Yah know, I've honestly never owned a Yamaha street bike. Had several tuning fork dirt bikes, but never a pavement version. Had several of the rest of the big 4 though. Bought the Ducati (2005 749) with 4600 miles on it (have some videos with it on my YT channel), beautiful bike, complete background history. Had the timing belts (timing belts, 89 Chevy Cavalier technology) replaced, valves checked (one already out of spec at 7500 miles), changed all fluids, got everything up to spec. Magnificent handling bike, until it started to stop. First breakdown was the reg/rec at less than 10k miles. Design team took a heat fail prone SCR reg/rec and bolted it to the motor case, then ran a radiator hose in front of it. WTF? It tried to burn everything electrical on the bike up. First ride home on the truck. $150 to Rick's for a mosfet reg/rec.
Then a few K miles later a wire in the fuel pump harness broke inside the insulation, second ride home on the truck. Got lucky and found an aftermarket harness for $100 (Ducati would only sell it as a whole fuel pump assembly for $1100). Got that fixed and by then the (dry) clutch was starting to squawk and squeal, timing belts were coming due again, battery cables were too small from the factory and needing to be upgraded, plus God knows what was getting ready to break next. The last summer I owned it I only rode it 700 miles, simply because I was paranoid to go any farther than I could walk back. Four years with no track days because I didn't want to be "that guy" who's bike blew up and oiled down the track. Miserable..
I sold it to some kid and walked away like walking out of the court house after a nasty divorce. Bought the SV650S a few days later and have never looked back. Even counting some of the old junkers I had when I was a kid, that Ducati was the worst bike I've ever owned..
