Can I ask what people think of warming up Ducati motors before a ride. Wisdom was, you always warmed the engine thoroughly, but some opinions seem to have changed now.
I take bike out garage, start it up and while it is warming I close up garage, put lid and gloves on etc. Usually bout 90s or so. Then I set off gently for the first mile or so and just gradually thrash her.
This will be interesting Buzz as we all have our theories but until they come up with an engine that talks, non of us will ever know I never really warm up unless snow on the ground prefering to ride off with low revs/gentle throttle opening 3 minutes after starting. Loosely speaking :- water-cooled bikes in the winter at the sensitive end of warming up and air-cooled in the summer at the opposite end. (MOO)
dont do no harm. but fot you car drivers out there with turbos let the idle for a few seconds before you switch them off.
Push bike out, start, go back to close garage, gloveson and ride. Not more then 60s. Then about 0.5 mile slowly as I have no choice, more round-abouts on one street then there is one round-about factory. From there onwards all bets are off.
Yeah, I hate my neighbours so I have to just start it and ride of in a reasonable time. Usually a few mins, it actually takes my 848 AGES to get to a point where it shows 41 degrees, if you just leave it idling so I wait for the 'choke' to have dropped the revs down a bit and go from there.
About allowing turbo'd cars to tick over after use. My BMW shut itself down as I sat at the lights on the exit slip road. That's hardly good for it...
Thanks for the replies everyone. I now know to always warm it up, except when you don`t. And for a long time , except when it`s short.
My Ducati is always warmed to between 40-50 degrees before it moves, more to ensure some oil temp as much as water temp. Then I'll take it easy until over 80 when I'm happy to rev the nuts off it. When you think of all the cams and rockers that aren't exactly engineered for million mile touring it's better to be safe than sorry. Either that or buy new, abuse the shit out of it and give the next buyer all the problems you've created. My daily rides, TL1000 or GSXR1100, are just wheeled out, left running full choke while I get my lid and gloves on then I pootle off until up to temp. I do this even at 5am. It's only the same as starting the car to warm up while you scrape the ice off the screen in winter.
Always wait until it indicates 40+ before moving, it will only get to about 60 at this time of year on open road
i thought i read somewhere that the 748 doesn't get oil to the rockers until 2 minutes after starting? hence why everybody gets warn out rockers with no coating left...... am i right or is this rubbish? i let it warm up for 2 minutes while i put my helmet and gloves on and then go slow until i see the temp gauge reach the normal operating temp
