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I have already mentioned this and posted parts of it in other threads, also posted on another site, but thought it would be good to post it as a stand alone so please excuse me if you have already viewed this and sorry to clutter the site with more of the same, but with this post I’ve included some photos of the fix.
When first looking for what I a felt was a lean miss: see link if you dare; http://www.ducati.ms/forums/showthread.php?t=57491 I pulled the front plug prior to this which looked normal, so it was time to dig in and pull the rear. After gaining access pulled the plug boot and found it to be wet with oil about 1 inch up. WTF???? The engine was completely dry, 1601 miles showing. Looking down at the plug there was a pool of Very CLEAN oil up to the porcelain… again ..WTF????? Completely cleaned the bore of ALL oil before pulling the plug (didn’t want anything falling into the cylinder) and since it was shortly after a GREAT morning ride (except for the lean miss) it was still very warm. Pulled the plug and inspected closely .. Where is this oil coming from? About 10-15 mins. passed, looked into the bore again and saw a spot (looked like a line) I thought I might have missed.. But???? Made absolutely sure it was clean (as I thought I had already done), another 20 mins pass & looked again. 2 little drops forming. (see pictures).
Long Yellow Blur story as usual, but I searched for answers. It was porosity in the casting. (in the photos it’s stated “Crack”, that was before I found out differently not wanting to do them over so posted as is) I contacted Guy (pronounced GEE) Martin of MBP in an email thinking if anyone.. He calls me. Who does that? Great man. We talked for awhile, he’s seen this before (although Ducati of NA wouldn’t acknowledge it, also the photos were done to send to Ducati of NA - another story), there is not an oil pressure issue like an oil passage and the top of the piston was wet with oil so I was concerned the head was cracked because I know it didn’t come from draining into the cylinder after I removed the plug, but I was told the head is pretty thick in the combustion area so, possibly other issues to come? He gave me the Permanent solid fix without taking the head off. What he said to me before hanging up was “My job here is to make you happy” He’s one of a kind, good people!!
I measured the I.D. and length of the machined spark plug bore, (can’t find any of my notes for dims) machined a thin 6061-T6 aluminum sleeve leaving it .002-.003 smaller then the bore (and just short of the 45 degree angle in length) so when installing, it wouldn’t get stuck, and as Guy said “If you get it stuck before it’s down all the way you’ll need to call a Dr.” haha! so it’s best to leave it smaller then “On Size” and have to drive it in place. I also prepped the bore with a hone to rough the surface slightly, cleaned all contact surfaces to make both parts completely oil free before final placement.
Using the cylindrical 680 Loctite (fills a gap of .015) spread completely over the sleeve and bore, worked it into place with slight twisting till it bottomed out, cleaned up all excess @ both ends (and there was plenty to clean up), allowing it to cure for a few days should do the trick. I also installed a press in plug into the spark plug hole (too lazy to make a short threaded plug and didn’t have an old spark plug to modify) to allow easier access, mostly for clean-up and of course so nothing fell into the cylinder.
I made a mistake here by using some OLD loctite (it does have a shelf life but never ran into issues with that issue .. Until now, at least that’s what I assumed happened) I had a full med size bottle, probably 8-9 years from my airline days. That stuffs expensive so…. If it can go wrong……..!! But doing it over is no treat either!! Sometimes ya just do stuff…… False economics!!
So after still having the miss and rechecking the plug after this fix with 2112 showing on the odometer (even with the miss I couldn’t stay off of it, [just stay out of that rpm range as much as possible. Ha!] -- can you say addition? I know ya can!!) there was a small pool of oil starting again, but this time looked to be trailing up between the sleeve and head, onto the boot seal at the top, and on down the plug boot. So I made a cap to fit snug, using 680 I tapped it in place to finish off the fix. I must say it does look better then just a sleeve cut short. Maybe it was supposed to happen that way? I was thinking about doing that anyway but got lazy, so this forced me to do it!
Since the cap install I haven’t looked yet but I’m confident it will hold as it is a solid fix. With 680, even being old should have worked (so I thought) and assume I didn’t get full coverage while sliding the sleeve in place, even though I took extra care to do so. Always something.
So if you wonder why the inside of your spark plug bore or boot is wet while all else is dry, this could be your problem and fix. Hopefully this will be my last long story of repairs and mystery problems/issues, but who are we kidding…?? Ha!!
