Would you buy an 8 valve with flat tappets?

[Rough Edge racing]

Has anyone actually found bearing damage as a result of failure?

   Peerhaps some persons who have ridden the bike 50,000 miles after a bad flat tapppet failure was rollerized can a
nswer from experience?

[SteveRivet]

I wouldn't.  I took a bath on a 2011 Stelvio over this.  Tried to order the parts and gave up after 3 months.  Like one of the earlier posts said, if you did this 3-4 years after the bike came out it may have been a good idea, but these are all ~10 years now and a good number have already been rollerized.

-Steve

[Dilliw]

I have an '03 hydro with 90k on it and a '11 Tenni SE with 25k so I do feel your pain.  But I bought both knowing fully what I was getting in to and what needed to be done.  The hydro was extra difficult because in 2005 the kits were not yet available.  I had to wait almost a year until the recall was performed (first kits went to unsold bikes).

I do believe the reward is worth the aggravation though.  The EV has been rock solid for 15 years save for when the tranny bearings went out at about 80k.  Even then I made it home 350 miles (but doubt I had much more left).  My Griso, after rollers, plug wires and Mark's map, is the best running and most reliable bike I've ever owned to date.

Speaking to a dealer one time who sold both Triumph and Guzzi, he said that the his Triumph customers become regulars.  The Guzzi customers, on the other hand, he sees for the first 5km while he's fixing all of the stuff that the factory should have done right, but after that they sort of disappear.  My experience too.

[Kiwi_Roy]

Roy: It is very easy to tell simply by removing a valve cover and looking. With a little homework, pics are easy to find to compare old and new. You don't need to look further. As for the Griso SE, aka Tenni Griso, I believe all of them needed rollerization. So if that specific model is what someone seeks they need to verify one way or the other before they lay down the cash. 

John Henry

JH, a Tenni, that would be tempting.
Peeking under a cover is a long way from this, just saying. the tread was asking if you would buy a bike knowing that it had flat tappets.
So we already know it needs a kit, you are factoring the kit into the price by knocking 2K off the asking price.
If knew for sure I could buy the right kit, I wouldn't need to look first because replacing parts is a given, with Petes excellent tutorials it would be a great winter project.
To open it up and find this wouldn't be too scary.

The chances of seeing this would be very remote, that bike must be knocking on 100K miles surely, I wouldn't look at one more than 20K
That would give you a sinking feeling but surely its rattling like a couple of skeletons in a tin bath at that stage.
Reminds me of a Vincent I had once, there was about 1/4" missing from the tops of the cam.

Cheers
Roy

[pebra]

Q: Would you buy an 8 valve with flat tappets?
I did buy a 2009 8V Griso in 2013.
At the time I knew there was a risk, but it was not yet established that all flat tappets would fail, so I felt lucky and bought it 
Had it rollerized later @ 14,000 km, Piaggio supplied parts and I paid a mechanic for the work.
I just love the 8V motor.

Would I buy an 8V with flat tappets again?
Definitely, if the price and mileage were right.
Small chance about the mileage by now - - - - -

Eyes wide open so to speak.

[bhattman]

In a word: NO.

If I were to buy a Griso, it would be an 1100 (2V(4V) motor), or 8V that came from the factory with rollers.
Same goes for a Norge, 2V(4V) or 8V roller.

Did the Breva 1200 Sport (2008) Have the same issuue of the flat tappet? Or was it only Norge, Stelvio and Griso?

[MGrego]

An '08 Breva would be a 2valve per cylinder engine, so no, it wouldn't be affected by the 8 valve flat tappet issue.

[Huzo]

I wouldn’t but an 8V if it had spherical tappets..

[Huzo]

Do I recall the 1200 Sport was available as an 8 valve in other countries? Only 2 valve models in the US.

John Henry

Yeah, Lovey has one.