Page 80 - Australian Motorcycle News (January 2020)

080 DESIGN LINO TONTI
GURU

THE

MODEST

MAESTRO

The most accomplished motorcycle

engineer you’ve never heard of

WORDS ALAN CATHCART
PHOTOGRAPHY CARLO PERELLI/MOTOCICLISMO D’EPOCA

he roll call of illustrious Italian motorcycle designers is a
long one, but alongside such legends as Carcano, Taglioni,
Tamburini, Marconi and Galluzzi, Lino Tonti’s name is
generally overlooked. Yet this shy, modest progettista played
T a part in forging his country’s incomparable road racing
heritage, as well as developing Moto Guzzi’s unique design format that
still lives on today.
Tonti was born in 1920 in Cattolica and, after obtaining his diploma
in aeronautical engineering, the youthful prodigy was hired as a
draftsman by Benelli in 1937, swiftly progressing to the road racing
department under Tino Benelli.
There, he worked on the 250cc DOHC single with which Ted Mellors
beat the supercharged DKWs to win the 1939 Lightweight TT, and in
1950, Dario Ambrosini scooped the 250cc World Championship. He
also helped design the supercharged Benelli 250cc four-cylinder GP
racer, before he was conscripted into the Italian government’s wartime
aviation program in 1941.
Postwar, Tonti originally teamed up with his friend Massimo
Pasolini – father of the famous Renzo – to adapt military transport
jettisoned for civilian use, but in 1947 he designed a prototype DOHC
single for Pasolini to race with some success on the street circuits of
the Adriatic Coast.
The 75cc DOHC Linto (as in LINo TOti) Bialbero was later increased
to 125cc for road racing, and a 50cc version also appeared later.
Spurred by the success of the then-new Vespa, in 1950 Tonti unveiled
a futuristic-looking big-wheel scooter, the Linto Cigno 125, as a direct
competitor to the best-selling Moto Guzzi Galletto. He succeeded
in selling the project to Aermacchi, where Tonti was hired as chief
engineer and which lead him to settle in Varese for the rest of his life.
But in 1954 his design for the equally avantgarde Dama 160 scooter
using an Aermacchi engine was rejected by management, prompting
Tonti to leave. But not before he used his own Linto Bialbero engine to
power an Aermacchi streamliner which, ridden by Massimo Pasolini,
smashed NSU’s 50cc and 75cc World records on the autostrada running
north from Milan.

80 amcn.com.au