RampantBadger's Radical Ducati Project

[RampantBadger]

I thought some of you might be interested in my long term Ducati Frankenbike project.
The basic plan was convert one of these:

into something similar to this:

That is the '9 1/2' race bike built by Radical Ducati, the bike I am building will be fully road legal but track biased.

I started by buying this little beastie, a 1999 Ducati ST4

it was in pretty good nick, a little tatty here and there but had a nice strong 916 desmoquattro engine.

Then bits started to arrive including this beautiful S4R Monster swingarm.

Other parts include: a 999 Tank, radical Ducati Monjuic Seat unit, 1098 Forks, 999R Forged Magnesium front wheel, Hypermotard Evo Rear Wheel, 848 Brakes and master cylinders and S4R Monster Rearsets.

[RampantBadger]

Once I had enough parts I started the strip down, under the fairings were fairly congested and I quickly realised that I would have to change a fair chunk around including chopping the loom up.

I don't have a garage or a workshop so most of my work is being done on my driveway / in my garden.

I couldn't help offering up the new tank and seat to see how much work the rear end will need.

All that framework at the rear was going to be chopped out and a new rear subframe fabricated.
once it was stripped I swapped the swingarm and rear wheel, the original swingarm was an absoloute pig to remove! I snapped 3 sockets trying to get the bugger off.

Then it was time to swap the front end
Custom fabricated (By MADASL Racing) top Yoke on

1098 Forks and Clip ons fitted

And the 999R front wheel fitted

[RampantBadger]

I had reached a point where my skills were running out so the bike went into MADASL Racing for the fabrication work.

Rear Subframe removed for the tank / seat mockup

Temporary mount tacked together to hold the tank and seat unit

Custom exhaust fabricated, its going to be a touch loud :twisted:

Rear Subframe fabricated and ready to come home for me to get on with it.

[RampantBadger]

Time to see how much work the loom needs, the ECU will be sitting under the seat.

It sits really nicely in the new rear subframe, some tangs have since been welded onto the frame to hold it permanently. Once I had the ECU location sorted I started to run the loom back out to see how much modification it needs.

Henry helped...

It all seemed ok until I tried to wire in the replacement dash, an Acewell 6556 unit.

Its tiny, the size of a smartphone and absolutely packed with features but the loom it has to go into...
The Horror!

I'm not an electrician and being Red - Green colourblind really makes wiring it up fun, especially when half the descriptions on the bike wiring diagram are in Italian and the dash ones are translated from Chinese! After liberal use of Google I managed to get everything labelled up.

Then disaster struck, I thought I had the dash wired up right but when I was testing all the sensors and switches worked the unit threw a wobbly and bricked on me. After a call to Acewells technical support dept they confirmed that it was fubared, however, they also confirmed that the unit had been incorrectly wired in the factory and they would send me a replacement free of charge! result.

After a few issues with the loom everything was wired up and all working perfectly, headlight fitted too, starting to look like a bike again.

[RampantBadger]

As the bike is water cooled it was always going to be a challenge to hide the rad and pipework away, so instead I'm making a feature of it. Queue Forge Motorsports and a custom curved Ally race rad.

It looks even better in the metal, and brilliant on the bike.

As we are close to getting it back on the road the bike is now over with MADASL again, we've started to strip down the loom. I've cut a load out of it that wasn't necessary and we will be shortening it as its waaaaay to long.

all wired up as a temporary connection to check everything works before its cut to length.

Battery and reg/rec positions have been finalised and I have settled on a Pipercross air filter.

The dash has been fitted in its final position.

[RampantBadger]

New clutch pressure plate and samco hoses fitted and the water temp sensor has been removed for modification.

fully serviced, changed the belts and replaced all of the rotten old external bolts with stainless items.

[RampantBadger]

It's alive, IT'S ALIVE!!!
https://youtu.be/hIpS9ZnBSyc
We cranked it a few times with the fuel tank off to get some oil flowing through it, then when we connected up the tank it fired first prod of the button, happy days!
I was expecting it to be louder to be honest but it's got a lovely bassy note in person.

 

2 years work so far and it's finally starting to come together, I have the wiring to finish and some mounts to make up to hold a few bits and bobs then it is on to preparing it for an MOT. The plan is to be able to ride it for shake down testing this summer before stripping it all down to tidy it up and paint everything, that's if I get time of course...

Edited 24 May, 2016 by RampantBadger

[KenONeill]

I'M PRETTY SURE THAT DUKES ARE ALLOWED TO BE LOUDER THAN THAT!!

 

Seriously, I'd not have revved it much higher myself after the engine had sat around for 2 years, and certainly change the oil and cam belts before giving it big beans.

Also, a mate of mine used to have a Yam 750 (in the 1980s) and it got much louder over about 4_000 on the stock system.

[fabiamk2SE]

What an awesome thread, for an awesome bike.

Love it!

Thanks for taking the time to do all that, it was a very interesting read!

Looks the dogs nuts!

[RedBen]

Great write up, cheers!

Love your work on this, really looking forward to seeing it on the road.

[Danny 57]

Very good write up on the history of your build with some excellent pictures and above all else you have done very well to persevere with the build. Well done.