Hi I am on the verge (hopefully) of purchasing a lovely looking ST4s in red at the weekend, and I need an answer to a niggling question that I can't seem to find anywhere, what I want to know is do the mirrors fold in/up or not ? as they are rather wide when fully extended and I know I will struggle to get it past the gate post as I have a narrow gate entrance which I wheel my bike through and if the mirrors don't fold in I'm not sure I will be able to buy it :-(. Any help would be gratefully appreciated. If it helps its on an 51 plate 2001 (non facelift). Cheers !
Oh dear ! :-( Thank you for replying, do you or anybody else know the width of the ST4s from mirror tip to mirror tip as that will really give me a good idea to see if i can 'slalom' the bike through the gate. cheers for the help !
Thanks for that, much appreciated look forward to hearing from you . This is going to be my first Ducati (if i buy it ;-) !! And i'm really looking forward to buying something with a bit of soul & character instead of the run of the mill Japanese bikes that i have had before.
Excellent !! Thats a massive help !! my gate is 830mm wide i'm going to really have to jiggle it through if i want it to fit !! thank you very much with the prompt help with this issue.
Strange but the mirrors on my '99 ST2 do fold! I am sure that they are standard and they have springs inside the arms so that they fold.
Oh right Bob T ! Even better news ! someone had mentioned to me that they are spring loaded but i didnt know if they could be actually moved regularly as the springs get weak over time.
Great ! Thats good to know then if i ever need any (which i probably will) with moving the mirror or mirrors in every time i go through the gate. Am i right in thinking as well that the actual mirror stalks can get brittle/fragile over time ?
Not had mine long enough to know, but they seem pretty sturdy and I think that the stems are made from cast aluminium so should last. They are only attached with two bolts. In your case I would cut two slots in the gate, or park the bike in the house.
So they should be strong then which is good. Both of those options aren't really viable, good ideas though on the gate chopping & or putting it in the house Bob T ! ;-) HaHa !
They're not supposed to "fold" in the same sense as car mirrors fold. They are spring loaded so that the stay in position when they are knocked, and subsequently they do not break the mirror stalks or mounting points and fairing. So you wouldn't be able to "fold" them back to get through the gate.
As Antonye states,they take a mild knock,and no more,easy to break the plastic where the 2 bolts go through,and a real bugger to glue to stick well around there too. I speak from a few years with them. Decent mirrors though.
They will move a bit before the springs become unhooked, but not really designed for folding back. To replace/refit the springs you need to remove the mounting bracket, which involves partially removing the inside top of the fairing/screen to get to the bolts, and pulling the spring through the bracket from the underside. Only takes ten minutes, but not something you'd want to do every time you took the bike out. If you're careful you can pull the mirror out by the stem and fold it downwards, folding them up seems to unhook the spring every time - I've done this a few time to get my ST through the front door (only way to get it in the garden) but I' not sure how often you could do it before damaging the springs - though they are cheap enough. You could consider after-market mirrors that do fold, provided the distance between the mounting bolts is adjustable you should be able to find some that fit.
One of the first things I did with my ST was ditch the OEM mirrors, as bring my bike into a shed via a narrow gate and it was just a pain in the arse to have to try to wiggle the feckers in and out - mirrors, I mean Replaced them with a folding set that look better and work as well.
They fold a little bit - but only so that they do less damage to anything you hit... Move them back and forth more than a few times and they will break. Mine went in the skip a while ago, to be replaced by a pair of aftermarket round ones...
Agree with JR45 completley. The easy solution is to remove the LH mirror.. There are lots of aftermarket mirrors about that share the same mounting holes, its easy to find a pair that do fold, try a pair for a Triumph 955 sprint.. Martin
