Sunday, 4 December 2011

Benelli 900 Sei


Things always go wrong when you least expect it. Two years and 12000 miles into my ownership of the Sei, halfway along on a journey to Berlin, the six cylinder motor began to misfire. We had been rolling along in the outer lane of the autobahn at 125mph. Well, as near as I could gauge from the waltzing speedo needle.

There's nothing like having a long line of huge BMWs and Merc's suddenly up your arse to get the adrenalin going. The Benelli seemed to lose 25mph in an instant as it went on to four or five cylinders. There was no way I was going to let go of the bars to indicate I wanted to head for the slow lane. No, siree, I'd once waved back at a motorcyclist only to have the bars shake wildly. Never again. I put the indicators on, always a difficult task as the switches were so worn they were very vague.

As soon as the indicators flicked on they drew some power, the bike lost more speed as the misfiring intensified. I left them on long enough to get into the 80mph slow lane. We burped along for about four miles until a turn off appeared. The Sei kept going until we hit a small town called Varenhtz, about 10 miles from Hannover.

I'd had some electrical faults in the past. Typical Italian traits - connectors that rusted, wire that fell apart, regulators that disintegrated, lights that blew and horns that croaked rather than screamed. There was nothing too serious, nothing that a bit of wiring and used Japanese components could not fix.

Now, I had a dead battery, the third one I'd fitted to the bike and only two months old. The acid was at the correct level, thus it wasn't boiling over but failing to charge. The big question: was it because the generator was burnt out or because the wiring or black boxes had failed?

I was peering under the seat when a booming voice speaking in heavily accentuated English made me leap a yard in the air. Much laughter followed as I clutched my chest in heart attack mode. The German was a BMW fanatic, spending ten minutes slagging off Italian people and machinery. I was just summoning up the nerve to hit him when he changed tack entirely, ending up inviting me into his house for the night and helping me suss the Benelli in his garage.

The generator had indeed burnt out. No problem, was his constant refrain, he had a cousin who was an auto-electrician. Five days later I was back on the road, having consumed more beer in shady bars in that time than I usually managed in a year. The rewind had cost £200, these Germans don't work for peanuts even during a recession.

To be honest, I was quite thankful for the extended R & R because two day's hard charging on the Sei was all it took for me to have pains in my thighs, backside and shoulders. The Benelli has a very wide set of sidepanels and skimpy seat that were not much good after 50 miles. With the lack of speed limits in Germany I'd soon come to the conclusion that the best thing to do was to eat up the mileage as quickly as possible.

The Benelli had two things going for it. The motor had perfect primary and secondary balance that meant even when flirting with the red zone it still retained its unique smoothness. The other thing was the exhaust noise, although noise is too harsh a word to describe the beautiful, spine tingling note that came in after 6000 revs out of the conveniently baffleless (due to rust) 6-2 exhaust system. I never tired of that note, would often play on the gearbox even when there was no real need.

The Sei had come with very strange gearing, I always felt that I needed an extra couple of gears. I could quite happily take off in third gear. The motor liked to rev, but had just about enough power below 6000 revs to make life interesting. With the exhaust howl came real power. A larger gearbox and smaller back wheel sprocket gave much taller gearing; vastly more relaxed but still able to take off with ease in first gear.

It made for a relaxed 100mph cruiser with the taller gearing, although it did little for fuel, which still stayed close to 40mpg, despite only being fed by three carbs. Top speed was a somewhat nervous 140mph, but up to 125mph was tolerable with regards to stability.

If the engine looked like a CB500 motor with an extra couple of cylinders, the frame also looked like something Honda might've produced in the seventies. Fortunately, the Wops were past masters at making motorcycles handle even if part of that solution was suspension that did not move unless assaulted by large pot-holes or stimulated by speeds in excess of 90mph.

Ultimately, there is too much mass placed too high fighting a fairly minimal tubular frame. Flat out, weaves come in from a mildly oscillating back wheel. Cornering hard the front forks will shake exiting curves if the stands haven't dug in and thrown the bike way off line.

A bit of time with the Sei revealed that none of these apparent traumas came near to turning terminal. Helped by an excess of feedback from the excellent, if short-lived, Metzelers and the knowledge that a bit of violent input would calm the beast down rather than throw it into a bigger wobble.

As I closed in on Berlin I was thankful for this inherent lack of suicidal inclinations. The road was very rutted, with grooves about two inches deep across the width of the surface but going in the same direction as myself. At 30mph they would have been tolerable but at the 80mph the traffic velocity forced on me some lesser bikes would've been into terminal speed wobbles. The best bet was to let the wheel follow the rut and not panic when the bars shook. I was glad, though, to get off that road.

Oil was something the engine loved to consume. I knew when it was low because the excess heat would spread to the gearbox, making it feel like slicing a blunt knife through rubber. Figure a pint every 125 miles. I used the cheapest 20/50 I could find, which probably didn't help.

Berlin revealed that some of that oil was seeping out of the cylinder head gasket. A hissing noise indicated that the head needed to be torqued down with some violence. Taking the massive tank/panel/seat combination off wasted a good hour and I wasn't too amused to find that two of the nuts were rounded off. Obviously, someone had the same problem before. Still, I stopped the worst of the leak and removed the hissing.

Due to the delay en route I was all too soon back on the road to the UK. For one wild hour I held the speedo at 135mph. I wasn't the fastest vehicle on the autobahn by any means! Judging by the rattles I don't think Benelli intended it to be ridden like that. The chain was almost dragging along the ground, but then it rarely lasted for more than 6000 miles.

The discomfort was such that I carried on for the rest of the day at ton plus speeds until we hit the coast and the ferry home. I could barely walk when I crawled off the bike and got some rude comments from a couple of dubious characters in pink leathers on a similarly hued Harley! I was too tired to beat the shit out of them.

Back home the hissing and leaking had returned with a vengeance. Rather than tightening the head down further, my force on the nuts stripped two studs out of their threads. I had a second bike so it was not the end of the world.

Taking off the cylinder head revealed that it was cracked! The bores, pistons and crankshaft were all in fine fettle so I couldn't dump the bike with a clear conscience. The clock read 32000 miles. The head also looked a bit warped. After a bit of running around I found an engineering shop that would weld the cracks and machine the surface flat for £100 cash.

Two weeks later I was merrily reassembling the bike when tapping the exhaust into place caused one of the downpipes to crack. More welding. I could have cried. But finally, the engine was in one piece (not too difficult but a huge number of bits to juggle) and I was ready for the road again.

I ran it in by using it for commuting in town. Not ideal as it was too wide to use almost any of its prodigious acceleration. After 300 miles I found it was reluctant to go over 7500rpm, which wasn't so bad on UK roads as it'd still cruise at 90mph or more. A compression test revealed it was about 20% down - quite common after a partial rebuild as most engines don't like to be disturbed.

By the time 37000 miles were done I was of the impression that the bike was not going to last much longer without an infusion of cash. They are weird bikes to buy and sell. I bought mine for £725 after it had been advertised for £2500! I was the only one to turn up to look at the machine, gave him my number after telling him how much I was willing to pay. I put an advert in at £2250 and had two punters almost coming to blows. One forced £2600 on me. I would've been happy, in truth, with £600!

G.T.J.