Hey Terry in OZ! watch those anti - duc comments! I have 2 bevel drive twins and I think that motor is a masterpeice. Oops, I had better be nice I need to pick your brain a h#ll of a lot more on my new/crap K1. By the way I have had to suffer the indignity of a stock steel tank on my 900ss since I've owned it. I am going to guess that tank was made by a Brit or an Aussie, just because they seem to love their bikes that much. that thing is probably 1200.00 us.
Ha ha, sorry mate, the old 900SS I had was the most beautiful motorcycle that I've owned, it had the best brakes, and the staccato boom from the conti's was incredible, I could set off car alarms up and down my street on a quiet Sunday morning.
The problem was that for a while in the 1970's, all desmo Ducati's were built on Friday afternoons, and the QA team must have knocked off work at lunchtime. My bike was a well maintained, low mileage bike, but by the time the mechanics split the cases to have a looksee, the hardening on the gears was gone, the crank pin assembly was buggared and the clutch had said goodnight.
I could have spent the 6000 bucks to repair the engine, but for the same money I could buy a good low mileage BMW K100RT, which carried me for another 30,000 miles without a hint of trouble. No character, no pose value, just trouble free motorcycling. I do want another SS, but I'd probably pop for a DOHC Monster instead, I've heard that they're a little more reliable nowadays?
