All that glitters isn't yellow - or when is a Ducati Scrambler not a Ducati Scrambler

 

Compare and contrast – a brace of Ducati 250 Roads: one rather tatty; the other recently restored and recently sold by the first class team at Made in Italy Motorcycles. It made under £3000, possibly less than it cost to restore. So what does that make the tatty non-runner worth?

 

The Road was an even more asphalt targeted version of the Scrambler developed by Mototrans, the old Ducati outpost in Barcelona. Note the reinforced right hand engine case, with those bulges ribbed inside (oh-err, as Frankie Howard would say) for extra support and a better oil pump. Some say the quality wasn’t up to Borgo Panigale standards, but the 250 and then 350 Scramblers were built by Mototrans (with the usual Ducati engine cases) for final assembly in Italy. Funny old world

Even funnier is that the tatty non-runner has just finished an eBay auction at £1851 – in other words a grand less that it’ll be worth restored and running. In fairness to the seller, I said nothing while the listing was live, but as it happens even £1851 wasn’t enough to reach the reserve, so it seems the prospective buyer’s been saved; well, I think so. Having said that, maybe due to ignorance, it was listed as a genuine Scrambler and perhaps bidders thought it was. Emphatically not the case – the early narrow case Mototrans 250s, starting with the 24 Horas, even had different bore and stroke to the Bologna versions, and many internals are different. As are the tank, seat and loads of other stuff that differentiates the Road from a genuine Scrambler (below). So be careful out there – especially if the new Scrambler launch next weekend brings on a bout of old Scrambler fever