Torque Wrench, 21mm socket (or 14mm allen head for later model bikes), 10mm Allen Head Socket, Channel Lock Pliers or a Filter Wrench, Oil, Filter, New Crush Washers.

Step 1
The first step is to get all the necessary equipment and tools. The 21mm and 10mm allen
need to be sockets rather than wrenches because you will need to torque them to the correct setting. A torque wrench is required for all kinds of maintenance, so now is the time to bite the bullet and get one (reasonably priced ones are available at Sears and the like). You will also need about 4 liters of your preferred oil (I use 15w50 semi-synthetic Motul, but if your engine has less than 2,000 miles I would not recommend synthetic because the motor is still in the break-in stage). You also can't forget the oil filter and a crush washer for the oil drain plug and a crush washer for the filter screen bolt. The washers are cheap at 50 cents each, the filter is about $10, and the oil runs me $20.


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Winter is slowly approaching and soon there will be a time when you will need to prepare your bike for short winter sleep. If you want to get your bike clean, shining and ready for action in spring, the following steps are for you.

First, you should find a place to keep your bike over the winter. This place should be dry. It can be your own garage or sometimes dealers offer Ducati owners use their own garages for storing purposes.

Let’s start with engine related issues. If you’re going to stop riding your bike for more than a month, you should know you cannot leave any petrol in it. If you have spare time, make a last ride on your Ducati. This way you can warm its parts and top off all petrol it has. In case you don't have enough time, just pour out all you have in your tank.


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So you plan to buy or just have bought Ducati. Great job, you've made a good choice! Now all you need to do is to keep your Ducati in a proper condition. Just as well as cars, bikes require maintenance. Usually manufacturer establishes time intervals when some routine things like changing oil or replacing filters are done. These intervals depend on a brand. Ducatis are great bikes and many say they're simply best ones, but prepare to go through maintenance more often then with most bikes.

First thing that scares almost all new Ducati owners is valves. «How do those valves perform?», «Do Ducati valves require frequent maintenance?» – these questions arise from time to time on various motorcycle forums. Many riders confess they’d like to buy Ducati bike, but are deterred by specific valves and their maintenance. Indeed, all Ducatis have an exclusive desdromonic valve system. It has been created in attempt to make 2 cylinder engines as powerful as 4 cylinder ones. The main idea is in reducing valve float. All Ducati engines don’t have any valve springs, special rockers are used to open and close the valve. With no valve spring your bike can run at tremendous 18,000 rpm and even higher! You can read detailed information about Ducati valves and their desmo system in official Ducati website. If you use your spare time to read this information, you will see what exactly requires adjustment and understand desmo is not scary at all. I bet you can even do it yourself. Certainly, there's nothing bad to pay to professional to get your valves adjusted, but prepare to pay around $250-$300 for 2 valves per cylinder and twice as much if you own a superbike with 4 valves per cylinder. If you decide to adjust valves yourself there are plenty of web sites describing how to do it. You can even watch a video showing this process. If you’re a person who wants to know everything about the bike you own, then don't hesitate and do it. Anyway, valves adjustment must be done every 4,000-6,000 miles and that is pretty often comparing to other bikes. Typical Japanese bike owner will probably make 12,000-16,000 miles before valves adjusting and certainly it is not so complicated. Ducati is a real bike of the dream, but it's not cheap in maintenance, so if you need to make frequent bike rides on a daily basis, think of buying second motorcycle with cheap adjustment costs.


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