I'm thinking of buying Monster 696, what should I pay attention to?

I plan to buy the 20th anniversary version of this classic beauty in the future and what should I look for? If I buy it, it will be my first Ducati and I only know the Desmo and I don't know if there are any chronic problems with other parts. I am skilled and knowledgeable in repairs but I need advice from you for this model.

I hope someone can chime in buddy...ive never had any monsters so I cant say...IF you get no responses here, i know there is a pretty active UK ducati forums..they may be able to help out


good luck
jag

I think you'll find the 696 underpowered. That being said it will be stone ax reliable. If you're a decent mechanic shimming a 2 valve will be readily doable and it sounds like you have some experience. The plan with the belt drives is to check the valves and adjust as necessary every time you change cam belts (I run them about 15K miles except the for 1198). If I were to buy another monster I'd buy a S4RS. 2006-2008 I think. These are the last of the original monster series (shorter and lighter than the later ones). These have 998 testaretta superbike motors, water cooled, make about 135 HP with a decent exhaust system, 56ish inch wheelbase with radial brakes. Really fine handling motorcycle as delivered (all the early monsters were pretty good but these with the superbike geometry and ohlins are really good). 420ish lbs wet. They made a tricolor version of this right at the end (2008). These are equally easy to service just with the added complexity of being a four valve and water cooled. IMHO the testaretta's are the easiest 4 valves to shim (the V4's are like miniaturized testaretta's but the 5 mm shims are kind of a pain). Just need to pull the radiator to get to the front valve cover. From a reliability standpoint the most unreliable part on all of these would be the rectifiers. Ducati put these enclosed under the seat on multiple monster models and these need to be moved into the airstream the common plan being just to cut a hole in the cover beneath the seat and turn them upside down. If the bike was broken in appropriately and you pay attention to the valve train (I reset to within factory assembly specs if needed every valve check and ignore ducati's operational specs) all the belt drives are pretty much indestructible. One other thing the belt drives have a single row output bearing in contrast to the self-aligning double roller on the later bikes so they are more sensitive to the chain being run too tight (they spall the bearing and you need to split the cases to replace).