27 Facts About Ducati

Ducati is directly owned by Italian automotive manufacturer Lamborghini, whose German parent company is Audi, itself owned by the Volkswagen Group.

Ducati soon dropped the Cucciolo name in favor of "55M" and "65TL".

In 1985, Cagiva bought Ducati and planned to rebadge Ducati motorcycles with the "Cagiva" name.

In December 2005, Ducati returned to Italian ownership with the sale of Texas Pacific's stake to Investindustrial Holdings, the investment fund of Carlo and Andrea Bonomi.

Volkswagen chairman Ferdinand Piech, a motorcycle enthusiast, had long coveted Ducati, and had regretted that he passed up an opportunity to buy the company from the Italian government in 1984.

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Since 1926, Ducati has been owned by a number of groups and companies.

Ducati is best known for high-performance motorcycles characterized by large-capacity four-stroke, 90° V-twin engines, with a desmodromic valve design.

Ducati branded his configuration as L-twin because one cylinder is vertical while the other is horizontal, making it look like a letter "L".

Ducati has converted to wet clutches across their current product lines.

Ducati's designs ranged from the small single-cylinder machines that were successful in the Italian 'street races' to the large-capacity twins of the 1980s.

Ducati introduced the Pantah in 1979; its engine was updated in the 1990s in the Ducati SuperSport series.

All modern Ducati engines are derivatives of the Pantah, which uses a toothed belt to actuate the engine's valves.

In 1973, Ducati commemorated its 1972 win at the Imola 200 with the production model green frame Ducati 750 SuperSport.

In 1975 Ducati offered hand-built production racers, the 'square case' 750SS and later 900SS models, built in limited numbers.

Ducati's liquid-cooled, multi-valve 90° V-twins, made from 1985 on, are known as Desmoquattro .

Ducati Paso was introduced in 1986 with the Paso 750, followed in 1989 with the Paso 906.

Ducati has since ceased production of the 916, supplanting it with the 749 and 999.

Ducati has produced several styles of motorcycle engines, including varying the number of cylinders, type of valve actuation and fuel delivery.

Ducati has made other engine types, mostly before the 1970s, with one, two, three, or four cylinders; operated by pull rod valves and push rod valves; single, double and triple overhead camshafts; two-stroke and even at one stage manufactured small diesel engines, many of which were used to power boats, generators, garden machinery and emergency pumps .

Ducati is famous for using the desmodromic valve system championed by engineer and designer Fabio Taglioni, though the firm has used engines that use valve springs to close their valves.

DESMO, the Ducati Enthusiast Sport Motorcycle Organization, is a North American group affiliated with the factory Desmo Owners Club.

Ducati has a wide range of accessories, lifestyle products and co-branded merchandise bearing their logos and designs.

Ducati has a licensing agreement with Tumi Inc, launching a collection of eight co-branded luggage pieces in 2006, sold through both of the brands' retail outlets.

Ducati rejoined Grand Prix motorcycle racing in 2003, after a 30-year absence.

Ducati supplied customer bikes to Pramac Racing, with Mika Kallio and Niccolo Canepa riding for the team in 2009.

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Ducati has entered a bike in every AMA Superbike season since 1986, but withdrew from the series after the 2006 season.

Ducati had an important place in early Superbike racing history in the United States and vice versa: In 1977, Cycle magazine editors Cook Neilson and Phil Schilling took a Ducati 750SS to first place at Daytona in the second-ever season of AMA Superbike racing.