Corse Db4c

Corse DB4C

Moto Point's 24-karat Bimota

IT’S ALWAYS THE SAME,” SAYS Shin Kondo. “A customer crashes his bike, then brings it to me to be repainted. I ask him how he wants it to look, and he says, 'I'll fax you a drawing.' But the drawing never comes. Finally, when I call him a month later, he asks, ‘Can you paint it like your racebike?' ''

Sure, he can. And that’s more or less what he did with the Bimota shown here. Commissioned by Moto Point partner Tom Grudovich, the so-called “DB4C” sports a breathtaking paint job that replicates the DB4’s stock scheme in the SB8RC’s candy colors with gold pinstripes. At first glance the paint looks OE, but as you walk around the bike and the light reflects at different angles, you detect pastel undertones that shift from pink to green. Call it subtly stunning.

Like the Corse SB8, the DB4 is bedecked in top-shelf running gear, multitudinous titanium fasteners, a titanium-nitride-coated. 2-into-l Ti exhaust (that shaves an incredible 17 pounds from the Stocker's 24!), even a Ti kickstand (a mere $800). But the streetbike goes the racebike one better in that its entire aluminum-trellis chassis is goldanodized. The “Corse” logo embroidered in the faux suede seat provides the finishing touch.

Underneath the beautiful body lurks a Ducati 900SS engine that is stock save for a pair of Keihin 41mm flat-slides. Peak output is said to be 80 horsepower at the rear wheel, which combined with the bike’s 338-pound dry weight produces substantial getup-and-go. 1 know because I rode it, albeit briefly before the shock-reservoir mount-one of the few parts Kondo didn 7 make—broke, leaving the reservoir dangling by the hose.

Total bill for the DB4C came to $52,000, which even allowing for the $18,550 cost of a standard DB4 is an obscene amount of money to spend customizing a streetbike. But then, what would you expect to pay for a 24-karat Bimota?

Brian Catterson