Ducati Monster Forum

Good read

http://hellforleathermagazine.com/2012/04/what-vw-means-for-ducati/ (http://hellforleathermagazine.com/2012/04/what-vw-means-for-ducati/)

yes it was a good read...for those unsubscribed, it won't be open for long.

What's the skinny for those who aren't subscribers?

"Nothing will change"
"Piech wanted Ducati for his own personal reasons"
"VW/Audi doesn't need Ducati and its 1.2 bill price is a drop in the bucket for a company that generates 8+ bil in revenue every year with sales of 209 billion"

Here is the story on Reuters ...

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/17/audi-ducati-idUSL6E8FH5DR20120417 (http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/17/audi-ducati-idUSL6E8FH5DR20120417)

Interestingly, my three vehicles - a white VW Jetta TDI, a blue Porsche 911 C4 and a blue/white Ducati S4R are now all from the same "stable", and although they are all "blau mit weiss" none of them are BMW's  :D

Duchess

I didn't catch the end of your bike purchasing thread. Congratulations. Good choice. It's funny because you never really know what you want until you ride it.

Ducati Monster TDI   [Dolph] lol

well...the closest I have ever seen to that is this  -> http://www.gizmag.com/go/4273/ (http://www.gizmag.com/go/4273/)

would I love to see it come to fruition?....hell yeah...but not bloody likely.

https://www.audi-mediaservices.com/publish/ms/content/en/public/pressemitteilungen/2012/04/18/audi_ag_acquires_sports.standard.gid-oeffentlichkeit.html (https://www.audi-mediaservices.com/publish/ms/content/en/public/pressemitteilungen/2012/04/18/audi_ag_acquires_sports.standard.gid-oeffentlichkeit.html)

time to update the site domain name to www. Audi Ducati Monster forum.org

I think the biggest change will be that Audi will want to increase production numbers.

hope this means, that audi dealers will now sell bikes and do service much like BMW does. There is always a shortage of dealers... and  [bacon]

Maybe they will fix the tank issue  [laugh]

My thought exactly.  Maybe with Audi's money behind them, they can permanently resolve the plastic/expanding tank issue.  Definitely has me looking elsewhere for a replacement bike down the road.

Sorry guys, they got a settlement over that issue and I doubt they'll be reopening it. 

okay...tired of the statements of dreaming that are getting repeated and I have to chime in with a reality check for a moment....what this will do for VW/Audi is nothing really....it is another boutique figurehead brand they can attach to their belt to say they own it...


what this will more than likely do for Ducati is very little...the biggest change is that Ducati should be able to access better buying power through VW's purchasing negotiation of volume through any trading partners they have which should potentially lower the price of some parts and increase the availability...that is short term...long term, industrial expansion for their programs beyond Borgo Panigale and materials and so forth used for development are going to be increased so that they can expand as they need to and should give them greater access to things they may not have previously been able to access/afford...and this should help them increase output and volume in a similar fashion to the level of expansion that Lamborghini has experienced

It will be interesting to see if Bosch components make a comeback on Ducatis..

Or if Ducati Energia components make an intro on VW/Audi cars...

Well I know you all want my opinion. So I'll forecast good things to come. At least Harley didn't buy them. And BTW, isn't it VAG that's really buying Ducati?
It would be great if they did something about the faulty PA6 fuel cells, but can we at least hope they would acknowledge the issue, and attempt to remedy with future product? I mean considering that even the bikes being made now aren't immune?
I don't think the design sensibilities will change at all, so no worries about bland styling and all the bikes being painted silver. I very much like Audi styling anyway BTW. Lambo became a more useful car after VAG bought them, if you will remember how brutal they used to be pre-buyout. Better a Ducaudi than no Ducati at all. Italy's just about bankrupt; all of southern Europe's up the creek. Spain is going through major pain. Better they got bought up than allowed to die. These are tough times.
How many owners has Ducati had now anyway? They will keep pissing excellence no matter what. All the radicality they have introduced in the past few years have been critical successes and I don't see this latest development being an issue.

Dealer network/service would definitely increase sales IMO.  Another benefit is the "loaner" program while it's being repaired.   Think any s series 4 wheelers would be available?   [evil]

Well... one thing that's just always prove true for Ducatis'...

Duc's always get some VAG sooner or later ;) haha

Siemens is German last time I checked. ;)

I'd expect little from the group for Ducati other than finance and accounting. Piech is not dumb enough to "kill the goose that lays the golden eggs". Piech is not Bavarian.  8)

Maybe you could also explain to the lads that VAG is very far from being "VW". I haven't the patience. Had the politics gone very slightly differently, we'd be looking a PAG anyway.  ;D

Can I say that I hown an Audi now? ;D

Ducati Quattro anyone ?  

Or a real Ducati Diesel, not the fake marketing one ...

I now own 3 VW's - a Jetta, a 911 and an S4R ... Laughing at myself, because my initials are also VW :D

Siemens efi is only on a couple of bikes...696... the rest are marelli...

i think you're right about the vag contribution.   too bad its not pag...

Here it is on bloomberg
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/17/audi-ducati-idUSL6E8FH5DR20120417 (http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/17/audi-ducati-idUSL6E8FH5DR20120417)

 There is some very smart people that know what they are doing over there at Ducati and they will make great use of this new found money over at the R&D department.

