DUCATI’S V-TWIN DYNASTY
With the Ducati’s V-twin superbike family destined for the history books, we took a worthy walk down memory lane to relive 29 years of booming brilliance.
Ducati’s liquid-cooled, eight-valve V-twins have been so successful for so long that the end hardly seems possible, but the name printed on the red, white and green fairing confirms it: the 1299 Panigale R Final Edition will be the Bologna factory’s last desmo V-twin flagship. In November at EICMA in Milan, Ducati will unveil a new-generation super-sports V4. And unlike the limited-production Desmosedici RR of a decade ago, this V4 will take over as the firm’s top mass-produced sports bike, ending an era of liquid-cooled, eight-valve desmo V-twin dominance that began way back in 1988 with the original 851.
That format has served Ducati brilliantly for almost three decades. In an everincreasing line of model numbers from 851 to 1299, eight-valve V-twins have built the firm’s reputation, winning 14 World Superbike rider championships and 15 manufacturers’ titles, plus countless races, national-level series and awards for design and Bike of the Year. Sure, there have been other important Ducatis too: Monsters and Multistradas, sports-tourers and even Scramblers. But it was the eight-valve V-twin superbikes that dragged Ducati into the modern world and did most to turn a low-volume, loss-making firm with a reputation for dodgy electrics into a brand famed for glamorous design, cutting-edge technology and racetrack glory.
Internal warfare
Ducati’s status was very different in 1985, when the firm was bought by Claudio and Gianfranco Castiglioni, whose Cagiva company produced small-capacity bikes at nearby Varese. In the Seventies, Ducati’s reputation had been built on rorty V-twins including the 900SS, and Mike Hailwood’s TT comeback win in 1978. But by ’85 its air-cooled bikes were outdated, investment by previous owners the VM Group had been minimal, and in the previous year production had declined to a record low of just 1765 bikes. Among Ducati’s remaining assets was young engineer Massimo Bordi, the head of engine R&D. Bordi had joined the firm direct from Bologna University, where the subject of his degree thesis had been a desmodromic four-valve cylinder head. This combined the positive valve closure system, used successfully by Ducati’s legendary former chief engineer Fabio Taglioni, with the multi-valve layout of Cosworth’s allconquering F1 racecar engines.
Since joining Ducati, Bordi had been forced to spend much of his time working on industrial diesel engines, as well as developing the air-cooled Pantah V-twin. When new boss Claudio Castiglioni requested ideas for a new-generation engine, Bordi suggested an eight-valve desmo V-twin, inspired by his thesis – but found fierce opposition from Taglioni, still a powerful figure at Ducati. According to Bordi, Taglioni was jealous of the idea and told him, “This engine is wrong. You will be fired next year and then I will tell you why it is wrong,” before sketching a four-cylinder desmo alternative himself.
This battle between engineers would arguably be more important to Ducati than anything that ever took place on a racetrack
– and the younger man won. With Castiglioni’s backing, Bordi began development of a high-performance, eight-valve desmo V-twin that also featured liquid-cooling and fuel-injection. By September 1986 Ducati’s small team had built a 748cc prototype, fitted in a modified 750F1 chassis that they entered in the Bol d’Or 24 hours, ridden by an all-star team of Virginio Ferrari, Juan Garriga and former 500cc world champion Marco Lucchinelli.
The V-twin was quick: I was in that race too and can still recall Ferrari out-braking me in the middle of the night before outpacing my GSX-R750. After 15 hours the Ducati team was in seventh place when a broken con-rod ended a promising debut. Six months later, in March 1987, the V-twin had been enlarged to 851cc and was producing 120bhp at the rear wheel – enough to give Lucchinelli a comfortable win at the Daytona Battle of the Twins race. In April of the following year the Italian scored an even bigger win, at the first round of the new World Superbike championship at Donington Park.
