996 What Did You Find Inside Your 996s ?

Crowned, have you read Falloon's works on the evolution of the 916/748, "Ducati Desmoquatro Superbikes" and "Ducati 916"? Those books in conjunction with his "Ducati Desmoquatro Perfomance Handbook" list the detail differences for the US and Europe spec 996S and the preceding SPS. The books suggest US spec 996S retained the basic engine with none of the tuning bits from the SPS. Eu spec ones kept 996SPS engine with T1 cams and Titanium rods but included changes from P8 to 1.6MB1 (twin injector version) of the ecu and some odd chassis variations such as a change to the fourth gear ratio. What was fitted to each bike may of course have varied a little during the production cycle but the texts in each book are quite clear for the specs of the bikes through the MYs to MY01. Are you looking at an Eu spec bike?

 

I don’t know for a fact but I see no reason why the service life of a Ti conrod would be any different to that of a steel one, which should be forever. If anything gives it will be the big & small end bearings not the conrod itself. Afaik Ti conrods were used to save weight thus reducing inertia permitting faster rev spin up and higher top end revs.

I’m no engineer and I may have just fabricated all that in my head as a plausible reason. I stand to be corrected.

If it were me buying the bike I’d be looking at service history, mileage, number of previous owners, overall condition, genuineness of the seller. These are the important factors IMO not whether it has Ti conrods or camshafts.

 

The Ti rods go on for ever but they are nothing special, not like RS rods. Rod bolts however are use twice and throw away. Price per bolt is 'interesting'

 

Crowned- a euro spec 996S is a rare thing on this side of the pond. If the service history checks out, I'd definitely be trying to score it.

Does the seller realise it's different from US spec?

If not, no reason to offer a premium over a 'normal' 996S.

 

I spent a while looking for an S engine, went to look at 3 so-called Motors looking for the T1 cams
I found
A1 (Stock)
A1R (S4r)
And the old endurance one from the 916 (can’t remember the number)
Definitely check before you buy, from what I learned it only seems to be the very early S models (eu only) that got the leftover sps stuff, then they used whatever was in the parts bin
A decent/ true s motor is like gold dust

 

There was an old PerformanceBikes article years and years ago about bodging engines to sell....id love it if someone had that...

One bloke bought a bike and wondered why compression was down, took the head off and one of the bores had half a tennis ball in it. Another ones engine detonated and found a con rod made of wood.... awesome...

 

You can take one of the covers off so you can see the cam an just rotate the engine untill you can see the number, still a bit awkward when it’s in the bike

 

I picked up a 2001 996S engine a few weeks ago for an absolute bargain. Not sure the seller knew what he had. I'm giving it a refresh but everything inside is same as the SPS. Factory lightened crankshaft, pankl ti rods, T1 camshafts and close ratio gearbox. Plus being 2001 model it has the better starter gear ratios than the earlier models and the silver engine covers which I think looks better

 

has a 996s got twin crank sensors??

 

Just the one pick up sensor. They run the same 16M ECU as the standard bikes

 

my old EU 996s had Ti rods fitted to it as i had the motor apart for a rebuild

 

when i tore my 996 engine down i found mostly bits of gearbox......everywhere!!......its how my build got started haha

 

don't "they" always say the best upgrades are tyres. wheels, shocks front and rear,,,,,better masters

horse power and higher revs....who wants that? sod it.....i do! mwhahaha

 

funny that was the same reason i had to strip my motor, as the gearbox output bearing failed..