QuoteMy point was that people with problems might have a helluva time getting DNA to recognize it.

Right on, I see the light now, sorry.
I have been riding my bike alot the last few days and have a couple of findings. I notice two things. I will keep my observations of only engine performance, the rest is awesome too but for lack of confusion I will stick to the motor.What I notice is it behaves diferently depending how/where you ride it. I see a protential for improvement in one small area that lies around 3800- 4200 rpm with the bike under a light load. This is right where you might find yourself cruising say on the highway. I believe this is an epa thing as we spend most of out time on the bike around this rpm and light load. Now, if you leave a light hard and load the engine good, the bike launches hard and pulls strong right through the rpm range from 3500 rpm to 9000. There is great throttle response and the bike pulls clean and hard from a very low rpm. Now if you lolly gag and loft through the gears the hole in the 3800 - 4200 rpm shows its head. I love this bike. I own a mint condition 2002 VFR 800 Honda that I have ridden for years and jumping off the Duc onto it is alarming to say the least. The Duc is sooooo much better its is amazing.

Quote from: gearhead on June 09, 2008, 06:44:29 PM
Right on, I see the light now, sorry.
I have been riding my bike alot the last few days and have a couple of findings. I notice two things. I will keep my observations of only engine performance, the rest is awesome too but for lack of confusion I will stick to the motor.What I notice is it behaves diferently depending how/where you ride it. I see a protential for improvement in one small area that lies around 3800- 4200 rpm with the bike under a light load. This is right where you might find yourself cruising say on the highway. I believe this is an epa thing as we spend most of out time on the bike around this rpm and light load. Now, if you leave a light hard and load the engine good, the bike launches hard and pulls strong right through the rpm range from 3500 rpm to 9000. There is great throttle response and the bike pulls clean and hard from a very low rpm. Now if you lolly gag and loft through the gears the hole in the 3800 - 4200 rpm shows its head. I love this bike. I own a mint condition 2002 VFR 800 Honda that I have ridden for years and jumping off the Duc onto it is alarming to say the least. The Duc is sooooo much better its is amazing.

Thanks Gear! 

Your post makes me feel a WHOLE lot better about the bike!  I was close to ditching the idea and going with the s2r 800.  I may get the bike with slip ons and see if that will make due.  Will I need the other DP kit or can I just run the slip ons? 

Quote from: nkryptit on June 09, 2008, 06:52:53 AM
So does that mean that this is a fuel problem, and not so much a fuel system problem.  If I pump premium here in the states, am I getting this "gasohol"?

If you live in the US and live in or near an urban area or any area that has air quality problems ethanol laced fuels are mandated and can be as high as 10%.  High octane fuels are more likely to have a higher ethanol content since the additional ethanol adds octane.  I dislike the name "premium fuel''.  The name creates the illusion it is better quality.  The octane is higher and unless your engine requires higher octane there is no benefit.

 As I am doing for now, running just the slip ons with the baffles installed, is fine. I hope in the near future I can get this taken care of but for now it works great.Just needs a little fine tuning.

So what does Ducati recommend for octane ratings?

Also, shouldn't the bikes that are sold here in the US be set up to accept these common fuels?

Quote from: SolidSnake3035 on June 10, 2008, 03:15:55 AM
So what does Ducati recommend for octane ratings?

Also, shouldn't the bikes that are sold here in the US be set up to accept these common fuels?

+1 ...  I was told (by the sales guy) when I picked up my bike that it was a "premium" only bike.  Anyone want to call BS?

Quote from: gearhead on June 08, 2008, 11:30:50 AM
I have been doing some experimentation this weekend. In general I found the same thing, just not the over heating with the complete kit without db killers. The bike ran poorly with the full kit installed. I pulled the plugs and it was way lean. What I dont get here is what is the purpose of the new module if the kit was designed for race only, open baffle with high volume air filter? The reason I ask is because it appears the original module is richer than the race version. In my experience all fuel injected bikes today are running too lean in the midrange for emission purposes. This is confusing that when you add a complete factory engineered kit it even runs leaner. It ended up the only acceptable way to get the bike to work decently, besides totally stock , was too put the stock filter with stock module and run the Termis with the db killers installed. I will wait until it gets sorted out before installing the other stuff. The bike runs great this way, is a little to quite, but appears my only option.
I ask this question again as nobody answered it before. Did the guys who got the complete kit get the dealer to install it and fine tune it or did you do like me and install it yourself?

