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Cyphon68's 899 Carbon [Street] - Picture Overload

11K views 19 replies 10 participants last post by  -Clint- 
#1 ·
Back in August I had the pleasure of going to the Moto GP at Indianapolis and was quite impressed with several older Ducatis that had been given an carbon fiber treatment. "If I ever had the time and money to do it, I'd love to do that to my 899", I thought. Already having purchased a few Ducati Performance carbon pieces for my 899, I knew that it was a fairly expensive endeavor to do a carbon build on the bike...and Ducati didn't even make all the components in carbon. I did some quick research and found that there are a few manufacturers that make replacement carbon parts for all the body panels, and only 2 or 3 manufacturers that make a carbon fiber fuel tank, but even those tanks were for the 1199 (which I already know has a fundamentally different rear clamp design). I quickly talked myself out of doing any more research as the costs would simply be too high for my comfort level. As luck would have it, I made out like a bandit the very next month on an anniversary trip to Las Vegas so I decided to get started on the build.

I love the look of the Tricolore 1199, the Tricolore Nero designs, and was inspired by Carbonvani's version of the tricolore.


The following is my attempt at attaining a similar look with my 899. I decided to go 2x2 twill carbon weave to mix up the look a bit from the Ducati Performance 1x1 carbon weave, but this meant replacing the parts I already had in carbon fiber. Sometimes the glossy carbon can get a little over done, so to attempt to combat this effect on my bike, anything that was a glossy panel from the factory, I ordered the carbon part in gloss. Anything that was matte plastic or otherwise matte from the factory, I ordered it in matte carbon. I could come to regret this, but so far I really like the look. I ordered nearly all the carbon parts from MotoComposites.com, rather than Carbonvani because MotoComposites allowed me to choose from several different weights of carbon, I could specify the 2x2 twill weave on every piece, as well as choose the finish (gloss / matte).

Front Mud Guard
Front Fairing
Front Fairing Stay
Side Upper Fairings
Side Lower Fairings
Air Duct Covers
Ignition Guard
Gen 2 Exhaust Shield
Rear Mud Guard
Brake and Cluch Reservoir Brackets
Shock Guard
1299 Tail Fairings
1299 Tail Winglets
1299 Seat Cowl
1199 Fuel Tank - CDT / Fullsix (OppRacing.com)

1199 Rear Subframe
1199 LED Headlight
Competition Werkes LTD Fender Eliminator
Competition Werkes Integrated Tail Light
Rizoma Rearsets
Rizoma Brake and Clutch Reservoirs
Evotech Radiator Guard
CTEK battery tender pigtail
ASV Levers
Ducabike Clear Clutch Cover
Telferizer Ball RAM Mount
Ducati Magnesium Engine Casing
Ducati 848 Red Anodized Clutch Spring Caps
Ducati Rear Spools

The carbon fiber parts arrived in November and were all very impressive quality. The CDT carbon fuel tank was particularly impressive. The tank is a single molded piece with brass fittings for the breather lines, fuel pump, and tank mounts. I'm not sure that these pictures truly do it justice. The tank itself was drastically lighter than the stock tank. While I'm sure I'm going to get a lot of "BRUH" faces for not weighing everything for the weight savings, I'm really doing this for the look. Wheels and exhaust aren't being changed and those are two pretty big areas to save weight. I will weigh the bike when the project is done to give you a final weight, but CDT does state that the steel 899 tank weigh around five times more than the one piece carbon tank, and I can believe it. You can pick up the carbon tank by one of the brass fittings with your pinky. The weave and finish are flawless, which made me feel better about buying the tank, considering its rather high price.



The fuel tank itself was the most daunting task as I wasn't sure exactly how much would be involved in removing the rear subframe and how much would line up. I had read Jarelj's build which involved switching to an 1199 aluminum tank, but he had mentioned modifying a racing rear subframe to work on the 899, so it had me worried that it may not be straight forward with street parts. When I questioned a Ducati dealership about the install they thought it would work with some welding, which scared the crap out of me if we're talking about a carbon tank. I was already pot committed though, so the project started.




We first needed to get the fairings off, stock fuel tank removed, and the rear subframe removed so that the 1199 aluminum subframe could go on, as well as installing the carbon exhaust cover. I'll warn that if you attempt to do this, be prepared to grind / drill out several hex screws that round out. We were using fairly new hex keys and some of them still rounded out the black soft metal screws.







