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How
did a small company, originally set up in a basement
in central Bologna, become one of the most famous
enterprises in the motorcycle arena? How did it progress
from making a small condenser to collecting an enviable
number of racing victories?
In this DVD we discover the creation of the company
by three Ducati brothers and their insight into the
future. |
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In
1926, Adriano, Bruno and Marcello Cavalieri Ducati
founded a company, dedicated to the creation of electrical
condensers. Inspired by the achievements of fellow
citizen, Guglielmo Marconi, the three entrepreneurs
created a small laboratory in Bologna, later choosing
Borgo Panigale as the location for a building that
would become famous in Italian industry. After Ducati
was destroyed in a World War 2 bombing raid in 1944,
the Ducati brothers realised that the public needed
new modes of transport to mobilise the country.
They produced the Ducati Cucciolo. |
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| The Cucciolo represented Ducati's first step into the world of motorcycles. Small and reliable, the Cucciolo was a symbol of the Italian post-war renaissance. By 1946 production was underway and in 1949 Ducati completed its first real motorcycle, the Ducati 60, that was soon joined by the Cruiser, the first scooter in the history of Italian motorcycling to have an automatic gearbox. |
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| In
1954 the newly formed company Ducati Meccanica recruited
a man that would come to represent the Ducati product:
Engineer Fabio Taglioni. Entrusted with the far from
simple task of creating a race bike that would be
a winner right from its debut, Taglioni began to
design the Gran Sports that would dominate in such
high level competitions as the Milano Taranto and
the Motogiro d’Italia. |
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| In
1956 Fabio Taglioni took a technical solution that
had already proved successful for Mercedes and its
winning Formula 1 cars of 1954 and 1955 and integrated
the Desmodromic system into a motorcycle for the very
first time. The system featured a sophisticated system
of camshafts and opening and closing rocker arms to
provide a controlled closing of the valves without
using normal coil springs. Victorious upon its debut
in 1956 with the Ducati 125 Desmo, the ‘Desmo‘
engine technology continued to be developed and refined
from that year on and became one of the key features
of Ducati’s tradition. |
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| The
Ducati brand has always been associated with the performance
of the riders who have ridden the Borgo Panigale-made
machines to competition wins and international titles.
Building an incredible history, four generations of
Ducati riders describe their adventures on the track,
their extraordinary experiences with members of the
team and life in the Ducati family. |
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| In
1957 two Ducati employees, Leopoldo Tartarini
and Giorgio Monetti were supported by the company
on a tour around the world onboard two Ducati 175
machines from the production line. This ‘promotional
tour‘, never before imagined for a motorcycle, became
an incredible adventure that saw the two protagonists
complete more than 70,000 kilometres over a period
of twelve months. |
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| Ducati’s
entry to the American motorcycle market was a significant
step for the Italian manufacturer, which started by
developing two important projects, the Apollo and
the Scrambler. Both bikes created history, the former
for being the first Ducati with an ‘L‘ configuration
engine while the Scrambler, initially intended only
for the American market, became the most desired bike
of the moment for Italians. In response to the influx
of Japanese machines in the early 1970s, Ducati produced
its first twins, the 500 GP and the 750 GT. |
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| The
‘Imola 200’ in 1972 was the first competition
for race bikes derived from production machines and
signified one of the most important victories for
the Ducati Twin. At its debut, the ‘750 Imola’
ridden by Paul Smart and Bruno Spaggiari, demonstrated
incredible potential by outclassing the competition
and beating man-of-the-moment, Giacomo Agostini on
the MV Agusta. |
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| Later
in the 1970s, Ducati scored one of its most important
victories in the 1978 Isle of Man Tourist Trophy.
That win on the notorious island track was to be one
of the final victories for Englishman Mike Hailwood™,
the unforgettable champion who began his brilliant
career on board a Ducati in 1958. |
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| The
need for Ducati to update production of the Twin-cylinder
engine meant that in 1979 the ‘L‘ shaped engine
advanced from using a cam drive system that involved
shafts with beveled gears, to one driven by toothed
belts, thus initiating the ‘Pantah‘ project.
This modernisation of the engine came at the same
time as the introduction of the Trellis frame, and
in 1986 went on to introduce the first four-valve
engine, which would later contribute to the birth
of the Superbike family. |
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| The
1990s saw Ducati further strengthened by its success
in Superbike competition and that experience used
in the production of two iconic motorcycles: the Monster
and the 916. This decade brought the creation of Ducati
Corse, dominance in the Superbike championship and
the debut in MotoGP, which then produced a world title
in 2007 with Casey Stoner. |
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