Finished refreshing '74 Laverda 3C

Took 3 months but went through it pretty thoroughly, brakes, suspension, some electrics, carb rebuild, lots of polishing and touch-up painting, new gauge faces, re-chromed headlight mounts, etc. First ride today, brilliant. I was lucky to find one at an affordable price that had 12.7K miles on it and was original except for the K&N pods, which fouled the side covers. I found an airbox and intake boots, so it's back to stock. Starts on the button and runs great, just need to swap in a new charging coil, which I have lined up (with a loaner 45mm / 1.5 reverse thread puller). The ignition coil side works fine; it's not the best system, and there are upgrades, but at a cost I can't swing, so I'll fix & enjoy with the old-style system and a simple swap.

It's wearing the N15's mirrors temporarily, I have some shorter rectangular ones (personal preference for this bike) on order.

Nice work, looks great !

Great work!
Does that one have the 180 or 120 degree crank?

Looks fantastic! The frame, body work, and engine cases look like new, all original?

robs ss said:

Great work!
Does that one have the 180 or 120 degree crank?

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The 120 crank came along much later in the production run.
Lovely bike, rather fancied one for a long time, but now I think it's too late to start on such a tall & heavy bike. In our workshop, we have 3 Lav 1000's, two have been in bits for 15-20 years and the third was parked after a low speed crash, also about 10 years ago. The consensus seems to be that it's interesting to ride one fast, requiring a lot of effort and determination to make it go round the the corner. Also requires a "manly" left hand on the clutch, especially in traffic. It's significant that the owner of the 3rd bike took another of his Laverdas to Spa the first time he went, experienced the weaving in high speed corners and promptly built a modified Ducati Pantah for the following year! Much easier to ride and more stable he reported. With a 900 engine in it, it's probably quicker as well!!

I have another friend who is very into ground up rebuilds of them, producing a museum quality finish. Looks lovely, but not for me. He also built s couple of replicas of the factory space frame bikes. They sounded lovely, but had severe reliability problems when parading them at Spa.

The engines look so massive (and are quite heavy), so it's always been a mystery to me how they could have so many problems with the heads warping and crankcases deforming.

The only things non-original were the K&N pods, which were contacting the inside edges of the side covers. I found a nice used original airbox and rubber inlets. The clutch is about 2/3 the effort of my N15CS, not light, but not too heavy IMO. There is a mod for the linkage but I don't need. It doesn't feel awkwardly tall & heavy to me, and the handling didn't strike me as anything but good, but I'm 6'3" 230 lbs and also ride an '83 Suzuki GS1100E. Now I have a 2nd right-shift bike with yet another pattern to keep me on my toes.

I have read that they changed from the iron 'skull caps' in the cylinder head to all alloy in 76-77, which were poor quality castings and caused problems. They went back to iron after that.

2WheelsUp said:

Looks fantastic! The frame, body work, and engine cases look like new, all original?

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I hand-sanded and buffed what I could on a buffing wheel; the rest was polished in place. The gauge faces are new reproductions, tedious to crimp those ND rings on. The replacements are stiff stainless steel vs the chromed metal originals. I had to make a wooden jig to do the job, as I don't have a machine shop to make a device to roll them. It was a workout with hand tools. The crimp is hidden, so it's fine. I touched up the frame paint in place. There were only a few chips, no rust really, just a bit tired.

I replaced the original rectifier (it had no regulator) with a working Shingenden SH775, but it's not charging due to no output from the charging coil. I'll pick up the replacement & puller tomorrow. The ignition is Bosch HKZ, which was problematic; it's not sealed well from the elements, and I'm told that it's rubbish and shouldn't work etc. But it does. The ignition circuit runs directly off the other stator coil, so I can ride it, just throw on the charger when done to replenish the battery, especially if I use the headlight. Many recommend an upgrade due to the wonderful new mappable advance curve that transforms the bike, high-zoot technology, and high (200-320W) output, but I don't have >$1K to spare. I run LEDs, so I'm pretty sure I can get it sorted for a small fraction of that, 120W or so will be fine. My KTM gets by with half that & LEDs, similar setup.

gpzkat said:

Took 3 months but went through it pretty thoroughly, brakes, suspension, some electrics, carb rebuild, lots of polishing and touch-up painting, new gauge faces, re-chromed headlight mounts, etc. First ride today, brilliant. I was lucky to find one at an affordable price that had 12.7K miles on it and was original except for the K&N pods, which fouled the side covers. I found an airbox and intake boots, so it's back to stock. Starts on the button and runs great, just need to swap in a new charging coil, which I have lined up (with a loaner 45mm / 1.5 reverse thread puller). The ignition coil side works fine; it's not the best system, and there are upgrades, but at a cost I can't swing, so I'll fix & enjoy with the old-style system and a simple swap.

It's wearing the N15's mirrors temporarily, I have some shorter rectangular ones (personal preference for this bike) on order.

Click to expand...

Cant see the photos as it comes up saying content not viewable in your region. Enjoy what was a statement bike when it appeared on the seen. Drew me to it like a magnet & repulsed me at the same time lol. Personally I loved the 3c Jotas needed a hairier chest than I had. Probably why I ended up with a T160 Trident.

Chris said:

Cant see the photos as it comes up saying content not viewable in your region. Enjoy what was a statement bike when it appeared on the seen. Drew me to it like a magnet & repulsed me at the same time lol. Personally I loved the 3c Jotas needed a hairier chest than I had. Probably why I ended up with a T160 Trident.

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It's a shame Imgur did that, or whatever the case may be.