Auction at Dragone Classic Motors 1967 SCD 350 one of 12?

[SubaruPaul]

http://www.dragoneclassic.com/auctions/ ... rcycle.htm


Mostly wanted to post this hear to hear what folks thought about this bike. Forks don't look '67 to me , but maybe someone here can educate.

[Eldert]

looks like the real thing to me . it has a sandcast cilinderhead for sure .
i would like to see more engine close ups .
could be a 1968 who knows . the frame is correct to without the loop behind the top rear motormount to the rearsets

here is a engine closeup of SCD nr 17



Eldert

[SubaruPaul]

Any thoughts on how much $ this bike might go for?

[double diamond]

There was a Mach 1S on ebay recently, restored though had some issues. Bid up to ~$32K. Similar bike and rarity but not exactly the same as an SCD, might be a good value indicator. Matt

[SubaruPaul]

Thanks. This one the sellers say is one of 12 but our good friend here says his is number 17 ....

This bike is just 15 minutes from me so I'm very curious. The Dragone brothers have an incredible car resto shop for decades now and have had a few bikes come through but I've never seen them do any bike resto's. Last barn find I remember them selling was a really early Indian - rough , many thousands of dollars away from running let alone restored. But they have a large customer base and plenty of exposure.

Thanks for any input. I'm sure its out of my league but I'm going to ask my friend to attend the auction since I'll be out of the state then.

I'll ask him to shoot pics.

[Rick]

I called the auction house and spoke to 2 guys about this bike. The first guy read the printed description to me and told me the auction estimate was $40,000 to $50,000. I then had several conversations with Manny Dragone, and got more information. Mr Dragone impressed me as an honest man with little experience in old Ducatis- he basically knew what the guy who traded it to him told him.
He did have some other photos, and after seeing them I started to think the cylinder head wasn't right. The exhaust attached with the production threaded collar instead of the studs, and there were protrusions in the head casting for the valve cover bolts that I didn't see in the photos of another SCD at Phil Ansyley's site.
The top image is of the Australian SCD at Phil's site:

Dragone head.jpg

I spoke to Manny again, and he said he wondered about the head himself, since the valve cover bolt holes didn't line up with the head and the cam wouldn't fit into the cam tunnel. He said the valve cover had the offset holes, which would be from an SCD, and the exhaust port was threaded.
So, I'm speculating that he has the SCD cam(high lift) and valve covers, but a production head- something probably happened to the SCD head, someone tried to fit a production head, and when it didn't fit the bike was abandoned.
Keep in mind that I've never seen a real SCD, and have no expert knowledge.
That said, I think it's a really nice bike. It is, probably, a factory race bike that may be, unfortunately, missing a unique and almost impossible to find part. It would be a great historic race bike, but the Pebble Beach crowd won't accept it.
I wouldn't want to spend anywhere near their estimate for it.
Here are the other photos:

photo (2).JPG

photo (4).JPG

photo (7).JPG

photo (5).JPG

The carburetor looks huge and probably won't clear the gas tank, but the remote float bowl is there, laying near the swingarm.
Rick

[Rick]

To follow up, I asked him to take the tank off and take some pictures of the head, but he wasn't where the bike was, so I never got really good pictures of the head- wish I could see the fins on the top.
Also, the pictures he sent me were too big to upload here, but if anyone wants them, send me a PM with your email and I'll forward them to you.
Rick

[SubaruPaul]

Rick, Thanks for going that far and relating to us. Manny is a great guy , same for his brother. They REALLY know their trade on cars , but as I've seen in the past they tend to pass over the bikes as they find them.

My friend might make it down for the Thursday and Friday previews. I probably won't be able to make it.

[Rick]

My friend didn't get a chance to look at the bike, but says he's sure he saw it at Mid-Ohio a few years ago. A friend of his did see the bike this week, but I'm not comfortable posting what amounts to 'hearsay' on an Internet forum. You can send me a PM if you want to get the opinion of someone I don't know and can't say how valuable his opinion is. Sorry.
Rick

[SubaruPaul]

No sweat , and I'll check with my friend soon to see if he went there too.