It started with the Strada
More to the point, by this time Ducati had begun production of the 851 Strada streetbike, as well as an 851 Superbike for racing only (plus a small run of higher spec, 888cc Lucchinelli replicas). The roadster produced a claimed maximum of 100bhp at 8250rpm, held its black-finished engine in a chrome-molybdenum trellis frame, and weighed a claimed 180kg dry. Curiously, it had 16in wheels instead of 17-inchers like the Superbike racer, whose frame was identical. The Strada looked good, if slightly bulbous, in its curvy full fairing, tricolore paint scheme and single seat. The engine was flexible; the Weber injection worked pretty well. Acceleration was strong, if no better than that of Suzuki’s similarly powerful GSX-R750, as the Ducati rumbled towards a top speed of close to 140mph. But I was far from the only rider who found the 851’s handling distinctly strange, especially at slow speed.
The culprits were the 16in wheels, which Ducati initially claimed had been specified due to lack of 17in radials from Michelin, although Bimota’s YB4 was so equipped. Whatever the reason, uncertain handling was one reason for the muted reaction to the 851 Strada. Another was the price: at £10,995 it cost more than Suzuki’s GSX-R1100 and Yamaha’s FZR1000 put together. Ducati built only 300 units, and still had to
discount some to get rid of them. But Bordi was learning fast, and just a year later the 851 was comprehensively overhauled. Visually it was revamped with slimmer bodywork, painted Italian racing red like Lucchinelli’s factory racer. Reshaped cams, higher compression ratio and a new exhaust raised output to 104bhp and boosted midrange too.
And the biggest change was to the chassis, which gained a modified steering head, longer Marzocchi shock and, most importantly, the 17in wheels it should have had all along. The result was a rapid, sweet-revving bike that handled and stopped as well as any superbike on the road. The 851 was revitalised, sales were much stronger, and Ducati’s eight-valve line was up and running.
The birth of an icon
That was also true on track, where Raymond Roche and Doug Polen won three straight World Superbike championships in the early Nineties. Alongside the standard 851 Strada, the factory brought some of that factory magic to the street with a series of 888cc Sport Production specials, starting in 1990 with the SP2. By 1992 the series had reached the SP4, and in that year came the most exotic model of the lot: the 888SPS, or Sport Production Special, of which only 100 were built. The SPS featured an enlarged, 888cc engine with high extra compression, big valves and hot cams giving 120bhp at the rear wheel. Its chassis spec more than matched that, featuring Kevlar and carbonfibre fuel tank and bodywork, and Öhlins suspension. The price was an eye-watering £16,650, but for early-Nineties speed, blood and thunder there was nothing to match it.
Two years later Ducati raised the stakes in a subtly different way with the 916. By this time Castiglioni had hired former Bimota co-founder Massimo Tamburini, who had established the Cagiva Research Centre at San Marino, near his home town of Rimini. The design genius and his small team created a bike that set new standards of streetbike style and performance.
The 916 got its name from the larger, 916cc capacity generated by its longer-stroke crankshaft. But although peak output was increased slightly over the 888cc unit to 114bhp, most engine parts were unchanged. The rest of the bike was new, including the chrome-molybdenum trellis frame, which gained rigidity with an extra engine mount at the rear.
Tamburini and his right-hand man Massimo Parenti had considered using an aluminium frame, and got as far as a non-running prototype before deciding the layout didn’t suit Ducati tradition. Instead they combined their new steel frame with an aluminium single-sided swingarm, which Tamburini admitted was chosen for looks rather than stiffness. Style the 916 had in abundance, thanks largely to gorgeously sleek bodywork that incorporated a highlevel exhaust. The look matched the performance of a bike that charged to over 150mph, had storming midrange grunt, weighed a very competitive 195kg, handled superbly, sounded gorgeous (especially with obligatory Termi cans fitted) and raised Ducati’s profile to undreamt-of levels.
