< AllMoto's Motorcycle Investor mag

Motorcycle Investor mag

Aussie factory black MV on market

(14 Dec 2022, by Guy 'Guido' Allen)

This claims to be the only black MV Agusta 750 S to 'escape' the factory, and now it's up for sale

A motorcycle pitched as a one-of-one factory black 1972 MV Agusta 750 S with a colourful Australian history has popped up on the market via Moto Borgotaro in New York.

The machine claims to be the first imported into the country by then distributor Bob Jane, himself a successful race car driver and founder of a nationwide tyre retailing franchise that still trades today. He passed away in 2018.

Above: Giacomo Agostini is said to have ridden the machine at Sandown, in Australia.

As for the MV, it is said to be the first example brought into the country, air-freighted in for the February 1972 Melbourne Motor Show. Giacomo Agostini rode it for some demonstration laps at a car Grand Prix at Sandown.

Above: Front page of Australian Motor Cycle News in March 1972, showing the bike sitting on its Melbourne Motor Show stand.

It was apparently entered in the 1972 Castrol 6 Hour production race where it scored a DNF and more successfully at the following Easter Bathurst meeting.

Jane is then said to have sent the bike back to the factory for an overhaul, when it was painted black presumably at his request. It's believed to be the only example to 'escape' the MV works in that trim.

Above: A period ad, probably from Australian Motor Cycle News, offering the full MV Agusta range through Bob Jane. Note another famous car racing name – John Harvey, who was later influential with HDT and HSV. The 750 S was priced at Au$3889 (US$2700, GB£2200), or approximately double that of the Honda CB750-Four of the same year.

The machine was then said to be kept for Jane's use, before it was sold in 1989 to a friend and fellow car racer Bill Morris, who took it back to the UK. It's claiming just 24,000km (15,000 miles) over its life.

It subsequently went through the hands of a couple of collections in the USA, and is said to have received another mechanical refresh from Giovanni Magni in Italy in 2021.

Now in the hands of Moto Borgotaro, it's up for sale. No price has been mentioned.

See the Moto Borgotaro listing

See our MV Agusta 750S profile

And the unusual development story