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I've been having masses of fun discovering the horrors contained within my engine - bottom bevel sleeve loose in the housing and both bearings broken up, leaving the bevel gear free to rise so that it barely made contact with the crankshaft bevel. The teeth on the crank bevel are badly chewed up and broken.

While the timing cover was apart I thought it prudent to inspect the oil pump, and found that at some point the bike had been run with the drive tang not engaged in the timing gear, so that the oil pump gear had done a passable imitation of a milling machine on the pump back plate. Apart from that, there is no ball valve on the pump and no hole in the back plate for one, so I'm assuming that the later Mototrans bikes never had them?

Time and time again, when I need some odd part or spare, I search through my junk accumulated over 45 years of Ducati ownership and find what I need. It just goes to show that I was right to never throw anything away. I found the rubber-mounted inlet manifold from my 350 from 40 years ago, cleaned it up and sleeved it down and bored it to 27mm and it will live again on the Strada.

Duccout wrote: Apart from that, there is no ball valve on the pump and no hole in the back plate for one, so I'm assuming that the later Mototrans bikes never had them?

Jon will put me right if needed; but in the meanwhile, Colin ....

This one?

Yes, I noticed that the parts book showed a ball valve, but mine has no hole in the back plate for one, and also, instead of one round hole and one 'd' shaped hole, it has two round holes, so what to make of it? I don't think that the back plate is home made as it is ground in the same way as Ducati originals and the holes are all in the exact place.

No-one said it was easy.....

I have come across oil pumps without the ball valve.
They will still pump oil fine without.
A couple of questions,
Do you have a hexagonal nut on the back of the pump, with a valve inside?
Does your timing cover have 'Made in Spain' cast on the outer face?
As far as I am aware, by 1978 when the Stradas were first introduced they all had 'Made in Spain' cast into them.
One or two of the earliest Ventos and Forzas still had 'Made in Italy' cast onto the outer surface, a hangover from when Mototrans first produced the widecase models.
If you don't have 'Made in Spain' cast onto your case it may have been replaced with an earlier one with a different pump.

Jon

No, no hexagonal nut and valve and 'made in Italy' is cast into the cover. The bike has definitely been in some sort of a crash, so maybe the owner replaced the scratched cover. I notice that Nigel Lacey say's that his pumps can be run without the ball valve, so maybe it is not an issue. I was also surprised that my engine has Scrambler valve sizes (36/33) as I thought that the Strada was sold as a performance bike.

Duccout wrote: ... I thought that the Strada was sold as a performance bike.

Nah, sorry to disappoint you Colin, the Vento was the 'Go Fast' model: a claimed 28.8 horses versus the Strada's 21, top whack of 170kmh versus the Strada's 125.

Even the Forza - whose intended market positioning is not quite so easy to discern - was rated at 22 hp and 145 kmh .