About bloody time. He has been riding a Ducati for nearly 20 months now and it seems they have listened to nothing he has said. MOTOGP: Rossi - 'Ducati Now Has A Plan'
Better late than never! But will it be soon enough for Vale? If I was someone from Audi coming in I doubt I'd be wanting to keep on the designer of a bike that a string of world class talents can't ride, that doesn't turn and eats rear tyres...after two years of frantic development.
Interesting quote in the article.. "With the chassis it will not be a modification but some parts with a different shape and weight distribution, and it is the first step to understand the way to follow next year and if it is the right way to improve the bad feeling that I have." Sounds like he plans to be there next year, but that could be the typical Rossi curve ball
Doesn't everyone forget just how quick the Ducati 800 was out the box oh and the simple matter of a world championship....
Yeah but then one C.S. complained about the chassis and things went from bad to worse. The bike was as you say a winner straight out of the box you wouldn't have thought that he could have fucked it up so much.
Yes but everyone's on the Bridgestones now, not just the Ducati and a few others. It's a spec tyre rather than a bespoke one. The design department have yet to make the bike work within the confines of the current rules. Personally I feel they made a mistake in abandoning the carbon fibre chassis as it's an early where they could have stolen a march over the competition.
Stolen a march . I dont think so Niall Mackenzie raced a carbon framed bike back in 84/86 . It didnt work then either. Many have tried but all have failed.
That was 28 years ago and technology has moved on a bit since then! The Cagiva 500 didn't do too badly. But Ducati has little knowledge of aluminium frames and I think they might have persisted with it.
Thats exactly the point . They have little knowledge of aluminium and carbon chassis thats why they should have stuck with the trellis . Things have moved on since Mackenzies armstrong But that dosent make it work any better . Theres not enough flex and it cant be built in . You watch the panigale will fail as a race bike too and it will be for the same reason. Crap chassis.
Carbon for motorcycle frames is and was a dead end street, a motorcycle frame needs to deflect when the bike is cornering to cope with the loads put upon it through the wheels by the road surface, when leant over the front and rear suspension is only an ornament, it cant react to side loading. carbon is too stiff. alloy and steel tube frames can be designed to flex in the right place and by the right amount to allow the bike to keep its wheels in line and on the track and rider to have a good 'feel' when cornering. carbon is perfect for race cars where the stiffness of the chassis is everything, and the suspension can be tuned to cope with various loads under constant input paths.
What, you mean like John Britten managed with a similar concept 20 odd years ago, which did work - with less resources than Ducati have.
Yes the Britten was a brilliant concept bike. Seem to remember it won one or two battle of the twin championships and a few fastest speed competitions . Cant remember it doing very well against the big classes. But the man was a Genius and could have possibly gone a long way with it had he not been taken so young. It isnt the best bike to base a chassis discussion on either as it didnt have one.
I don't think moving from a carbon chassis to the aluminium one has made much difference to the bike. Even Rossi has admitted that. It makes you wonder if there is something inherently wrong with Preziosi's design thinking.
I don't disagree that the carbon frame had issues, but carbon can be made to flex pretty accurately if you want it to, I have several fishing rods in the garage to prove it.
