Running temp
 

What is the normal running temp ( according the the gauge) on a 988? ... mine seems to run high ....

thanks

In the middle of the guage, ie. needle straight up.

:D

My 998 usualy runs at 180 ish but yesterday, when caught in traffic, it was running at 200 ish.

In hot weather but on the move it should be about 170-180.

ºF or ºC ? :D

That's why it's easier to say "needle straight up" as they're the same gauge but with a different scale on them.

Mines a °c and runs a little hotter than that ...

50 mph in town and it will be at 90-95 .....

on open roads, mine normally runs at about 80'c
yesterday tho it was hitting 110'c :o

I saw my 900ss above the 3/4 mark for the first time yesterday. This was at the end of a day's riding when I got back into town and hit traffic.

Mine got to 214 yesterday in traffic.

I'm yet to see my SP above 1/3 of the guage...should I be worried?!?!

A bike should get up to temperature for best performance.

Duane Mitchel reported that he ran a series of tests to establish optimum running temp for a race bike and found that (185F) 85ºC was about perfect. Over that, they lost horsepower fairly quickly (down about 15 HP at 100ºC) and below that the same (down about 6 HP at 65ºC).

The computer uses the engine coolant temperature sensor to supply additional fuel while the engine is warming up. Engines need more fuel when for a cold start as there is no heat in the ports and chambers to keep the fuel atomized as vapor, so it condenses. Fuel as a liquid burns very badly in the combustion chamber, so throwing more at it ensures enough stays as vapor for some sort of combustion. Injected engines get a very nice fuel spray from the injectors and this is why injected engines behave better when cold.

In the Ducati system, the sensor tells the ECU to stop warm-up fuel enrichment at around 175°. So from a fuel correction standpoint, the proper operating temperature is above this value. Reduce the coolant temperature below this and you're not operating efficiently.

So cooler is not better from an operating perspective. YOU may feel more comfortable, but the bike is not operating at an optimum point on its fuel map.

In particular, I had to remove the water plus Water Wetter mixture from my 916's cooling system because it was running too cool.

On a day with a 75°F ambient air temperature, coolant temperatures would only reach 140 - 170°F (60 - 75°C.) I tried blocking off air flow to a section of the radiator, but temperatures still stayed below the gauge midpoint. At these temperatures, the ECU is still adding extra fuel for warm-up conditions (below 175°F.) The tailpipes were black from an overly-rich mixture and gas mileage was down.

thanks Guys

A very interesting/helpful thread - I had been wondering about the temps on my ST4s. I get similar readings of about 80c with highs of 110c when stationery in traffic in hot weather. I am used to having a clear "red zone" so you know it is too hot. you don't get that on a digital readout. All I could find in the owners manual was a comment that 120c was when you should start to worry!

Daryl

Mine will go between 80°C and 100°C in the heat around town but normally sits somewhere between 40°C and 80°C (i.e. 1/3rd of the gauge). So I wouldn't worry to much Harv

Mine sits to the left of straight up just inside the middle third, unless it's a hot day and I'm in slow traffic.

I was concerned about it running too cool and spraying excess fuel into the cylinder to compensate so Steve at MotoRapido took a look.

Confirmed temp guage was accurate, the ecu wasn't overfuelling (FIM Chip though) and all is well in my world.

Apparently it's not uncommon for them to run cooler once the cam timing is set correctly.

yep my 996 runs at 80 but 100 ish in traffic

my 996r and 998r both in australia run 80-85C winter while riding,but in traffic do tend to run up to 110C; at this temperature I found I was splitting header tanks ( I stopped this occuring by replacing the rubber bung under the ignition key with a piece of turned delrin exactly the right length to stop the flat ( relatively ) top of the tank flexing and incourageing the tank to split along its top rear edge.If the bike doesnt run over 100C the water loss is negligible ; however if the bike has a split tank the riding temperature (80-85C ) stays stable long after the bike has increasing temperature problems while idling . This is because the bike requires less effective radiator area at large airflows;-- but the 996r-998r have marginal cooling efficiency while stationary (get hot) It appears the fan only switch on at 95C which gives to small a margin between the fan cooling and system pressurisation (boiling). I found this out by disconnecting the fans (2x) and measuring the engine temperature with an infra- red gun.I needed to do this because one of my 996r s consistantly overheated at the lights after 60kms of riding;-- the problem gets worse as the water level drops because it eventually starts to decrease the effective radiator area ( some of the tubes are not full of water) and the heat rejection starts decreaseing, next the bike then starts to overheat while being ridden ,this is more serious because the motor get hotter quicker than it will at the lights ( idling) I noticed that if I started to ride the bike that the engine temperature would drop back to 80-85C and I could get home without having to remove the tank and add water.A another common problem occurs when refitting the ballast tank line to the radiator neck,If you put the hose on too far the hose clip will stop the radiator cap from fully seating and this reduces the pressure that the cap will unload (dump ) at; this causes water loss from the cooling circuit into the recovery circuit , with the same results as above , because the cap doesnt seal well the ballast water isnt recovered to the cooling circuit on cool down ---overheating results
I recommend getting a 85c fan switch from motowheels, lapping the top of the fuller neck for a good cap seal,fitting a higher flow fan to the single fan models, getting the fuelling right,using water wetter (redline)
contary to whats stated above the thermostat job is to stop the engine running too cool under ' riding' conditions ; my thermostats appear to open according to my infrared investigations at 85C. The radiators easily provide enough heat rejection under riding condition with standard engines with less than 15% increase in power, but are marginal at the lights.
Ducati were recently selling off the DP radiators for the 998 cheaply!
Febur also sell decent oil coolers ( again available from motowheels) and these also add to the total heat rejection and will have the same effect as a larger radiator BREAKOUT