Clear coat

[Snips]

Hi,

Apols for the non-Monster introduction... bear with me.

One of the things stopping me chopping my 1098 for an 899 is that, amongst all the other 'cost saving' compromises of the 899 over the 1199, it also lacks a coat of clear coat, making the paintwork even more vulnerable than usual.

The 1199 does have clear coat.

The lack of clear coat is obvious in the shine of the paintwork (even when new), and very obvious around the Ducati decals on the tank. Without clear coat, the lettering looks and feels like an applied sticker with a sharper edge. With clear coat, the lettering is beneath the clear coat layer, so more blended.

Anyway, I popped into the Sheffield dealer yesterday to see the 899 and 1199 side-by-side and took the opportunity to look at the Monsters they had.

I was disappointed to see that the 1200 and 821 they had in also did not have clear coat. The only 'new' Monster they had in with clear coat was an older 696 (with the now old-style fake tank covers).

They didn't have a 1200S in for me to take a look at - does anyone on here know if the 1200S has clear coat protection for the paintwork?

Thanks.

[Dookbob]

The clear coat is only another couple of coats of paint, but without a colour pigment. So if anything occurs that would damage the paintwork, a clear coat is not going to make any difference. I take your point about the edges of the decals though, but if you ever want those decals off for whatever reason then you will be glad they don't have a clear coat over them.

[Darren69]

It will probably make it less likely to get scratched with some clear coat and easier to polish out any very minor scratches. I may give the colour a bit more lustre too.

[SunEye]

If you want to protect the paintwork then something like a VentureShield urethane film will probably do more than a clear coat.

[Snips]

If you want to protect the paintwork then something like a VentureShield urethane film will probably do more than a clear coat.

Thanks, and I do use VentureShield on my bikes too.

But not including Clear Coat on a £13K bike (in the case of the 899) seems like a cost cutting measure too far.