bag with a big «b» and a press kit. It was quite basic from a Xerox and in a broken English. But hey, it was my first Bimota stuff.

Speaking about Bimota stuff I met with Sarti back in 1998 at the SB8R intro. He was there marketing his book. I later sold dozens of his book in Norway, most of them to non-bimotistas. Little did I know at that time that this book would become a cult classic:-)

[brian]

No worries, thanks mate. I like hearing stories from the 'old' Bimota days, factory visits and the like. I would have loved to be closer to be able to visit the factory in Rimini.

I have a copy of the Sarti book, very nice quality and a great record of the Bimota history.
_________________
'99 DB4 #104, '96 SB6 #1165, '94 DB2 J #652, '99 DB4 #088, '08 VTX1800, '93 ZXR750R M1, '95 ZXR750, '95 ZXR750 Race Bike, '94 CBR400rr NC29 Race Bike, '94 CB250, '49 BSA C10 250, '61 BSA A10 650, '89 ZXR750, '91 Ducati 851

[brian]

I don't even know if there was a brochure for the DB2J (Junior)? I've never seen one.
_________________
'99 DB4 #104, '96 SB6 #1165, '94 DB2 J #652, '99 DB4 #088, '08 VTX1800, '93 ZXR750R M1, '95 ZXR750, '95 ZXR750 Race Bike, '94 CBR400rr NC29 Race Bike, '94 CB250, '49 BSA C10 250, '61 BSA A10 650, '89 ZXR750, '91 Ducati 851

[atomibart]

Good evening jonoft
I remember someone selling many Bimota parts saying he was the former Bimota importer for Norway, that was in the mid 2000s, was that you ?
I hab bought a few SB8RS parts.

Chers
Damien

[jonoft]

Hello Damien

Yes, I rembember you. When the difficulties at Bimota started in 1998 the importers were asked to support the company by increasing orders. In my case I purchased more units of certain models than my market would absorb. At the same time Bimota was owing their suppliers money so many parts like body work were hard to get and often delayed for months.

Even before Bimota went bust I had to cannibalize crated bikes. For models like DB4 I got around by fitting them with body works from Carbon Dream and exhausts from Corse Japan. At the same time I also purchased whatever spare parts I could get from Bimota to support my customers in the future.

I was in dire straits at that time because being the worlds only «Bimota Only» importer I had no other products to support my business. At the same time I was spending money on spare parts, had half a dozen bikes or so I could not sell because they were missing parts as well as 5 dealers with each two bikes as part of the agreed floor plan.

When Bimota finally closed I offered wear part packages for every model and started breaking remaining bikes in stock for spares. After supplying Norway with parts, and leaving a stock of hard to get parts to support own customers I in 2005 began selling to other importers and dealers and also on ebay.

In the process I got to know bimotistas from all over the world. I sold lots to the US, Germany, France and the Netherlands. I have also shipped spares to places like South Korea, Australia, China, Chili and even to a remote island in the Pasific. I can also proudly say that I have been able to fulfill every request for spare parts from Norwegian owners (almost) to this day.

Damien, very good to hear from you after 20 years. Jon

[atomibart]

Yes indeed Jon very good to hear from you too !

I have not used my SB8R spare parts yet as this a very reliable bike.

Interesting story about relations between Bimota and its sellers/importers...I've heard about many similar ones unfortunately

[jonoft]

I have been a long time friend of the iconic marque from Rimini. Despite being a forerunner in design and technical solutions I also acknowledge their many technical shortcomings and financial failures. And also that problems were left to the importers sometimes.

It was very frustrating that for years Bimota struggled with the tuning of their fuel injected models when Kawasaki got it right with their first already in -80. I still have re-programmed Eproms for the DB2SR, YB9SRI, SB7 etc. adapted to the cold climate of Norway. Even the SB8R had lots of issues with the FI.

I was the first to homologate the DB4. During noice tests by the Department of Transportation on an ice cold, rainy day the bike suddenly stopped. Water from the front wheel sprayed directly into the air filter box and ended in the float bowls. Needless to say that I did not get the bike homologated before I got Bimota to install a deflection plate. When I complained Bimota was kind of surprised to learn that anyone would ride a Bimota in rain:-)

I was also the first importer to homologate the Vdue. October 9th 1997 was also a rainy day. I had spent the previous days running the bike in and I was very surprised how different it was running from the test bike I rode in Italy just 6 weeks before. But just like Nick Ienatsch (the author of the infamous Vdue article in Cycle World October, 1997) I rode the Weber injected version. Not that the test bike drove perfect either, but I started riding when 2 strokes from Japan ruled so quite impressed.

Testing in Oslo went fine despite the engine bogging and running a bit erratic. But later that day during a pass-by wide open throttle noise test in 2 gear the engine seized. It was not a complete seizure, still tests had to be aborted due to increasing sounds from the gearbox that was about to run empty of oil. Got the bike homologated, though.

Cleaning up a storage room I found a binder with old fax sheets. January 26th -98 I complain about paying Lira 6.500.000 for a replacement engine. Bimota later reimbursed me, but this is just to give insight in how things were back then. April 28th in another fax Bimota apologies for all the problems with the Vdue.

