Messages

Thanks everyone, I appreciate the feedback.

I'm probably going to be selling off some parts and wonder who you folks use for the best rates.  I may sell through ebay, though I'm not quite sure yet.

Thanks,

Roger

Hey, that's a cool looking engine stand!  A little big for my living room but still neat.

The USPS taking longer than folks expect is just how it is now.  The tracking number is still saying in transit, so I would not issue a refund.  It's not like you can tell USPS to bring it back.  It will eventually show up at the buyers address and you'll be out the cost of the item and shipping.  I would think USPS has some sort of process for determining when an item is truly lost.  Until that happens, no refund.

Why would someone put that much money and effort into a build that does not have a clear title?  It's a collection of parts waiting to be spilt up.

Four time champ, nothing left to prove and in a tier 2/3 team.  I'm glad he's moved on to enjoy his family.  Also, it might be enjoyable to see
how Alonso deals with having Lance as a team mate, especially after Austin.  So four drivers gone this year and some interesting driver pairings.

A different situation entirely but I restored my XR500 plastic tank many years ago that was heavily oxidized. The oxidation was just stupid thick. It was a lot of scraping and sanding through finer and finer grits, then polishing and finishing.  A lot of work but it came out great.

Yep, agreed, the dealer is easier to go after.  First though, I'd try to get out of the middle of the conversation and get Detroit and corporate pointing fingers at each other.  As I said, they should work it out so you are made whole without you having to sue or be out of pocket for the repair.

There are restoration products you could try but I don't think they would work for really heavily oxidized plastic. I'm not confident there's a way around
mechanically removing that thick oxidation layer.  There are probably chemicals that would remove the layer, but you may be left with a melted, uneven surface that does not look good.

This seems a bit unreal.  If the Detroit dealer did not tell you the mods you wanted would void the warranty, is it up to you to know this?  Apparently so.  Was it in the original warranty information sold when the bike was new and you did not get it?  Unfortunately, as you said, Ducati has the money to just deny the warranty claim and you have to sue.  It seems to me that between the Detroit dealer that performed mods that Ducati corporate claims caused the damage... between the two of them they need to make you whole.  You operated in good faith and Ducati as an entity is clearly not.  This makes Detroit Ducati look uninformed about the capability of their product to handle mods.  If Ducati corporate refuses you claim, then they should demand that Ducati dealers do not perform any engine mods at all if the product is still under warranty and if they do, then they are on the hook for fixing it.  Ducati corporate needs to do a better job of protecting the brand image because things like this makes the brand look bad.

I was asking about gasket material because I don't like using the two separate cylinder base gaskets.  I've had some that overlap and trimming them is a pain.  I've seen 1 piece for rz350, but the stud spacing looks different.

This morning I pulled a 350 bottom end apart and found that the case stop is cracked and deformed slightly.  Not so bad that it's not fixable and the cover
was not broken.

I have to believe that a fair number of "repair" videos on youtube are just for content.

Is anyone making their own gaskets?  The bulk material I can get locally is a bit thicker than the stock Yamaha material.  Probably fine for most things but probably not for base gaskets.

Thanks for the reply!  And I'm stupid!  I haven't had a land line in so long it did not occur to me that someone would.