They tell me that a Ducati is the equivelant of a 2 wheeled Ferrari.....I can believe it. 15 years ago I owned a rather splendid Ducati 900 Superlight, this I had for about 3 years and used daily as a commuter vehicle. Now I was told that it would be dead unreliable and that I'd really need 2 of them, you know 'one for the road and one for the garage being fixed' that old chesnut! Well not so with this one, it's Italian engineering coupled to Hitachi electronics made it bullet proof. However as things turned out it was not 'deer proof' and in my 3rd year of riding it daily, I hit a deer with it! Oh dear oh dear, this did knock my confidence in bikes and although we were both ok and remained vertical during the collision, I decided to sell the Duke and remain on 4 wheels instead. Fast forward 15 or so years and I regretted selling that bike since it was so pretty. Then one night in a local gastro pub I ran into the Chap who bought the Duke, I asked him how he liked it, upon which he explained that he never rode even it in all the time he had it and that he never past his bike test either. THEN..................in true Italian fashion he made me an offer I couldn't refuse.. And so here it is returning back to its original owner....ME! Note the first picture shows it with my Lotus V8 in the 1990s and the rest show it's return with the girls checking it out.....Emily is doing the restoration. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Congratulations!!! It looks gorgeous and still in great shape. My 95 SS/SP was one of my all-time favorite machines. I sold it to buy a 748 but would love to find it again.... 2cam
Great story, enjoy it. Nothing wrong with motorcycle as art. I have one bike I have no intention of riding any real distance. Just like the look of it. Makes me smile.
Helluva a machine for a guy who can't pass a bike license test. I suspect they both may have met a bad end if he had. You were destined to have it.
Great story indeed and I must say it looks more natural in front of the Mondial vs the Lotus but beautiful in both pics!
Cheers Guys for you comments here.. Well it's still in good shape but it's a monoposto so if I decide to ride it againI will have to figure out a twin seat arrangement for Emily, although she is lusting after a 6cyl engined bike herself. Thing is though with bikes you rarely get a second chance and I worry. So like PvDirk said, maybe it'll be a glorified ornament that I tootle down the shops on, and the rest of the time it'll just live in my studioas a disply, I don't know. I love the machiness of it and it's great to ride, I even ride like I'm invisible and that attitude has saved me many times from car drivers etc. But where we live there is road kill everywhere and I don't even drive Kato near dawn or dusk when animals are onthe move.. Anyway it's great to have it back and Emily wants to dismantle and clean it up to near showroom, get bits plated, cambelt change etc. Also she is fascinated by the desmo valve train system and wants to tackle that although I know it won't actually need doing because I did it myself before I sold the bike. Apparently it was run up every year, it's air cooled so there should be no issues with it. Emily will do the belts and check everything on the engine before she even attempts a start, so inthe meantime the Duke is sitting quietly waiting...... All the best Bell ;-) ps.yes I think it looks better next to the Ferrari too..
The Duc is great...but this Italian beauty has the engine with a Ferrari inspired head....and it certainly sounds like one when wound up! Brock Image Unavailable, Please Login
Wow coollooking bike, however it does look like it might transform at any moment..... Image Unavailable, Please Login
Ah yes, now that's a proper bike! That's an Ace Cafe 'ton up' hairy chested road burner..... Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Very sweet! Ducati is the only motorbike I like and I do not like motorbikes in general though I drove moped Vespa scooter, which I really much liked, but I guess that was because of the birds always wanted to have a lift 90ties.. that was a very different time Bell! You could still make a decent crash and still walk away with same scratches of course wearing the most unsafe helmet being in your shorts & sneakers. Nowadays... you will be doomed to be road kill yourself as our highways and even provincial roads got too busy to make a decent crash then it was in the 90ties. I think the US of A is the best continent to tour your bike like The Hogs Far stretched road where you make a decent crash and only hit a cactus. Not sure if that is pleasant Anyways! love the bike and keep it safe!
