MV Agusta

MV Agusta is a motorcycle manufacturer founded in 1945 near Milan in Cascina Costa, Italy. The company began as an offshoot of the Agusta aviation company which was formed by Count Giovanni Agusta in 1923. The Count died in 1927, leaving the company in the hands of his wife and sons, Domenico, Vincenzo, Mario and Corrado. Count Vincenzo Agusta together with his brother Domenico formed MV Agusta (the MV stood for Meccanica, or mechanics, Verghera,a City in Italy where the first MV's were made) at the end of the Second World War as a means to save the jobs of employees of the Agusta firm and also to fill the post-war need for cheap, efficient transportation. The company manufactured small-displacement, Café racer style motorcycles (mostly 125 to 150 cc) through the 1950s and 1960s. In the 1960s small motorcycle sales declined, and MV started producing larger displacement cycles in more limited quantities. A 250 cc, and later a 350 cc twin were produced, and a 600 cc four-cylinder evolved into a 750 cc.

The MV Agusta F4 was the motorcycle that launched the resurrection of MV Agusta in 1998. The F4 was created by famous motorcycle designer Massimo Tamburini at CRC (Cagiva Research Center), following his work on the Ducati 916. The F4 is unique with its four pipe undertail exhaust, single-sided swingarm, large front forks (49 or 50 mm diameter) and traditional MV Agusta red and silver livery. The F4 is also one of the few production superbikes to have hemispherical chamber 4 valves per cylinder engine.