Motorcycle Investor mag Subscribe to our free email news
Hailwood's Ducati 250 (by Ian Falloon, Apr 2022) ![]() The
troubled history of Ducati's parallel twin racer
Many
followers of Grand Prix
racing believe the greatest rider ever was Mike
Hailwood. Hailwood could ride
any motorcycle to its limit, and won races on several
makes, in a variety of
displacements, often in the one day. In 1959 and
1960, he won all
four British titles (125, 250, 350 and 500). While best
known for his nine
world championships on Hondas and MVs, it was Ducati
that Mike was associated
with at the beginning and end of his motorcycle racing
career. In those
days Mike seemed
more interested in playing jazz than racing motorcycles
and he suffered
criticism through having a millionaire father who
provided the best equipment
and tuners. However, he quickly overcame this and
established himself as an
extraordinary talent. Hailwood was
also provided a
factory-prepared 125 desmo twin for selected events.
Soon after receiving the
desmo single Hailwood rode it to victory at Snetterton,
the first win in
England by a desmodromic Ducati. He followed this with
eleven victories in England
that year. The 175 set
the basis for all
the racing parallel twins in that it featured twin
overhead camshafts driven by
a train of spur gears from a jackshaft between the
cylinders. There was a pressed-up
crankshaft consisting of two flywheel assemblies clamped
by Hirth (radially
serrated) couplings. Complex and
difficult to work
on, the engines were beautifully constructed, with the
flywheels and big-end
assemblies machined from solid and all the gears drilled
for lightness. There
was dry clutch and exposed hairpin valve springs but
still a wide 80-degree
included valve angle. With an 11:1 compression ratio and
18 mm Dell’Orto
carburettors, the 49 x 46.6mm 175 produced 22bhp at
11,000 rpm. By 1959, this
was increased to around 25bhp but the powerband was too
narrow, the 112kg
machine too heavy, and it suffered in comparison to the
single. The 250 twin
was first
revealed in February 1960, but when Hailwood first flew
out to Italy for
testing it wasn’t ready. Later in February, both he and
Franco Farnè rode it at
Modena and were apparently satisfied with the machine. A unique
feature of the twin
was the ability to remove one side of the engine leaving
the other intact.
Unfortunately, the engine was too powerful, and too
heavy, for the scaled-up
125 double cradle frame, even with Norton forks and
Girling shocks. The brakes
were Oldani twin leading shoe (220mm and 200mm) but the
machine was
considerably overweight (a claimed 112kg but plainly
optimistic) and suffered
from poor acceleration. The machine
was sent back to
Italy for a new frame, and it arrived back in time for
Mike to win the
international race at Silverstone at the end of May.
Although the new frame
still didn’t solve the handling problems, after the Isle
of Man, Hailwood
elected to ride the 250 at the Belgian Grand Prix Spa
and came fourth. He then took
the 250 to a
five consecutive victories on British short circuits
before Ulster Grand Prix
where the 250 appeared with another new frame. Stan
Hailwood commissioned this
new Reynolds 531 frame from Ernie Earles in Birmingham,
lengthening the
wheelbase from 1314 mm to 1,72 mm, and lowering and
moving the engine further
forward. Hailwood came fourth at Ulster but he still
wasn’t overly impressed
with the handling. Apart from
Snetterton (where
he won on the 250 twin), Hailwood chose his Mondial for
the rest of the 1960
British season. Hailwood did ride the 250 twin early in
1961, winning again at
Snetterton but was disqualified at Silverstone as he was
entered on the
Mondial. Initially
the Ducatis were
for John’s younger brother Norman, who raced the 250
several times towards the
end of 1961. Before the 1962 season a new frame without
a lower right frame
tube was produced but Norman had little success with it.
John Hartle was set to
ride the twin in 1963 but this didn’t eventuate, however
Mike Hailwood gave the
250 one final victory at Mallory Park at the end of
March. Hailwood’s final
ride on a Ducati until 1977 was at Silverstone in early
April 1963 where he
rode the Surtees 250 twin to second behind Redman’s
Honda. He obviously
believed that
more horsepower was needed to win Grands Prix but
somehow lost direction by
creating a design that was excessively complicated. The
parallel twin
experience also showed that Ducati didn’t have the
resources to produce and
develop one-off racing bikes to order. Possibly
these projects were
accepted as the economic circumstances at the time were
so difficult any
commissions were welcome. Unfortunately doubling up the
existing successful
singles was a recipe for disaster and what was really
needed was a completely fresh
approach. The twins were plagued with troubles from
fractured crankcases,
broken gears, and electrical and ignition problems. They may
have been
sophisticated designs but their complexity made them
problematic, and their
power taxed a chassis that was inherited from lower
powered and more balanced
designs. If nothing else, the parallel twin episode
convinced Taglioni on the
virtues of light weight, balance and simplicity, almost
to the point of
obsession. All his later attempts with multi-cylinder
racers were half-hearted. ------------------------------------------------- Produced by AllMoto abn 61 400 694 722 |
ArchivesContact
|