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Hi,

In my continual quest for cool ducati parts, i got a really nice racing tank, the ex owner told me that it was from the racing department...
So i got curious and tried to find which bike this tank belong to, from my (quick) research, it match visually quite well the Desmo parallel twin from 1958, all the other tanks look slightly off, but the desmo twin has the same profile, tabs and cap location.
Here is the picture of the desmo twin from ducati website (could not find other pictures) :

Here is a quickly made overlay picture with the tank:

What do you guys think? anyone know of any other bike using this kind of tank?
More pics:

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it doesn't smell gas at all, but it looks like it did get some action at one point!
Thanks

Greg

I'm jealous!

I see nothing to make me doubt that it could be what you think it is.

I suspect that before you ever go to use it you will have it painted. If it were me I would in my spare time in front of the TV (if I had any such time) take a cloth moistened with a mild paint thinner and slowly try to take the existing exterior red paint off (without taking off the next layer underneath) to see what clues about its history/heritage might be underneath the red paint.

Maybe you find paintwork like that in the black and white photo, or something peculiar to a racing team or rider that could identify where and when it saw usage or maybe even add more value to it.


Jim

Looks like a match to me. That is quite a find! Love the look of those "imperfect" hand formed race tanks. Add me to the list of jealous onlookers.
-Gabe

that is an unbelievable find! awesome tank!
funny thing is, I have a tank that I was told was inspired by too much beer.. after looking at your picture I think it was inspired by your tank.

Ross Thompson could fix that 'beer inspired' tank, the end result would be all metal, no bondo.

It wouldn't be cheap. just perfect.

http://www.execulink.com/~rosst/

John, i can see that your tank was really inspired by beer, and probably 3.5 gallon of it! ahah
Thank you guys, I might try to contact Ducati directly to see if they have more clue... the hard part is going to find the correct person to talk to!
If it really belong to the twin desmo, i'll feel bad using it on my bike, maybe they would be interested in getting it back?
Can't really find more info on the 1958 twin desmo neither, if any of you have some, how many bikes, pictures etc.. that would be greatly appreciated.

The person I think you want to speak to is Livio Lodi who is the Curator of the Ducati Museum.

I used to have his email address, but it was more than a decade ago since I last communicated with Mr Lodi and I may not be able to find the address or it may no longer work.

I do see that Mr. Lodi has a LinkedIn account, and that may serve as a way to make contact.

I had been thinking in the back of my mind that factory may like to have that tank back, but it's rather easy for me to be overly generous with another person's wealth.

That you have even considered the possibility of offering the tank back to Ducati, regardless of whether it would be gifted or you would be somehow compensated, says great things about your character.


Jim

Hi Jim,

I tried to contact Mr Lodi through linkedin, but no luck, no answers (yet )

Hi!
After keeping the tank alone for a while, i decided to grab some acetone and a piece of cloth and rubbed the red lacquer, here is how it looks under, it appears that it has been sanded off a little, but the paint scheme is quite nice, same blue as diana with red pinstripe:

Have you ever seen photos of a Mondial dustbin from the 50's? The paint reminds me of that. Very cool.