MY 2016 959 I bought it this year with 2200miles. In preparation for track use I have thoroughly inspected everything and and prepped it. Occasionally after it has been sitting for a week or so it drops a little coolant. When it is on the kickstand it appears on the left side as if it is coming out of the bleed hole. I have read every thread written in English about this issue.
Two weeks ago I was looking things over trying to figure out why. I found my reservoir was about 8oz overfilled and was surprised I could make such a stupid mistake and shrugged it off thinking I overfilled it due to the difficulty to read the reservoir level with the light colored Engine Ice. Now the bike has been on my lift for two weeks and it spewed out another small amount of coolant. This time the bike is straight up and down and the coolant ran down the right side of the motor and pooled a tiny bit on the left by the shock mount.
Back in I go looking. What I found was it was leaking at the junction of coolant line to the Vertical cylinder. Just a tiny amount that was pooling up and running down. If the bike was on its kickstand it runs right down to the weep hole and you could think that was the issue because you would see a little pool running out from there, why would look any further up the engine?
When I released the suspect clamp I got a substantial pressure equalization I was surprised because the bike had not been run for two weeks. Originally I thought it was under pressure and I cannot really explain that but if it was actually pulling a vacuum and I can make sense of it. I believe it is pulling air at that point which is the highest point in the coolant system. When the bike gets hot it pushes a little coolant into the reservoir then cools down to pulls air in from the leak. More air in the system the more it heats and expands. Best I can figure I have got a poor clamp install and or a bad radiator cap. Oh yea, my radiator was about 8oz low, so it is pushing coolant out without drawing back in. Parts are ordered. The leaking junction is visible if you remove the right side fairing and the coil pack in case someone else has these symptoms. Photos below
I am having a general over heat problem, my 959 was hitting 200 F coolant temperature at an ambient temperature of 84 F so I started looking. My recovery tank appears to be empty, nothing showing in the window, will check the radiator later today to see how much is in there. What caused the congealing? These come with ENI Agip coolant as factory fill. Did you add any additives of any kind that could have caused the congealing? I've never seen any signs of external leaks on mine so am puzzling on where the coolant went.
Well my recovery tank was bone dry. I removed the pressure cap from the radiator and filled it to the top of the neck then added coolant to the recovery tank but it is virtually impossible to see the level clearly through the window.
Every other motorcycle I've ever owned had a transparent recovery tank so you can actually see how much coolant is in there. Ducati chose to use an opaque black plastic with a milky white sight window that does not extend the full height of the tank.
The coolant is so light in color, I cannot determine the level.
Also the upper fairing interferes with access to the radiator cap and recovery tank cap, there is almost no clearance. I had to snake a 12" piece of vinyl tubing connected to a hand pump into the opening to get any coolant in to the recovery tank.
What a PITA, with a little thought, they could have made this much simpler to work on.
I had this same issue with the leaking hose where it attaches to the vertical cylinder. I managed to install a worm drive hose clamp over the existing hose clamp and secure the leak that way. It was a complete mission to access and complete this job.
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