Hey Guys, here is the Ducati cocktail bar in Rome that plied us with free food etc all evening. This is the one where the night staff thought I was that bloke 'Kid Rock' ha ha Went back the following day for breakfast, night staff had gone and my hair tied up plus daytime attire meant that my new found celebrity status just evaporated ... Anyway here are some shots of the bikes in the bar and us sampling some more yummy cocktails. I didn't realise Ducati made motorised pedal bikes all those years ago. Oh and the final shots were taken in what should be the most haunted places in Rome given all the hundreds of thousands of people that died there, yes the Colosseum! Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
As a youngster I had a couple of two wheelers. The first was a Vespa and I am lucky to have survived the one Interstate trip I took. The second was a 1948 Harley hard tail that I am both luck to have survived and lucky not to have gone to jail. It had no front brake. The tranny would drop its oil change plug and provide a rooster tail of oil. But I got religion when the local cop stopped me after chasing me out of town without my knowledge. It was without my knowledge because the only way I could ride it at highs speed (no speedometer) was to plant my feet on the floor boards and fixate straight ahead. I tried to slow down for my left turn but missed it by about 200 yards, looked into the vibrating rear view (bicycled) mirror and noticed the flashing red lights. The cop unsnapped his side arm, and with red face approached me and asked how fast I was going. I said I did not know and he said he chased me at over 100 mph. Also said he had radioed ahead for a road block. I was a local boy in a small rural town and he calmed down right away. Then he took one look at the bike and calmly pronounce it was unroad worthy. That was not in dispute. He had me push the bike back the 200 yards to my original intended left turn, and let me off with a stop sign violation. He did not have jurisdiction outside the town and did not charge me with everything else I had done. But I was confident I would never survive actual long term motorcycle ownership. I was home for shipping off to Vietnam and that seemed, perhaps, a less dangerous endeavor. Over the decades I have learned it was the proper choice. There are few 'fender benders' with two wheelers. So many people I have known have been seriously "f****d up and even killed. One of my lady friends was intent on owning a 650 one cylinder Savage and it broke her ankle. While at a dead stop it fell over on her. On the other hand my immediate family have been serious bikers for decades without a single broken bone. A full-on crash laydown in front of a truck at 50 mph but only screwed up the bike. My diminutive niece rode my brothers Harley XLCH, which he had dropped at 45 mph without damaged, moved on to a BMW 650, and now has a Ural with side car. The entire family, now getting older, has moved to side cars. At least three of them. They are partial to Moto Guzzis which have the same bad wiring as our cars and use similar intermediate solenoids. A lady acquaintance did a full face plant into a tree on her BMW, survived with only curious mental damage though part of the engine is still in the tree and rides to this day. Look up "Tail of the Dragon" and 'tree of shame'. The dragon is world famous and is near where I live and have driven it myself in a four wheeler. I once rolled a Caddi CTS in the local mountains over a cliff, upside down and backwards without damage to myself. Every single surface on the car was ruined. Though, when sliding upside down past the trees I said to myself I would need an entirely new paint job. I always told myself I was only permitted one bad accident. So after that I stopped my serious hot rodding.
Your are correct about USA. My sister and brother-in-law [the Motto Guzzi] people have a good friend from The Netherlands who keeps a bike in, I believe, Kentucky and does a yearly tour. Which is how my family met him. His wife never would visit because she was afraid we are too dangerous a place. However, he is now older and retiring from riding and brought his wife for a normal tour and stayed with my family a few days in Ohio.
Bell, Nice Slide Show! And Italy! I tell everyone "If you have only one foreign trip from USA go to Italy!" Venice in January would be a good start. PS: If I had the balls I would take in the Great Pyramid Of Giza once again. The grand gallery ... Jeeze 5,000 years old. Humans fear time. Time fears the Pyramids.
Yes Venice definitely, no place like it on earth, completely magical! Egypt the pyramids is on my wish list but it's too dangerous at the moment. However we have just come back from Athens which was lovely with lovely friendly people, in a very chilled and laidback walkable city.
My x-wife plundered Herculanium of marble and made me a signet ring! It was my second visit and we had an Italian American with us. The two of them were meandering about so I took off on my own. Then they ran across a grounds keeper and the two Italians struck up a conversation. He took out his keys and showed the two of them many things I never saw, including a large marble bathtub in one or another 'villa'. Ex wife mentioned she knew how to 'cabichon' marble, and the grounds keeper plucked up a scrap piece and gave it to her. Damn.....