When swapping to the CDT carbon tank, I had to drain the stock tank, then remove the fuel pump. Be prepared, it has a tight seal. I could have simply bought a new fuel pump and seals, but a quick search of Ducati Omaha's OEM parts catalog revealed that a new fuel pump is about $1120. I ordered a new gasket and o-rings which comes as a convenient kit.



With the fuel pump removed, it was time to transfer the pump, the plastic fitting on the bottom, and the cap to the carbon tank. One thing to be sure of is to remove all styrofoam inserts from the brass fittings. I ran into a small problem with putting the fuel pump into the new tank in that the 6 stock fuel pump screws were too long for the depth of the brass fittings.



After a quick email to CDT, they recommended the use of two washers between the fuel pump and the screws to help seat the fuel pump fully to the tank. This solved the problem immediately and I felt much better now that I could move forward. However, I couldn't move forward on the tank or the rear subframe because I realized that the 899 rear subframe uses shorter bolts for the two lower mounts of the subframe. While I was waiting on those longer bolts to arrive from Ducati Omaha's awesome parts department, I decided it was a good time to install the Rizoma rearsets. The process is pretty easy on the shifter side, with a small note that Loctite blue should be used on nearly all threads for the rearsets. The quick shifter was kinda tight getting a key in there to connect it to the rearsets, but with a bit of alignment and adjustment its workable without removing anything more. The brake side is a little tricky. The sensor needs to be installed before putting the rearsets on the bike, and there is a set screw that needs to be removed from the stock rearset. One last note is that the spring that previously surrounded the pin that goes into the Brembo rear brake pump will NOT be needed with the Rizoma rearsets.



After the rearsets were on, it was a good time to start tearing down the headlight fairing so I could replace the magnesium fairing stay with the carbon fiber fairing stay. The carbon fairing stay is incredibly light; a little over half the weight of the magnesium fairing stay it was replacing. The magnesium fairing stay was already very light (34% lighter than the stock aluminum fairing stay) so I'm not sure there was real cause for concern to swap it out, but I'm going for the look here, and the goldish hue of magnesium would stand out to me like a sore thumb every time I rode the bike.






If I had one component that gave me more grief than any other component, it was definitely the carbon fairing stay. The fairing stay mounts via two screws and a larger through bolt at the bottom. If I threaded the bottom bolt first, the top screws simply would not align with the holes on the front of the air box. I had to loosely mount the top two screws then had to apply a huge load of force to get the bottom through bolt to find its socket. There was quite a few strains and squeaks and pops that the carbon fiber made to make this bolt go in that didn't make me feel great about it, but after it was installed, it was very rigid. The posts that are meant to slide through the sides of the headlight and rubber grommets are perfectly cylindrical on the aluminum and magnesium fairing stays I've had. On the carbon fairing stay, those posts are tapered, preventing them from going all the way through the rubber grommets. This leaves very little room for the bolts to thread into the speed clips that are on either sides of the inside of the headlight fairing. To resolve this issue, I bought two longer bolts from my local hardware store, careful to ensure they had the same thread pattern that worked on the speed clips. If I had this part to do over and all the time in the world, I'd have sent the headlight fairing stay back to see if they could get a better fit for these posts and the sleeve for the bottom mount.

The headlight fairing itself required a little bit of sanding and grinding to fit the small speed clips along the bottom. This was rather quick work with a dremel, and didn't make me nervous at all, seeing how strong the carbon was and how built up the carbon was in these areas. The large speed clips on the headlight fairing kept moving slightly out of alignment of the tab while putting the headlight fairing on. The issue is that the headlight fairing is VERY rigid and the speed clips only barely clear the sides of the headlight, so the fairing must be slightly stretched to not bump these speed clips while attempting to fit the fairing into place. After nearly 10 tries of taking the carbon headlight fairing on and off, I decided to use non-expanding Gorilla Glue to help hold the two large speed clips in place. This did the trick and the longer bolts sinched right up. I swear to you, this was several hours worth of frustration finally solved, so this was a big moment once we finally got it.




