Bimota DB7 – The Italian beauty

As I’m always obsessed with Italian beauties, the land that produces some of the exotic brands like Ducati, Bimota, Aprilia, Moto Guzzi, MV Agusta, Benelli, Cagiva and much more excluding the car brands. I’m more inclined towards Italian for the amount of passion and detail that they invest in. I personally like Bimota for various reasons that have made me talk about this beauty and couple of them to mention is their frame, which is one of the world’s best housing the best engines and the exclusivity that a Bimota owner gets. The entire bike is hand built and the same builder who built the bike will be there till the bike is packed in the shipping container for delivery. This is absolutely not available in the Japanese mass production brands like Yamaha and Honda.

The company’s beginning was like this, in September 1972, Massimo Tamburini was on a race and crashed his Honda 750 four at the Misano race track at Italy which resulted him in three broken ribs. While Massimo was recovering, he started constructing a tubular steel frame that could withstand the horsepower and the track abuse given by the Japanese engines and the riders. The frame that Massimo constructed lowered the centre of gravity than the original Japanese frames which eventually reduced the weight of a stock Honda frame. The HB1 was the first creation by Bimota and thus the company started. The name Bimota was derived from its founders initials, who respectively were; BIanchi, MOrri and TAmburini.

The line-up of Bimota includes 6 bikes and out of which the DB7, was the one that attracted me the most, let’s see what the bike has got.

Looks: The main objective of Bimota is to keep up to their name by creating a Superbike that is distinctly Bimota and resembles no other superbike which will also be superior in power, handling and road or track presence. The Bimota DB7 is designed exquisite that it does not resemble any other superbike even by the slightest mistake. The DB7 is painted with team colors of red, white and black to all the carbon fiber parts designed by the designer Enrico Borghesan. The materials that are used in this bike are far superior to any other brand and are perfected to utmost detail. The sub frames, footrests and control levers are machined in single billet aluminum making it sturdy and yet exclusive in its own way maintaining Bimota standards. The tail section is completely made of carbon fiber that saves weight and also helps in aerodynamic properties which completely eliminates the need of Sub-frame. The weight saving and aerodynamic property of carbon fiber is also used for all the fairing sections, fenders, drive chain guards and instrument cluster supports. Further weight savings also comes from the mighty Titanium exhaust that has a design and a note of its own.

Engine: The engine is a track proven Ducati 1098 Testastretta Evoluzione 90 degree “L” twin, desmodromic that displaces 1099 cc churning out 160 hp at 9750 rpm with a torque value of 123Nm at 8000 rpm. Impressed? This engine is also the most powerful twin-cylinder production engine in history. The engine is an “Over-Square” heard it somewhere? Yes, the RTR resembles this design! That has a stunning and a massive bore and stroke of 104mm x 64.7mm. To utilize the benefits of the bigger twins, the cylinder-heads have been completely redesigned coupled with an advanced MotoGP induction technology to produce an incredible 160hp of raw spine chilling power. This is also achieved by the design of the new cylinder heads that feature a reduced angle between intake and exhaust valves, allowing highly efficient, straight intake ducts to feed the newly shaped combustion chambers again through the large valves. The throttle bodies also have been redesigned and shaped elliptically which increases the airflow by 30% over the conventional ones. With all these, the 1098 is one of the lightest Ducati Superbike engines ever made that is coupled with Bimota. Will this do? No, Bimota went one step ahead and added a new fuel injection system that has been specifically developed for DB7 that employs the state-of-the art Magneti Marelli 12 hole micro fine spray injectors that is controlled by an advanced Walbro engine control unit. The Walbro ECU is good in its own ways that is highly flexible in its tuning and re-mapping which is a great boon for tuners and professional racers.

Chassis: The DB7 frame is where the company’s mark is up to. The design of the DB7 frame is the most advanced evolution of the Bimota hybrid-trellis design. The structure of the DB7 is composed of mitrated and welded thin wall Chrome moly tubing and machined 6082 AC 100 Aluminum alloy. The Classic round tubes of the original Trellis design has been replaced with Oval section tubes for the DB7. All these innovations have enabled Bimota to reduce 2.3 Kg reduction in weight as compared to the original Trellis frame making it more agile, robust and confident. The swing arm of the DB7 is constructed with the same oval tubing and machined aluminum of the frame. The design is made as such the rear wheel travel is highly responsive and accurately follows the rider’s needs on almost all the road surfaces. The advanced feature of the swingarm is that the rider can adjust the ride height, independent of spring pre-load and other suspension settings done via an eccentric top shock mount.

Suspension: The front suspension is made by one of the best suspension experts, Marzocchi Corse consisting of a 43mm upside down fork that is fully adjustable for compression, rebound and pre-load. The forks are secured with machined aluminum crowns. The rebound damping offers 32 clicks of adjustment and compression offers 13 clicks. The rear suspension is made by Extreme Tech, 2V4 shock that is specially developed for DB7 that is fully adjustable for compression, rebound, and pre-load plus low and high speed damping adjustment. With these mind blowing features the rear suspension can be tuned for any kind of riding.

Brakes: For a bike that has put so much effort on frame, design and engine there must be some step-thru technology in braking too! Yes, The DB7 is equipped with dual 320mm Brembo floating disc mounted with Brembo 4-piston radial monobloc calipers that is again equipped with Brembo radial pumps in the front and the rear equipped with Bimota 220mm floating disc mounted with a 2 piston Bimota caliper that overall speaks the stopping power for itself.

Instrumentation and Electronics: The instrumentation provided in DB7 is one of the best in its class that cannot be compared to any other. The instrumentation is ease of use that provides optimum daylight visibility and extreme accuracy. The instrumentation is analog cum digital that features a big analog rev counter that is coupled to a large LCD screen with multiple digital readouts like time, distance, water temperature, service interval etc. that can be accessed quickly. The instrumentation also features a Shift Light that is positioned next to the rev counter that illuminates and warns the rider when maximum rpm for that specific gear is reached. Additionally, the instrumentation also offers complete timing and recording of race track performance. All these critical information can be accessed by two buttons which are designed to even use with gloved hands. Coming to the road level illumination, the DB7 is equipped with powerful twin vertical poly-ellipsoid projector headlights that turn night into day combined with the high intensity LED turn signals and tail light signals warns the on-going users about the decisions made by the rider.

With all these tonnes of exclusivity, no wonder Bimota has plenty of premium happy customers, who would want to acquire one more gem from them!

– Ram