The engine number is standard - all of the 996 bike would have the same code. Apart from the 996R of course because it’s 998cc. 996cc Watercooled 4 valves per Cylinder
Think mine is stock, at least I've not modded it and it was 3 year old when I got it in 2002, so unlikely to have been modded
the 4 pad calipers were a Ducati performance catalogue upgrade, as i had them on my 996 from my memory the SPS pista was an internal upgrade to shift the last of the 2000 sps's due to the 996r coming out. i bought the Pista kit back in 2001 to rebuild my 996 after a heavy crash, and it also came with Plaque and sticker kit, only the mudguard was separate to the kit .
Now that’s really interesting as it contradicts Falloon’s history and adds weight to my theory that the whole Pista / FR2 / SPS III thing doesn’t quite add up given all of the conflicting evidence. The fact that a kit including limited edition plaque was available to purchase is totally new info to me. The sticker kit is clearly in the DP catalogue of the time but the Pista ‘kit’ being something that could be retrofitted blows away any theory that they were a limited run. It also might explain this odd anomaly I came across - I dismissed it as a bitsa because the spec is such a mismatch to what would be expected on a Pista. But it may have been an SPS II bike that had the Pista plaque and the basic Pista decals retrofitted. https://www.ebay-kleinanzeigen.de/s-anzeige/ducati-996-sps-pista-026/2253622198-306-289 I notice that your bike had the grey frame and wheels - with Showa forks and painted airbox - the same spec as the one in the Anthony Godin advert described as a 1999 SPS II. “Built almost exclusively for the German market”. Does this sound correct to you? Was the airbox on the bike you owned not carbon as found on a standard SPS? With the one below plus your’s and the Godin bike that’s 3 bikes - all German - with that different ‘SPS II’ spec - which would also have had the homologation cylinder heads if the parts list is accurate. Incidentally the mudguard you had on you bike was the one from the SPS/F Can you recall whether the original was carbon or plain red?
So just to clarify, my old 996 in the picture above was a 2000 996 Biposto with some extra bits and pieces including the Pista kit.. number plaque below-
Just when you think you have a relatively decent idea of homologation models and their corresponding plaques, along comes a thread like this!
So here’s another question.. . I thought some later SPS came with Gold wheels? Mine has gold wheels and I assumed they were standard? Mine is 1039 and sold originally in portugal.
Not as standard. But that doesn’t mean the original owner didn’t spec different wheels from the Ducati Performance catalogue from new. Gold wheels were available in both Magnesium and Aluminium as extras.
Thanks for a very informative thread. I am about to buy #1097, but was wondering why it was sold with 5 spoke gold mag wheels, corsa rotors and upgraded calipers from factory. The FR2 name makes sense with all these factory/corsa parts available for the last Desmo SPS? The wheels are laser marked 0799 = original paint from 07/1999. Rear is 6". But what is/was the weight of a 1999/2000 996 SPS frame? The bike I am looking at was sold with a Verlicchi frame, which weighs only 8.9kg raw/painted.
Came across your epic post here Livefast, apologies for bumping an old thread but there’s another mystery 2001 SPS that is on Bring-a-Trailer right now.. listed as a 2000 but year digit indicates 2001. Oddly, the VIN also has a typo on the frame and 18 digits… Hoped you might have some insight, or at least find it interesting
An 18 digit VIN - that is bizarre. ZDM3H99S861B003736 The check digit should be 6 so ZDM3H99S61B003736 The extra 8 simply shouldn’t be there - I guess they are hand stamped so someone picked up the wrong one and rather than scrapping the frame they just carried on. There are some interesting comments on the listing: “Ducati confirms the VIN ZDM3H99S61B003736 as a 996SPSC – whatever the C means lol. In Europe there is no MY 2001 996SPS listed in the price lists, it goes from 996S to 996R. There are some bikes listed in Europe as 2001 models on their UK DVLA for example, but it’s due to when they finally ended up getting registered. I have heard about the SPS being sold in the US as a 2001 model, but not sure on the facts behind that. This bike is indeed a MY 2001 non-road use VIN. Who has the deets on MY 2001 USA SPS sales?” The ‘C’ seems to indicate that Ducati have this bike recorded as a specific model - California seems the obvious meaning as they have produced models specifically for that market before and denoted them with a C in their records. So it seems a batch of ‘officially not for road’ use bikes were stamped with a 2001 VIN and exported to the California market. In some cases fitted with mirrors etc and registered for the road- this bike obviously was bought as a collectors piece and never put on the road. With the 996R coming out Ducati had difficulty shifting the last of the SPS models in the rest of the world but maybe there was enough demand in California that the final run found a home there. California brought in tightened emissions standards from 2001 onwards so I would deduce that this is why these bikes and the 996R got stamped as Homologation models. Lovely bike though - box fresh after 23 years!
I was under the impression from bikes I've seen previously and their paperwork here in the US from previous sales, that the SPS models were not eligible in California for road use for several years prior to 2001. I also thought they were not street legal anywhere in the USA and were all sold as "off-road use only" as of like 1996 or 1997 maybe (pulling that out of my a$$ memory lol). That said, MANY states back in the 1990s had easy loopholes for registering a bike for the street. Some only cared it had the right equipment added, others since the VIN was a non-US VIN and wasn't in their database, just let it right through. Others simply assigned their own state issued VIN. We even have more than 1 documented cases of a 996R being road registered by the CA DMV. Actually, I believe prior to the 2001 SPS and R, the SP/SPS was a "grey market" bike in the US and that's why none of them were road legal in the late 1990s. Perhaps someone can fill in details and specifics I left out or got wrong
Couldn't agree more. Very interesting development on that auction btw, that's worth adding to this thread.. the seller reached out and posted a verification from Ian Falloon. But it's not cut-and-dry.. the 18-digit VIN is avoided, and he mentions that the last US-destined SPS were produced in 1999, yet this bike shows a production date of September 2000 on the frame sticker. This is accurate. None of the SPS or R bikes could pass US Emissions, so they were all sold with stickers stating that they were for "competition off road use only" and the purchasers signed something promising not to register or use them on the road. However, they had a VIN so they could still be registered. At one point I acquired a 748R from out of state. I brought it to the California DMV to register, "off road use only" stickers and all. They sent me to the California Highway Patrol for verification and I was able to go back to DMV and register it without an issue. And this was just a few years back. Our 996S and 999S models also didn't get the SPS/R engines for the same reason, and instead came with standard 996/999 motors and Ohlins forks instead.
