Midual Type 1 2016 — Specifications

Imagine a workshop somewhere in southwestern France, where master craftsmen assemble aluminum parts machined from solid stock with the same meticulousness as a Geneva watchmaker. This is not a scene from a 19th-century industrial novel. This is Midual, today, in 2016, producing 35 examples of its Type 1 at €155,000 apiece. The price of a house, yes. But what house has ever made a heart beat like this?

The engine deserves attention, because it tells a story. A flat-twin, cylinders arranged in the longitudinal axis of the motorcycle, transverse crankshaft: an architecture that English engineer Douglas was already exploring at the beginning of the 1900s, long before BMW pivoted the concept by 90 degrees to give birth to the R32 in 1923. Midual therefore returns to the origins, delves into the genealogy, and extracts 1036 cm³ with bore-stroke dimensions of 100 x 66 mm, a gear-driven camshaft like a VFR, and a compression ratio of 12:1. The result? 106 horsepower at 8200 rpm and 102 Nm of torque at 5500 rpm. Honest figures, not spectacular, for an engine of this displacement. The brand claims low-end torque availability, and the rather square engine dimensions might suggest otherwise, but it doesn't matter: the mechanics are not the center of gravity of the Type 1. They are its foundation.

What truly constitutes the essence of this machine is the layer of details that accumulates wherever the eye falls. The fully analog dashboard, with its multiple gauges for engine speed, temperature, voltage, time, aligned like instruments in a yacht cockpit. The knee pads covered in genuine leather. The aluminum brake reservoirs, knurled and hand-engraved covers. The solid-machined switchgear. And this fuel tank top, the centerpiece of the show, available in precious wood veneer, Australian oak in the lead, or in metallic surfaces worked like the bodywork of a 1950s Riva. Forty-five colors for the fairings, twenty-five sand-cast shades applicable even to engine parts. Buying a Type 1 is like spending a morning with a tailor, not at a dealership.

The technology follows the same vein. The 43 mm Öhlins FGRT inverted fork and the TTX36 mono-shock are not there just to look good on a spec sheet. The frame, for its part, abandons all convention: a double-walled aluminum shell that serves as a fuel tank. No tubular trellis, no classic perimeter frame. A structure where engineering and bodywork are one. Braking entrusted to Brembo plays the card of solidity: 320 mm at the front, four-piston radial calipers, 245 mm at the rear. No ABS, no traction control, no electronic aids. The Type 1 assumes that its rider knows what they are doing, or at least has the means to learn.

Faced with this positioning, traditional competition falls away. A Brough Superior or a Harley CVO play in a different register. You have to look to Avinton or NCR to find a comparable philosophy, that of the ultra-limited series built by hand for collectors who are looking for something other than timed performance. Midual understood this from the start by targeting an audience that also buys manually wound watches and bespoke suits. The 35 units of 2016 found buyers before they were even delivered. Each example is named, dated, and numbered. The warranty lasts for four years and after-sales service comes to your home for servicing. You don't ride a Type 1 to the local garage. The garage comes to you, and it arrives with white gloves.