Richard's ST2 pages - fuel filter

Information on this page last updated 2/16/02.

This is an important maintenance item on fuel injected Ducatis and the ST2 manual specifies replacement every 6000 miles. Symptoms of a dirty filter can be bad throttle response and possibly extra load on the battery and fuel pump ($$$). The Ducati filter goes for $20 from Koups. I have heard that this is the same as BMW part number 13 32 1 461 265 which may be a bit cheaper. Have also heard that a NAPA 3032 is only slightly different in size, still fits in the collar, and only costs a few dollars.

I could not find the NAPA filter so I used a Fram G2, cost a couple bucks. Outside dimensions are a tad smaller than the stock German filter so I had to shim the clamp a bit with a strip of rubber. I do not make it a practice to s kimp on parts but I thought I would try with this since the benefit of the more expensive filter was not obvious. Well, after about 4000 miles the Fram filter was dirty enough to cause the bike to start running really poorly. This happened about 500 miles from home on a holiday weekend so I ended up replacing with another Fram because it was all that was available locally (no motorcyle shops were open but Wal Mart was.) It has since been replaced with a Ducati filter. Not sure if the Fram is to fault, perhaps it is too small compared to the stock filter. But then again it was clogged and very black, the problem could have been some bad gas or more likely the vent lines which have been slowly shedding bits of rubber.

One of the ST2 Owners list members mentioned that his vent lines inside of the tank were dry/cracked, mine were as well at 6000 miles. I thought I would wait until the next service to replace them but they were looking pretty bad when I had to replace the filter on a trip as mentioned above. In retrospect it would have been better to replace them at the first sign of cracking.

On a 907ie it is possible to access the filter through the filler opening after removing the cap assembly, but no such luck on the ST2. Taking the fuel pump assembly out of the bottom of the tank is not that difficult. The manual says to screw some bolts into the empty threaded holes to aid in pulling the assembly from the tank. I found that the bolts that hold the plastic tank cover on work well for this purpose. Getting the assembly back in was a bit tricky, made easier with liberal application of vaseline on the o-ring.

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