Money matters
But popularity aside, the success of the 916 wasn’t sufficient to finance Castiglioni’s expensive dream of leading Cagiva to the 500cc world championship, with late payments to suppliers causing production to almost halve to fewer than 13,000 bikes in 1996. Around this time I recall visiting the Varese factory and seeing a warehouse full of unfinished 916s, awaiting parts that presumably hadn’t been paid for.
Then, in September of that year, Ducati was bought by US investment group Texas Pacific, which cleared over $50 million of debts and invested in a new generation of bikes. Top of the range was the eight-valver, whose first big upgrade was the Testastretta (‘narrow head’) engine. The 996R was produced in a run of just 500 units, all of which sold out online in a day when unveiled at the previous year’s Intermot show, despite a price of £17,000. The short-stroke motor’s capacity was actually 998cc, and its revvy yet grunty performance contributed to a stunning bike that also benefitted from Öhlins units at both ends, plus uprated Brembo brakes.
Identity crisis
By 2002 the Testastretta engine had been adopted throughout the eight-valve family, which was renamed 998 to reflect the capacity. The standard model produced 123bhp, featured Showa forks and Öhlins shock, and came in red or yellow with single- or dual-seat. Along with the hottedup, 126bhp 998S and limited-edition 998R it was the end of the Tamburini-styled line, because the following year saw the arrival of the dramatically different 999.
This was the most comprehensive eight-valve update yet, trumpeted by Ducati as a ‘Redvolution’ – and, as soon became clear, a huge mistake. Much about Pierre Terblanche’s design was good. The engine was mechanically unchanged; intake and exhaust mods added a single horsepower to a maximum of 124bhp, plus more in the
midrange. A stiffer, slimmer and lower chassis with twin-sided swingarm improved stability; an adjustable seat and footrests boosted control and comfort.
But as soon as the 999 was unveiled it was clear that its styling, with vertically stacked headlights replacing the 998’s horizontally arranged twin lenses, was a move too far. Criticism was vicious; sales of the 999 and identically styled 749 were slow. Neither the arrival of a 136bhp, Öhlins-shod 999S, nor even a 2005 update that saw the subtly reshaped base model’s output increased to 140bhp, could make the 999 a hit.
It was a sound bike, though – as has belatedly been realised – and it led to an outstanding one. The 999R, released in mid-2004 as a homologation special for AMA Superbike racing, was a weapon: powered by a short-stroke, genuinely 999cc motor whose bigger, titanium valves, hot cams and forged pistons helped lift output to 150bhp. Carbon bodywork and trick Öhlins suspension helped give a difficult chapter an exciting ending. But Ducati’s financial fortunes had plummeted with the failure of its most profitable model family. Another complete redesign was necessary, and it arrived in 2007 with the 1098.
New bike, old habits
Young designer Gianandrea Fabbro’s creation, with its return to slanted twin headlights and an aggressive, nose-down look, was a clear development of the old 916/998 line, and there was much more to the 1098 than a new set of shiny red clothes.
The new, 1099cc Testastretta Evoluzione motor was comprehensively redesigned using much race-learned expertise, to produce 160bhp. The more rigid, larger-tube trellis frame was also lighter, and once again held a single-sided swingarm. Brembo’s racedeveloped Monobloc calipers appeared for the first time; dry weight was just 173kg. The 1098 was magical at its launch at high-altitude Kyalami in South Africa, and faster still almost everywhere else.
Even better was the following year’s 1098R, and not just because its enlarged, 1198cc engine produced no less than 180bhp. With race-kit Termignoni pipes and ECU, that figure increased by a further 6bhp. But the exotic, £24,000 1098R’s claim to fame is that with the kit fitted it became the first sports bike with traction control, based on the system Ducati had developed for the Desmosedici MotoGP racer. Development chief Andrea Forni wasn’t joking when he said the 1098R was “more similar to a works bike than ever before in Ducati’s history”.