I am the original author of this post, and to answer your question, yes I had the full DP kit installed when I picked it up from the dealer, with db killers removed, ( have I said it is LOUD!!). Another Question has been the fuel. And the Owners manual states Premiun fuel only. One has to wonder is Ducati failed to take into account that we here in the States have no choice to but to run E10,ethanol,gas blend. I haven't had a chance to put many miles on it since my original post, but I love riding it. I haven't had it overheat again but it still stumbles at part throttle rolling into full throttle. My dealer rep still says nothing is wrong but that there my be an ECU fix coming (). I still can't figure out how I went the first 134 miles on 1.6 gallons, it is weird

The 95 octane recommendation in the owner's manual is in RON ( Research Octane Number) and is more like European middle grade.  Here in the US we use AKI rating which is an average RON and MON (Manufacturer's Octane Number).  RON and MON are two different test sequences so the mathematical average is not an accurate cross reference to RON.  Most stock 2 valve air cooled Ducs do not ping on 87 AKI.  Since the 696 is a new engine with fairly high compression 87 may or may not be sufficient octane.

I was doing a little looking around on ethanol gas in the US and found this.  http://www.jwardell.com/mini/2006/06/27/ethanol-gas-problems/.   It looks like some vehicles have seen some real damage due to the mixture. Let me know what you guys think?

Quote from: nkryptit on June 10, 2008, 08:24:29 AM
I was doing a little looking around on ethanol gas in the US and found this.  http://www.jwardell.com/mini/2006/06/27/ethanol-gas-problems/.   It looks like some vehicles have seen some real damage due to the mixture. Let me know what you guys think?

I don't like it, but most of us have no choice.  As far as major damage from use in newer US legal vehicles goes, not very likely.  I do suspect the possibility of somewhat shorter fuel pump life and problems from solvent properties causing fuel injection issues in vehicles that previously were running on non oxygenated fuel do happen.  Older vehicles, different story since components did not have to be alcohol compatible.

Thats the problem with most USA fuels  the mandated Ethanol content . As Ducati do not design the bikes to run on Gasohol,  they design the bike in Italy to run on regular RON 95 fuel with no Ethanol in it. i am sure that the fuel in the majority of US states is going to be a contributor to poor performance and running issues.

We are gradually having Ethanol based fuels same as USA forced on us in Thailand and the stuff is causing loads of problems even in engines supposedly designed for it.

In England most fuel is non Ethanol so there are very few problems with Ducatis there.

jerry

So the real question is: Has anybody with a 696 or other similar FI Ducs OUTSIDE the USA (using fuel with no Ethanol content) have any of these running issues? It is starting to sound like a Power Commander, and individual tuning is going to be needed if Ducati can't figure it out.

With the first two tanks of fuel, I used regular in it.  Ran okay, but then I saw the 95+ octane recommendation in the manual and switched to Premium (93 Octane).  I will say that since the switch, my mileage has improved along with the smoothness when running.

Quote from: MOUSEMAN on June 10, 2008, 12:26:42 PM
So the real question is: Has anybody with a 696 or other similar FI Ducs OUTSIDE the USA (using fuel with no Ethanol content) have any of these running issues? It is starting to sound like a Power Commander, and individual tuning is going to be needed if Ducati can't figure it out.

Will a power commander work with the duc's closed loop system? 

My experience with S4 is that even with PC3 when i put in Gasohol it runs much slower and uses 15% more fuel it is also rougher , put in Regular 95 and it runs perfectly . my Nissan Maxima iV6 car is the same .

Friends in Thailand with latest closed loop EFI Ducatis report same problems with Gasohol/ ethanol blended  fuels. Noone has anything good to say about it ....even guys at the local refineries say its CRAP .