 Hopefully style wont be sacrificed.  Some part of me loved the fact that Ducati was such a small company that made bikes in limited output.  Going to be very interesting to see how/if the bikes/company changes from here on out.  I say this is a good assuming the same people are behind the production of the bikes.

All the newer Monsters are Siemens. I'd imagine that's a trend.  ;)

Haven't been following the case since I retired. It's still pending, isn't it? Pretty complicated. This is the latest I could find but you have to read between the lines. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204124204577150560971351488.html (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204124204577150560971351488.html)

It still depends on who blinks first, given the "family feud", and then what the government thinks, right?

Panigale uses a Mitsubishi system...

Great, now all the Axis Powers are going to have their fingers in every bike  ;D

technically...it is refferred to as VWAG....but I get where you are going  ;)

REALLY???

wow..  talk about a huge PR loss for Marelli/Weber... (owned by FIAT no less)

dear god, I hope not. local audi dealer is full of douche canoes  >:(

come to think of it, BMW wasn't much better

Where does this happen? Around here, the BMW moto and car dealers are completely separate.

In Los Angeles

Which one? The only combo dealership I ever saw was Long Beach but they have since moved the motos to a separate dealership across the street.

Quite a large number of BMW Dealers here in Australia are both Car and Bike Dealers. talking to a former BMW bike dealer friend about 3 years ago, he said BMW had set the Service and Dealership standard so high he could not afford to reach them when it came time to redo his dealer contract, Just a small part of the Demands they put to him were:

* Larger Part Inventory holding (Nearly triple what he normally carried)
* Double his in stock Bike holding, he always had 4 or 5 on Display/Demo and 7 or 8 Crated. that had to change to 7 or 8 on Display 15 to 20 Crated.
* Showroom Size had to Double (at least)
* Service area had to Triple! with Dedicated Service Waiting room.
* had to Carry 10's of thousands worth of Accessories for every bike he had on Display. (So pretty much every Accessory in the Book for that particular model if he had that model in stock)
* on and on it went.

He gave up the Dealership, The local BMW Car dealer took it on, the Car Dealer now only carries 2 or 3 bikes on display and
also has a smaller parts inventory and hold virtually no Accessory stock.

As he said, he saw the writing on the wall, they simply wanted to bring it all in house.

BMW dealerships are separate in Japan.  It's kind of unthinkable to see a car/bike combo dealership here, even with Honda.

Seems to me that they could benefit from opening up a few more Dealerships. I'm lucky in that I only live 40 miles from my local ship. However, according to ducati.com, the second closest shop to me is 520 miles away. Its easy to lust after something you can go look at every Saturday. Lusting leads to buying. But if you gotta drive 3 hours to drool over something? Screw it.  [bang] If I just bought Ducati, first thing I would do is put a shop down the street from "nightster.lp"   ;D

Same for the Diavel.

my take away....

"If VW started selling Golfs that went 175mph, but cost $75,000, got 8mpg, required $5,000 services every 4,000 miles and blew up after 20,000 miles, VW would be in a lot of trouble, right?"

or at least the most interesting part of the article..

I don't see it that way.

AMG's participation with Ducati was just marketing.

Marelli gages and EFI have been on Ducatis since the 851, well before that really since Weber is owned by Marelli and they got Ducati to put their DCNF carb on the Paso 750 and Sport in 1987.

Prior to that, Ducatis had been using everything from Veglia to Smith to Nippodenso gages.  Since the rollout of the EFI bikes, all of them have had Marelli gages until recently.

Doesn't that kind of describe a watercooled 911?

What I was saying, is that the Diavel uses a Mitsubishi ECU too.

AHA

thanks

interesting that they have jumped to Mitsubishi then.  I thought the Siemens EFI system would be the preferred one..

More than likely, it was the easiest path for all the other functions besides EFi that the "box" has to manage now. Oddly, Siemens DOES handle ABS and DTC on the EVO though. Makes you wonder whether these ECUs are just for Ducati or are found in other applications. For 10+ years in cars ABS has been connected to ignition advance and fly-by-wire throttle.

Read that yesterday. Next time how about just posting the link?  [roll]

I am 100% certain they are not solely for Ducati, rather, they are usually designed in a componetized fashion with each feature a separate IC on the board.  They design the board for general purpose use, program it for the engine's specifics and then add additional functions for things like ABS.

Check out the Ignitech products, they have proven it can be done for the fueling for EFI and keep it fully programmable.  I got a couple of the IgniJET units for my group purchase and I am pretty impressed with the featureset in the device.  It really would not be much extra to add functionality for the ABS -- just a couple of sensor inputs for wheel speed comparison and then direct taps into the fuel/advance/throttle wire.

Thx.  Didn't realize.  Removed post.

you didn't know we're all saving up a world of butthurt for people like you!! (shakes fist)

 [laugh]

[thumbsup]  http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-04-18/volkswagen-seen-winning-no-earnings-from-piech-ducati-toy-cars.html (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-04-18/volkswagen-seen-winning-no-earnings-from-piech-ducati-toy-cars.html)

“The Ducati deal shows that Piech is an engineer and engineers are sometimes like little babies”


(Which of the article's authors are you?  ;D ;D )

(http://i992.photobucket.com/albums/af43/alexbodle/35.jpg)

Saweet.

My 2 Ducs are now step family to my 3 Dubs