 
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#2 ·
Still wanting to move forward but having just ordered those longer bolts for the lower mounts of the rear subframe, I zeroed in on the Ducabike clear clutch cover. This went on in about 15 minutes and was an amazing transformation to how this area looks on the bike. Setting the bike on its side stand, the clutch cover can be safely removed from the 1199 magnesium engine casing without worry of oil dripping out. While the cover was off, I took the opportunity to change out the clutch spring caps to some red anodized clutch spring retainer caps I found on ebay that were intended for the 848 / 1098 / 1198 clutch. The opening was just a tiny bit too small for the 899, so I drilled them out just slightly. I did these spring retainer caps one at a time, so that 4 other bolts were holding in the clutch while I changed out one retainer cap. This may have been completely unnecessary, but it definitely made me feel better about it. I just had to make sure when I put the Ducabike clear clutch cover on, that I used a torque wrench to properly torque the bolts down to 13Nm.




The longer bolts for the lower mounts of the rear subframe showed up, so it was time to install the exhaust shield (which required some trimming as it was intended for the single sided swing arm) and the subframe. Once the wiring was hooked back up, it was time to also install the 1199 tank clamp and finally set the tank in place. There are two brass breather hose fittings on the bottom front right hand side of the tank that require some new ear clamps to hold the hoses onto the fittings. The ear clamps that Ducati uses aren't easily salvageable, so I simply ordered some new ones to arrive with the longer subframe bolts.






Installed the ASV levers and took a bit of time to re-fit the mirrors, which is always a huge pain in the ass. The ASV brake lever had a ton of vertical wiggle so we hammered a washer down and shimmed the bolt that secures the lever. This made the operation a bit tighter than normal, but after several operations it was fine. Also took this time to install the front mud guard, which had yet another fairing screw that needed drilled out because it rounded out the hex socket. The cable tie at the back of the mud guard appears to be attached via a rivet, so I opted to use a more basic cable tie to secure those cables rather than drill out the rivet.









Still a little bit left to do in the project, but worth showing the progress thus far.
 
#4 ·
Insightful thread and great write up on all things tasty and carbon :)

Bike looks really great in carbon and all the other mods are very tasteful and I think the custom job is one to be proud of. I couldn't read it anywhere but has the carbon got any protective layer/film on it?

d
 
#5 ·
Thanks guys!

I couldn't read it anywhere but has the carbon got any protective layer/film on it?

d
When the project is completely done, it will get several coats of Ceramic Pro 9H, then a set of vinyls over some of the carbon, similar or identical to the carbonvani tricolore style.
 
#8 ·
Time to start fitting the 1299 tail pieces on the 1199 rear subframe, mounted to the 899. The tail fairing panel that has the lock assembly in it needed to be trimmed out a little with a dremel. The way the 1299 tail works, you can see through to the back side of the panels. This isn't a problem for painted plastics, but for carbon fiber, you see the raw layup surface and in my case, the tracking tag they used for manufacturing. The surface is much lighter and hazy than the perfect finish of the other side, so I decided to make sure everything fit, then take it back off and apply 3 coats of matte black plasti dip.








A small problem with the ASV shorty brake lever meant that the brakes weren't being applied, but the block at the left side if the lever wasn't depressing the lift sensor that indicates that brakes are disengaged. This meant the brake light was on, despite no brake pressure. Until I can figure out how to modify the lever so that isn't a problem, I'll be using the stock brake lever...brakes aren't exactly something I want to be unsure of. With everything back on the bike and good to go, it was time for a quick wash, dry, and a test ride.







One interesting thing about the Ducabike clear clutch cover: it fogs up when the engine is warming up, but stays clear once the bike has warmed up the air trapped in the cover. The bike feels quite a bit lighter to me, but I'm guessing there aren't HUGE weight savings. The stock steel fuel tank and steel rear subframe are kinda heavy by comparison and they are high on the bike. Other than an adjustment to the shifter to make for nice crisp down gear changes, the bike feels fantastic. I'll be getting the bike coated with Ceramic Pro 9H, then applying the vinyls.
 
#9 ·
SICKNESS!! Absolutely sick!!!

I Love it!
 
#13 ·
I love threads like this. Excellent commentary about what you were intending to achieve, lots of details, honest feedback about bits you weren't happy with, and a crap load of pictures.

Stunning work Ryan. Your bike looks amazing. You've inspired me to put the 1199 Al subframe and tank on my wish list :eek:

I never got to weigh my magnesium fairing stay, but am happy to learn from your post that it's 34% lighter :D
 
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