This 2001 Ducati 748 had been recently bought by a local customer – for a great price – but had only a partial service history, so its new owner wanted the bike gone over thoroughly. To be fair it’s a nice, tidy bike in good order and looks like it’s been well looked after. Softening the suspension front and rear was a specific requirement, which we did to the point that any softer would affect the handling adversely. Next up was a close look at the engine; the clutch was fairly worn (after 8,000 miles, as this bike had done, this is usually the case). These are expensive, and we recommended fitting the later aluminium plated items when it’s completely cooked. Then the usual stuff that you’d do to any Duke – new belts, air filters, throttle body balance plus a sneaky look at the back cylinder head to check the rockers for wear (the valves don’t need doing ‘til 12,000 miles, but this model year did suffer a few problems with suspect face hardening on the rockers).
All done - one very tidy 748 serviced, roadtested and ready for the summer...