As usual with Ducati, the technology soon filtered down to mass-production. The 2009-model 1198S had traction control to help regulate an engine that produced 170bhp. It was a superb bike: stylish, sweet-handling, powerful, blisteringly fast. And the way the 1198S brought MotoGP’s anti-spin technology to the street made it hugely significant.
Pan-tastic!
Even so, it was nothing like the jump that Ducati made with its successor: the 1199 Panigale. The name was inspired by Ducati’s local area of Bologna, yet ironically the Panigale’s design represented a total break with tradition. The 1198cc, over-square or ‘Superquadro’ powerplant was held in a chassis that abandoned Ducati’s familiar steel tubes for a revolutionary aluminium monocoque, as used by the Desmosedici V4 in MotoGP, that doubled as the airbox and used the engine as a stressed member.
The ultra-short stroke (and a move to cam drive by chain, instead of belt) allowed a heady 11,000rpm rev limit and a maximum output of 195bhp, a massive 25bhp increase that put Ducati’s V-twin right up with the
most powerful fours. Its magnesium headlight support and other weight-saving features contributed to an equally remarkable 10kg drop in dry weight to just 188kg. Ducati’s lavish press riding launch at Yas Marini in Abu Dhabi reflected the status of the most important V-twin since the 851.
The Panigale’s sleek looks helped make it a hit, and the upmarket 1199 S, with three riding modes, quick-shifter and electronically adjustable Öhlins suspension, was as high-tech as it was fast. It thundered to over 180mph, steered quickly and braked ferociously thanks to its ABS-equipped Brembo Monoblocs.
The next model in line was even more extreme. The 1199 Panigale R, launched in 2013 in an attempt to help Carlos Checa regain the World Superbike title he had won two years earlier on the 1098, featured titanium con rods, a lightened crank and Ducati’s first ever adjustable swingarm pivot. It revved to 12,000rpm, offered almost unlimited potential for fine-tuning and was a thrilling way to spend over £26,000. The following year’s 1199 Superleggera, dripping with carbon, titanium and magnesium, weighed just 155kg dry and was even better. Bigger means better Next came a mass-produced model that was destined to remain a landmark, not least because its phenomenal output of 205bhp at 10,500rpm meant it was more than twice as powerful as the original 851. The 1299 Panigale took all the good bits of the 1199, and added 10bhp at the top end plus 15 per cent more torque between 5000 and 8000rpm. In the case of the Panigale S it also added uprated electronics including a two-way quick-shifter, semi-active Öhlins suspension and cornering ABS. Every aspect of its performance was majestic, and its style and V-twin character put the gloss on an utterly captivating motorbike.
The special editions have been suitably spectacular too. Last year’s 1299 Panigale S Anniversario was really just a limited-edition 90th birthday model with minor styling and electronic changes. But the 1299 Superleggera unleashed this year is something else. Its 215bhp engine plus carbon-fibre frame, swingarm and wheels give a blend of performance and lightness that would have been unthinkable 31 years ago. V4 Victory? The 1299 Panigale R Final Edition is another exotic, low-volume (though not limitededition, as it’s Euro 4 compliant) gem that makes you wonder how Ducati could abandon decades of V-twin flagship tradition when they’re so close to perfection. But engineer-turned-CEO Claudio Domenicali has never been afraid to innovate.
Domenicali doesn’t need reminding that the gap since Ducati’s last World Superbike title is five years and counting – more than twice as big as ever before. After a decade spent developing the Desmosedici, he is in no doubt that a V4 can take over on both road and track. “The V-twin is a superb engine with some characteristics that remain unmatched,” he says. “But the balance between weight, power and torque of the V4 we are developing is superior.”
Just as these days hardly anyone looks at the Final Edition and bemoans the fact that it doesn’t have a steel trellis frame, no doubt we’ll soon be admiring Ducati’s latest rocketship without worrying that its engine is a V4 rather than a V-twin. Especially as it’s sure to contain some desmo DNA. As Bordi’s creation proved, sometimes you just have to take a bold leap into the future.