They claim to be «at the end of the problem» and «with the right solution in a very few time». Further that they are now «testing the new injection system in different weather over the next 10 days» and afterwards Galasso will come to Norway to «work on your 500’s». I am asked to be patient for «maximum two weeks». Bimota also say that they will send tomorrow by express courier the «console to work at the potentiometer».

Now, at that time I had already had three engines in bits and was alarmed by what I saw. I converted a Moto Guzzi to fuel injection in 1986 and had been working quite a bit on getting the fuel injected Bimotas run better so knew a
bit about setting up systems. I also did some testing on the Siemens injectors building my own test rig and noticed that a 9000 rpm they started to float, in other words they were open all the time.

This is no way ment to bash Bimota or the people who were working there at the time, but rather to give insight in problems that also the importers were facing. I also found a purchase contract dated September 24th 1998 were I agree to purchase another 2 Vdues of a batch of 26 claimed to be «modified and working». They did not!

I also purchased a Furano to help Bimota out. Not only did they have stock of older models made 5-6 ago, but they also would repaint stock and/or slightly modify old stock to shift them. The DB2 and SB7 got a new paint job, the YB 11 got a blue and silver paint, new instrument (that were crap) and a number plaque on the upper yoke. They all sat in my warehouse for a long time. And to make thing worse, Bimota in their desperation sold «out of the back door» at a huge discount a large number of bikes to a German dealer that for years had been specializing (and with great sucess) in grey and parallell imports. I lost several sales due to people buying from them. I can not blame them, they paid below my purchase price. Bimota later offered me bikes for the same low price, but the damage was done.

Now, I seem to be attracted to «exotic» bikes, small brands and one-offs so I am not new to their problems. I was the Van Veen agent for Scandinavia, and also owner for over 30 years of two (of total 39 made) such OCR 1000 bikes. I also was the Scandinavian representative for Munch Motorrad Technik and the Mammut 2000, a 260 hp turbocharged mastodont if I may say. Never sold any though because owner Thomas Petsch pulled the plug after making 15 bikes not to loose all his money.

[brian]

Jonoft, thank you! I love reading these stories about the history of Bimota and the trouble that the dealers around the world also faced. It puts into perspective how difficult times were.

Keep the stories coming
_________________
'99 DB4 #104, '96 SB6 #1165, '94 DB2 J #652, '99 DB4 #088, '08 VTX1800, '93 ZXR750R M1, '95 ZXR750, '95 ZXR750 Race Bike, '94 CBR400rr NC29 Race Bike, '94 CB250, '49 BSA C10 250, '61 BSA A10 650, '89 ZXR750, '91 Ducati 851

[jonoft]

Fortunately most of my dealings with Bimota brings happy memories. Most people at Bimota took great pride in their work despite hard times. Roberto Romagnoli, a gen. sales manager that actually left the company disagreeing strongly by the «back door» sales mentioned above I can not praise enough.

While the first SB6 made less power than the donor bike due to a bad design of the airbox the SB6R did not suffer from this even if the fueling was not perfect, but the overall design of the bike was in my eyes clumsy and it did not sell as well as the SB6. To boost sales there were some talks about a version with more power, supposedly the UK importer was pushing for this.

When this RR model did not materialize I March 1998 asked Bimota to make a one-off for me to test the response. Even if Bimota was a niche manufacturer making 7-800 bikes a year only at that time they would not do special orders. But still Roberto supported the idea. I wanted a big bore engine outputting about 160 rwh with stock cans. I also wanted a special paint job to set it apart from the standard one.

In a fax Bimota say they have no body parts in stock so will strip and repaint the red parts from the bike. They also ask if they can use Bimota Giallo paint (YB9SR) to save money. Apparently the paint shop had not been paid. Engine tuning would be at cost, a very resonable Lira 6.000.000 not including labour.

In June I took delivery of the SB6R1200. It looked so much better in yellow I thought, and it outputted 156 rwh with stock cans and stock airfilter needed for homologation. At that time Bimota did not have general homologation for their bikes. Either the importers had to do individual registrations only (most importers did) or do the costly and time consuming homologation themselves.

I homologated every model sold in my market so had to stick to parts with a Bimota part number to minimize the hassle. One thing was all the noise tests (imagine the intake sounds from a thin piece of foam and no resonance walls in the airbox) but I spent most money on homologating the thermoplastic fuel tanks that for some models looked like made in the back yard.

The 1200 could have been a much greater SB6R and a better selling bike. But sadly it did not happend. Bimota had other things on their mind summer 1998 and the SB6R was passe’. After getting plates on the bike it got open cans and specially made magnesium PVM wheels replacing the Antera clump weights. It handled better, the tuning was spot on fuelling wise and the extra power (read torque) lifted the front wheel easily even in 2nd. by grabbing just a handful of throttle.

[brian]

Do you have any photos of the SB6RR 1200 special?
_________________
'99 DB4 #104, '96 SB6 #1165, '94 DB2 J #652, '99 DB4 #088, '08 VTX1800, '93 ZXR750R M1, '95 ZXR750, '95 ZXR750 Race Bike, '94 CBR400rr NC29 Race Bike, '94 CB250, '49 BSA C10 250, '61 BSA A10 650, '89 ZXR750, '91 Ducati 851

[jonoft]

Tell me your email and I will forward Bimota communications, bench test and photos.

[brian]