[Ducati] Changing fork oil in 916 w/Showa

[Edward H. Welbon]

Thanks to all who contributed, the comments made it much easier than I 
expected and the bike feels so much better now.  No leaks either :-)

P.S. I used an engine hoist and an engine tilter to lift the bike. 
There are other ways but this way works pretty darn well.  I bought the 
engine lift and the tilter in a previous (lesser) four wheeled life.

http://www.bga.com/~welbon/images/duckForks1.jpg
http://www.bga.com/~welbon/images/duckForks2.jpg
http://www.bga.com/~welbon/images/duckForks3.jpg
http://www.bga.com/~welbon/images/duckForks4.jpg

I recently changed out the head bearing (used the tapered kit that is 
offered on www.motowheels.com).  I think the images demonstrate that the 
arrangement is quite practical.

Opinion: To paraphrase Ben Franklin, in my mind, Ducati motorbikes, red 
wine and sexual intercourse (listed strictly in order of descending 
significance) provide the strongest evidence that a *just* God exists 
and possibly even loves us.  Notice the explicit lack of reference to 
four wheeled vehicles and in particular those of German origin.  IMO, 
the existence of four wheeled vehicles is one of the strongest possible 
argument yet against the  existence of a *just* God.  :-)

http://www.ninwiki.com/US_Bureau_of_Morality


> Message: 1
> Date: Tue, 11 Sep 2007 23:09:08 +1000
> From: "Kerry and Brad Black" <bikeboy at alphalink.com.au>
> Subject: [Ducati] Changing fork oil in 916 w/Showa
> To: "Ducati.Net" <ducati at ducati.net>
> Message-ID: <003601c7f474$f0455dd0$6501a8c0 at bradpw5kkbszbp>
> Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="iso-8859-1"
> 
> some hints i'd give:
> undo the top triple clamp bolts then undo the fork caps with the
> lower bolts still tight.  do them up the same way.  they're not very tight.
> when refitting, the lower triple clamp bolt torque is 14Nm.  it's not always 
> clear in the manuals, and they can crack. you really need to pull them apart 
> and set the oil height, plus you can cycle the cartridge easier to clean it 
> out. pulling the compression valve out of the is the best way to flush all 
> the gunk out, or at least wind the damping adjuster all the way out.
> make sure you have the same number of available rebound clicks before and 
 > after the top cap is removed. if you pull the cartridge inner tube up
> quickly without the cap on oil sprays out.  any brand of fork oil tastes 
 > crap and really gets into your skin.
> 
> brad
>