The Gilera 50 5V Trial was a light off-road moped presented at the end of 1971, when Gilera had just joined the Piaggio group. With five speeds in a class where three were normal, it was an immediate success with Italian fourteen-year-olds and became the ancestor of a whole family of Gilera mopeds.
Gilera 50 5V Trial at a glance
| Maker | Gilera, Arcore, in the Piaggio group |
|---|---|
| On sale | from late 1971 |
| Engine | 49.8 cm³ air-cooled two-stroke single |
| Carburettor | Dell’Orto |
| Gearbox | five speeds (“5V”) |
| Frame | open cradle in steel tubes |
| Exhaust | high-level expansion chamber on the right |
| Street version | 1.5 hp, 40 km/h (moped law) |
| Plated version | 50 7HP Trial, 7 hp |
| Sold in early 1972 | over 5,000 in the first quarter |
| Kilimanjaro | 5,180 m reached in 1971 |
based on one source (Italian Wikipedia).
History of the Gilera 50 5V Trial
A moped for the new market
The 50 5V Trial was designed at a moment of change for Gilera. After the takeover by Piaggio the Arcore company needed a new start, and it aimed at young buyers, especially the fourteen-year-olds who were beginning to enter the off-road market and the new fashion for regolarità.
The Trial was presented and put on sale at the end of 1971 and was quickly successful. Its styling borrowed the stance of larger motocross bikes and appealed to teenagers: in the first quarter of 1972 alone dealers registered more than 5,000 sales. The project became the parent of a whole family of five-speed Gilera mopeds, later developed into Enduro and Touring versions.
How it was built
The bike, soon nicknamed the “Gilerino”, had a sturdy open-cradle frame of steel tubes built to take the knocks of dirt roads. It rode on knobbly tyres with wide mudguards, made of stainless steel on the earliest examples, and its footrests were fixed to the frame. The engine was a 49.8 cm³ air-cooled two-stroke single fed by a Dell’Orto carburettor, with a high-level expansion chamber on the right side protected by a characteristic heat-shield grille.
The technical selling point was the five-speed gearbox, which gave the model its “5V” name and set it apart from rivals that usually had three or four ratios. The pedal change sat on the left and worked with first gear upwards and the higher gears downwards, like the older Gilera Giubileo, which however had its lever on the right; that was against the trend among modern small two-strokes, which had first gear at the bottom.
The 7HP kit
As was usual for mopeds of the time, the law limited power to 1.5 hp and speed to 40 km/h. Gilera listed both the moped and a registered, full-power motorcycle version sold as the 50 7HP Trial. For young buyers there was also a widely sold conversion kit — an 18 mm carburettor, a different cylinder head for higher compression, a modified exhaust and a sprocket one tooth larger — that released the 7 hp of the registered version. The conversion made the bike much livelier off-road, but it cancelled the type approval for public roads and exposed riders to having the machine seized by the police.
Kilimanjaro
To prove the reliability of the new 50 5V Trial, Gilera officially supported an extreme expedition. In 1971 the Crosa brothers of Genoa, Gigi and Nicolò, organised a climb of Kilimanjaro on two machines that were standard apart from changes needed for the environment, such as a hot-air conveyor on the exhaust to stop the carburettor mixture cooling too much.
The expedition, called “First Climbing to Kilimanjaro 5000”, faced hard terrain and difficult weather. The brothers did not reach the summit at 5,895 m, but they rode the two small machines to 5,180 m above sea level, a record at the time for high-altitude motorcycle climbs. One of the two original machines, complete with its wear and its logbook, is now on public display at the Piaggio Museum in Pontedera.
Design and features
- Five-speed gearbox: the “5V” of the name and the bike’s main advantage over rival mopeds.
- Off-road chassis: open cradle frame, knobbly tyres, wide mudguards and frame-mounted footrests.
- Raised expansion chamber: a two-stroke exhaust on the right with a heat-shield grille.
- Two versions: a 1.5 hp moped and the registered 50 7HP Trial with 7 hp.
- Proven in the mountains: two standard machines reached 5,180 m on Kilimanjaro in 1971.
Gilera 50 5V Trial versions
- 50 5V Trial (1971): the moped version, limited to 1.5 hp and 40 km/h.
- 50 7HP Trial: the registered motorcycle version at full power.
- Later family: Enduro and Touring mopeds developed from the same five-speed project.
The off-road four-strokes that came before it are described with the 124 5V Regolarità Casa, and the road mopeds of the same years include the CBA. More models are in the Gilera collection.
Video: Gilera 50 Trial
Video by Lars Wiik on YouTube.
Sources
- Gilera 50 5V Trial, Italian Wikipedia: launch, sales, technical description, 7HP kit, Kilimanjaro expedition
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