For the last three weeks, I’ve been revisiting my childhood as the kid who can’t wait to get downstairs and open his Christmas presents, only to be frustrated by an entirely unreasonable (in my self-obsessed juvenile view) parental moratorium on leapings around before 5:30am. This time however the problem is not adult whim but the non-appearance of Santa’s sleigh — the one carrying my new Ducati. I’m fed up, the dealer is fed up and the ever-helpful Ducati UK are no doubt fed up with my plaintive — and no doubt still self-obsessed — phone calls. My bike was the second UK order and, apparently, was built as such, in the first batch of black 1200S Touring spec bikes. It was then loaded onto the trailers that were to go to the UK. No problem so far. What has apparently happened is that the shipping company have picked up the trailers in the wrong order. And, to judge by the 14-day lead time from Bologna to the UK, they bring them here via Central Africa. Guys, I could CYCLE from Bologna to the UK in less than 14 days…
Tag: Ducati (Page 2 of 2)
Seven years. Seven years? That’s 45,000 miles and but a single breakdown on my ST4s — my matt grey STealth machine — and it’s not even clear whether that breakdown was component failure or dealer-induced (another story too long in the telling). And once again going strong, even after three years of enduro use on our so-called drive — a kilometre of potholed track, with bombholes and mudbaths enough to please the most discerning hippo. Fully serviced suspension has brought the dear old thing back into an extended prime, but the world moves on and its time to see where to go next. Or rather, “as well”, as I’ve no intention of getting rid of the ST4s. But what to get?
Now things have changed. A lot. Motorcycles are very different from what they were in the early Noughties, as is my life. They’re faster, more sophisticated and more expensive. My life is has probably managed two of those three, but with a complete transplant from the depths of the overcrowded Home Counties to the wilds of a Highland Glen. New life, new places, but still with love and mammals. What hasn’t changed is that I still live on some of the finest biking roads on the planet, so the basic need hasn’t changed:
I still want a SPORTS tourer. More than ever I need the virtues of comfort, adaptability and a decent tank range — the last of these being utterly essential, given the distances between filling stations hereabouts — Highland Scotland is several times the size of Wales, but with the population of Cardiff. That makes for a lot of empty roads, motorcyclists for the entertainment of…
And heated grips have gone from being a luxury to a necessity.
&ldquot;You go touring. On a Ducati? — so where’s the tow truck?&rdquot; — if I’d had a quid (Eng. coll: unit of currency) for every time I’d heard that from fellow bikers, I’d be at least a couple of dozen cappucinos to the good. So here’ we are, three years and 31,000 miles down the line, and me and the Stealth Bomber are not only still hanging around together, but doing very well — I haven’t even managed to drop it yet, despite one panic-fuelled deadlift of 210kg — a strained muscle was self-healing, fairings aren’t. So, 31,000 miles in three years, on a Ducati. Without a support vehicle? (remembering that the average annual mileage of a Ducati in the UK is 2,500) Er, yes actually, so it’s probably worth a review of the score so far — let’s see just how temperamental these ‘fragile’ Italian beasts really are. First, the vital statistics:
Number of breakdowns: 0.
Number of no-starts: 0.
Number of not-quite starts: 1 (cold day and dodgy battery – replaced under warranty).
Number of stops on-the-road: 0 (although a worn-out wheel bearing discovered at the Nurburgring caused some nervous twitching).
Sometimes, just sometimes, there is no middle ground of opinion, no equivocation and no compromise possible for those times, places, events or objects which excite lust, disgust, incomprehension, inspiration or apoplexy — anything but apathy. As with Marmite (that’s Vegemite to the antipodally-challenged) itself, you either love it or hate it, and, if you’ve enough confidence in your product, you can even make an advertising campaign out of it. To be a tad more specific, if you are a motorcyclist and have ever seen a Ducati Multistrada, you have an opinion. You will either consider it an abomination, to be consigned to the pit whence it came, preferably as the headstone of its designer, Pierre Terreblanche, or as a bold and unconstrained leap into the future of what a motorcycle should be.
The awakening mind prompts again — it’s got a lot to deal with at the moment — some good, some bad and some merely paradoxical. But around and around it whirls all the same. The best medicine for this is the detachment of doing something — anything that requires total focus. This however from someone who, in the general course of things, is quite capable (to choose but two instances) of having malevolent door frames leap out and gratuitously bruise him or of losing the sunglasses that he’s been wearing for the last two hours — without taking them off.
