696 Ground Clearance Issues....

Hi All,
So we had a lovely ride 180+ mile yesterday and on the way back I thought I felt the tell-tale scraping ‘twixt peg and tarmac, so I do the same again and, yes, we have touchdown! No drama, bike nice and stable, lovely.
Back at home I bend down to check the foot peg to be greeted by this –



Yes, that’s a rather badly bent and scraped brake lever. Not good. Thank fek it didn’t dig in, eh?
TBH I expect better design than this from a manufacturer with such a sporting pedigree. My CB500 and Speed Triple never had this problem……Booooo.

This here is my Heath-Robinson Ground Clearance Gauge (HRGCG. Pat. Pending ) in operation, after I bent the lever back into shape-


As you can see, it confirms the lever is lower than the footpeg.

Hey-Ho. That’s life, let’s see how we can improve things, shall we?
Now, the only way to get more ground clearance is to raise the brake pedal, (as I doubt very much that anyone makes a modified one for the 696 just yet….) so I screwed the adjuster all the way in, but it still looked a bit-touch and go as to weather the peg or the lever would grind first. The only other thing I could see to get more clerance was to remove the locking nut on the adjuster, and the only way to do this is to remove the brake pedal. So, yes, off comes the pedal.
And “TWANG!!” goes the return spring, but more of that later…….

Here’s the pedal with the adjuster and nut loosened right off –



And here it is again with the locking nut removed and handily able to be tightened from below with an Allen key. (NOTE - That’s GOOD design, Ducati, apply it to the whole pedal please!)



And once back together, the HRGCG tells a nicer story -




Now, remember that return spring? Well it’s an ABSOLUTE BITCH to get back together! Really! I had to remove the footrest hanger and undo all the wiring and brake master cylinder from behind, then spend a ½ hour swearing at the spring to eventually coax it back onto place, before assembling the hanger again. TBH I don’t think it’s really worth it just to remove the nut, but I did because I knew no better. So now YOU do know better at my expense, and I wouldn’t recommend you do it unless you are a competent mechanic and good at solving little problems like this!

Whilst I was there I also adjusted the brake ‘actuator rod’ (The bit attached to the brake pedal in the pics) out a bit to take up some of the free play in the brake because of the higher pedal.
I still have some free play before anything happens, but the lever is up out of the way and I only use the back brake at slow speeds anyway, so that’s fine. Feels OK to me.

Hope this is of some use to someone


PS - Full size pics HERE.

[CK & AK]

AK 'adjusted' mine (raising it) the day after I got it as it was set far lower than any of my previous monsters when new. (as he also 'adjusted' the clutch lever too to be more user friendly)
As I dont often use the back brake its not a prob - and its now in a far more usable position anyway. Didnt take too long to do - maybe I should have posted about it back in early May - but didnt think of it really.
Shame you had to find out the hard way PP, but you seem to be sorted now

C

Ahh, no worries. Nice to know I'm not the only one to have discovered this, mind!


What it really needs is a hinged brake pedal I think....

Oh must ride faster,not done that yet !

[Seb_uk]

Fair play - I doubt most people would have the confidence to start dismantling a brand new bike! Hopefully it's sorted now - could well be worth trying to claim a new pedal under warrantly though if the lack of ground clearance caused the scraping.

Originally Posted by Sebuk

Fair play - I doubt most people would have the confidence to start dismantling a brand new bike! Hopefully it's sorted now - could well be worth trying to claim a new pedal under warrantly though if the lack of ground clearance caused the scraping.

Ahh, it's only nuts and bolts, and that's both sides I've had in bits now after fitting a 14t front sprocket which was also a bit of a git to change...!

I was thinking of the warranty thing myself, too, but I imagine they'll refuse as I've repaired it myself. I can't be arsed to waste a day faffing around in a dealers for a brake pedal TBH. Too much other stuff to do!


Done nearly 1800 miles since 16th June now...!

[Seb_uk]

Yeah - warrantly claims can take a while. I've been waiting for about 4 months to have my flaky engine paint sorted out. Still, all part of the Ducati ownership experience I guess!

I do hope they have solved that problem now with the flakey engine paint?