When first looking for what I a felt was a lean miss: see link if you dare; http://www.ducati.ms/forums/showthread.php?t=57491 I pulled the front plug prior to this which looked normal, so it was time to dig in and pull the rear. After gaining access pulled the plug boot and found it to be wet with oil about 1 inch up. WTF???? The engine was completely dry, 1601 miles showing. Looking down at the plug there was a pool of Very CLEAN oil up to the porcelain… again ..WTF????? Completely cleaned the bore of ALL oil before pulling the plug (didn’t want anything falling into the cylinder) and since it was shortly after a GREAT morning ride (except for the lean miss) it was still very warm. Pulled the plug and inspected closely .. Where is this oil coming from? About 10-15 mins. passed, looked into the bore again and saw a spot (looked like a line) I thought I might have missed.. But???? Made absolutely sure it was clean (as I thought I had already done), another 20 mins pass & looked again. 2 little drops forming. (see pictures).
Long Yellow Blur story as usual, but I searched for answers. It was porosity in the casting. (in the photos it’s stated “Crack”, that was before I found out differently not wanting to do them over so posted as is) I contacted Guy (pronounced GEE) Martin of MBP in an email thinking if anyone.. He calls me. Who does that? Great man. We talked for awhile, he’s seen this before (although Ducati of NA wouldn’t acknowledge it, also the photos were done to send to Ducati of NA - another story), there is not an oil pressure issue like an oil passage and the top of the piston was wet with oil so I was concerned the head was cracked because I know it didn’t come from draining into the cylinder after I removed the plug, but I was told the head is pretty thick in the combustion area so, possibly other issues to come? He gave me the Permanent solid fix without taking the head off. What he said to me before hanging up was “My job here is to make you happy” He’s one of a kind, good people!!
I measured the I.D. and length of the machined spark plug bore, (can’t find any of my notes for dims) machined a thin 6061-T6 aluminum sleeve leaving it .002-.003 smaller then the bore (and just short of the 45 degree angle in length) so when installing, it wouldn’t get stuck, and as Guy said “If you get it stuck before it’s down all the way you’ll need to call a Dr.” haha! so it’s best to leave it smaller then “On Size” and have to drive it in place. I also prepped the bore with a hone to rough the surface slightly, cleaned all contact surfaces to make both parts completely oil free before final placement.
Using the cylindrical 680 Loctite (fills a gap of .015) spread completely over the sleeve and bore, worked it into place with slight twisting till it bottomed out, cleaned up all excess @ both ends (and there was plenty to clean up), allowing it to cure for a few days should do the trick. I also installed a press in plug into the spark plug hole (too lazy to make a short threaded plug and didn’t have an old spark plug to modify) to allow easier access, mostly for clean-up and of course so nothing fell into the cylinder.
I made a mistake here by using some OLD loctite (it does have a shelf life but never ran into issues with that issue .. Until now, at least that’s what I assumed happened) I had a full med size bottle, probably 8-9 years from my airline days. That stuffs expensive so…. If it can go wrong……..!! But doing it over is no treat either!! Sometimes ya just do stuff…… False economics!!
So after still having the miss and rechecking the plug after this fix with 2112 showing on the odometer (even with the miss I couldn’t stay off of it, [just stay out of that rpm range as much as possible. Ha!] -- can you say addition? I know ya can!!) there was a small pool of oil starting again, but this time looked to be trailing up between the sleeve and head, onto the boot seal at the top, and on down the plug boot. So I made a cap to fit snug, using 680 I tapped it in place to finish off the fix. I must say it does look better then just a sleeve cut short. Maybe it was supposed to happen that way? I was thinking about doing that anyway but got lazy, so this forced me to do it!
Since the cap install I haven’t looked yet but I’m confident it will hold as it is a solid fix. With 680, even being old should have worked (so I thought) and assume I didn’t get full coverage while sliding the sleeve in place, even though I took extra care to do so. Always something.
So if you wonder why the inside of your spark plug bore or boot is wet while all else is dry, this could be your problem and fix. Hopefully this will be my last long story of repairs and mystery problems/issues, but who are we kidding…?? Ha!!
. Excellent that no one else has had this problem (that read this anyway)