That focus comes though, when I change modes — when I’m skiing, reading compelling books or listening to truly great music. But above all, it comes when I’m on the edge, in that space where enjoyment and survival depend on the interplay between concentration, judgement and execution. And that, for me, is when I’m skiing the high mountains, extreme mountain biking or motorcycling for its own sake. As it’s mid-April, and I’m in Southern England, let’s say it’s going to be a motorcycling day.
In Southern England, an only moderate spring and summer have suddenly sequed into a classical Indian Summer – it hasn’t rained at all for over two months. Today, it is absolutely pissing down. So guess when my new bike arrived?? Very nearly right – I actually picked it up yesterday afternoon, and managed the first 60 miles in the glow of a glorious Autumn evening, presumably running on residual kharmic credit. It’s been damply downhill ever since.
There have already been more words written and opinions expressed on the Ducati 999 than on most machines of recent years — replacing something as iconic as the 916 design was never going to be less than contentious. Over the next few months we’ll all no doubt be reading test reports and comparisons on the 999 until terminal boredom sets in. We’ll see it being wheelied, stoppied, ridden knee down, elbow down and occasionally arse up, by road testers whose behaviour is entirely untempered by the need to pay for maintenance, tyres and damage. Good for them — we’ll enjoy the vicarious carnage.
Me, I’m neither particularly fast nor painfully slow, moderately competent on a good day and prone to the occasional braindead moment — pretty much like most of us, then. So this is the everyman opinion, albeit concocted over the course of a single hour-and-a-bit’s test ride. This test ride has been occasioned by the decision to change bikes — time to pension off the faithful 748 for something a little newer, perhaps a little quicker and possibly a little more comfortable — the old injuries are playing up.
So here are my very personal impressions of what is, in brief, dynamically the best motorcycle I have ever ridden; visually, one that I find to be something of a curate’s egg and which I found ergonomically, er, perplexing. Of course, your mileage may vary…
This is where we go back to square one — one reason for buying a bike now, rather than at any other time in recent years. Easy one — they’re cheaper now than they’ve probably ever been. So why’s this, when nearly everything else in the UK is a gross rip-off? Dedication to the cause and enlightened self interest by the manufacturers and importers? Do me a favour — it’s all down to dear old Adam Smith, as interpreted by the EU.
After years of UK market prices being fixed by manufacturer’s cartels, the EU single market has now made it illegal for manufacturers to stop people buying the vehicle of their choice in any EU country. That of course hasn’t stopped them trying to get out of it — just ask Volkswagen what their recent 100M+ Euro fine was for. In the case of the UK, they usually use the need to supply a right-hand drive car as the reason for either not supplying or delaying the supply of a car. That barrier of course doesn’t apply to motorcycles — they are easily transportable and, most importantly, there’s no major conversion (lights and speedos only) required to suit them for the UK.
Given that motorcycle manufacturers and importers continued to hold their UK retail prices at 30-40% higher than the mainland, the last few years have seen an enormous rise in the number of independent dealers supplying parallel imports. Other than minor spec differences, including the Euro-voluntary 100bhp restriction, these machines are pretty much identical to an officially imported model, only way cheaper.
The upshot of course is that, with their market under increasing pressure, the major importers and manufacturers all cut their list prices dramatically in late 1998 or thereabouts. Since then, the sticker ‘premium’ for an official machine has shrunk to perhaps 15%. As I’ve found however, that’s only the start of the story — everything is up for negotiation.
So what’s missing if you go parallel? Depends on who you go to — there are parallel dealers who appear out of a backyard, bring in few bikes in crates, dump them on naive or greedy punters and vanish back into the mire whence they came. There are also parallel importers who care about service. Most manufacturers won’t honour pan-European warranties on machines bought in countries other than where they were originally supplied, so parallel warranties are usually provided by insurance policies, which don’t always offer the same level of cover as a full manufacturer’s warranty.
All things considered, a decent parallel dealer should be no better and no worse than any ‘official’ dealer. Unfortunately, that doesn’t say much — there are enough horror stories around from official dealers to base the parallel/official choice on reputation and direct experience rather than simply which camp they fall into. So, in the interest of adding to the overall body of knowledge, here’s my own experiences:
In the Beginning…
All stories should have a beginning — here it’s 1977, and my first bike, a 1958 Royal Enfield Crusader Sports, 849 EBB. Bought in a box and several paper bags for £80 and rebuilt over the summer of 1976 by myself and my father, this was my transport through my second and third years at University. Sold in 1978 to fund an expedition to Africa, it was briefly seen in about 1988, putting down Princes Street in Edinburgh, pursued by myself on foot, with a cry of “Come back you bastard, I want my bike back!!”
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