Over on the auction site we’ve got a very interesting Australian/Italian hybrid built by Brook Henry of Vee Two – meet the Squalo!
I’ve featured one before but that was when I was a newbie in the industry – years later I’m proud to call him a friend. I’ll be seeing him again this year at the Barber Vintage Festival and he’ll actually be doing a “residency” of sorts at Iconic in October, we’re having him take over a lift or two at our shop and he works on bevels for folks that want Brook’s expertise but dont’t want to pay to ship things out to him in Aussie-land. Brook is one of the folks who has signed my Kramer race bike and his history is an interesting read:
Anyway…back to the bike! In addition to making lots of reproduction and upgraded parts, Vee Two made a few bespoke models of their own, including the Alchemy (based on a bevelhead), and the Squalo as seen here (based on Ducati’s 900 twin. There were also plans for a supercharged Super Squalo based on the 999S though that didn’t make it to production.
The Squalo was offered as a kit, though you could order a complete bike directly from Vee Two. Total production was less than 100 units. The OVER Racing frame from Japan weighed 16.5 pounds, and the swingarm added another 10. Because of the kit build nature, there was a lot of variation between builds – the average complete bike was around 330 pounds.
This example (VIN: 6J9M32000W2TA2019) has roughly 4,719 miles. I asked Brook for some history on it, to which he responded: “Was built for a young guy in the US, think he was a computer nerd in Silicon Valley. Very young and very cashed up. He came to the shop and ordered it and I did meet him and he was not a motorcycle guy. I took it to the US and had it on display at Pro Italia’s stand on Ducati Island Laguna WSBK (not sure what year but Troy Corser was ridding for Aprilia). I shipped the Squalo to Texas I think after the show. It has an aluminium fuel tank, the only alloy tank we ever made (all the rest were glass). I am pretty sure it has high performance parts in the engine and the bike was a joint venture between Over Racing in Japan and Vee Two.”
I can’t say if it’s the ultimate street-legal 900SS, but it sure is a cool one. If it tempts you as much as it tempts me, you can find this Squalo for sale in Greenwich, Connecticut with bidding up to $5,889 and the reserve not yet met here on Iconic Motorbike Auctions.
Disclosure: Bike-urious is a partner in Iconic Motorbike Auctions.