Description

The long-established firm of Benelli has made a large range of motorized two-wheeled vehicles for the better part of this century.

The six Benelli brothers formed their company in 1911, and were making famous racing motorcycles by the 1920's.

In the 1930's, they were one of the big five (The Pentarchia) of the Italian bike industry, along with Garelli, Moto Guzzi, Gilera and Bianchi.

The factory was destroyed in World War II, but production began again in 1949. Brother Giuseppi left and founded Motobi, later to return to the fold. Production consisted mostly of 49cc to 174cc two and four-stroke cycles, along with double overhead cam four-cylinder racers.

The mid-sixties saw the introduction of a commercial tricycle in the well-established Italian idiom of a load-carrying platform attached to a moped or scooter chassis with some form of cab or weather protection for the driver. Few were made.

The Argentinian Alessandro de Tomaso bought the firm in 1971, and they were once more at the forefront of racing. The company was sold and resold in the '90's and continues to make exciting machinery to this day.

Manufacturer: Benelli SpA, Pesaro Italy

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This was one of the vehicles sold at the Bruce Weiner Microcar Auction in February 2013. Website owner Harry Kraemer has all of the sale data from that auction in his Market Watch section of his Wheels & Wings site Flymall.org. See link below for the data.

Click here for auction sale report