Cleaning paper towels
 

Collected the bike from dealer after having some work done.
Rode it, no probem. Filled it with petrol, about 100 yards down the road it started to cough, splutter, and the engine seemed to be running on one cylinder only. Looked in the tank, nothing.
Got home. emptied the tank thinking it might be the fuel, swopped the spark plugs. Put some petrol in and noticed 2 large pieces of cleaning paper snagged around bottom of the fuel pump.
The dealer had used them to clean out some moisture from the tank and left them in.
Since then it has not run properly. The dealer variously stating it is te ECU not functioning, the Power Commander and the wiring loom.
The gauze and petrol filter were changed. I back flushed the lines from the conector in the bottom of the air box.
Would that paper be likely to cause fuel starvation?
Would or could that lead to other issues as the ECU is expecting proper fueling but not getting it?
Help would be appreciated. it just seems to coinciental that paper in tank = ike stopping = ongoing issue, the dealer won't fix.

The purpose of the fuel filter is to prevent any foreign debris that makes its way into the fuel tank from clogging the injector nozzles. So it stands to reason that some of the cleaning paper could be in the fuel filter, but a clogged fuel filter usually shows up as a flow restriction at higher rpm.

Running intermittantly on one cylinder suggests a plugged injector or an ignition problem associated one or both spark plugs. Pull the plugs to see if only one cylinder is affected, and if so, try switching ignition wires, ignitors, injector relays etc. between cylinders to isolate the problem.

One concern when servicing the fuel system is you need to be very careful not to dislodge any fuel line particles downstream of the fuel filter - they'll plug the injectors.

Hi,

When it started I changed the spark plugs over and then the cables to the coils.
The fuel filter has been changed. Looking at the the turn over when starting there is definitely little or no fuel coming from one of the injectors. Could not find anything in the manual about cleaning or checking the actual injectors.

In you opinion is it likely that the paper caused the issues. Because quite honestly I cannot see why I am doing te clean up work here when it was the dealer that left the paper in in the first place.

I take it that they're not an official Ducati dealer, otherwise I'd have said get straight on the blower to Ducati UK and leave it to them to sort them out...

Having to sort out problems that a dealer has caused just doesn't cut it.

G

Regrettably it was MD racing. Hardworking and good guys.

I cannot see how the 2 incidents are not related but liberal use of techno babble meant that they were seeking to make out that the peper towels could not have caused the continued starting problems.

Well there are two options in my mind.

1, Take it on the chin and try to sort it yourself if they are not willing.

2, Tell them as they are not taking responcibility your going to take it to an Authorised Ducati dealer and if the problem is found to have been caused because of the paper towel issue, then they will be responcible for the bill.

Neither options are very good and they may not agree to #2 but it could be worth spelling it out to them after all if an independent dealer can confirm the paper towels caused the problem they dont have a leg to stand on if they admitted to leaving them in the tank.