Engine shut down while riding. Shuts down when clutch fully engaged

[Bianca]

I'm taking her in to a mechanic on this one (obviously), but I thought I'd get everyone's opinion on this, because I can't find it anywhere in the archives...

Tonight, I was riding my '07 Monster 695 home, on the freeway at about 80mph, in 5th gear, and the engine shuts off. I manage to cross 5 lanes of traffic with no power and thankfully, there's a generous shoulder on the right. I start her back up, start to roll out slowly, and she shuts down again. I start her and try to find neutral so I can get off and take a look. Can't find neutral. I hear a faint clicking through my helmet, traffic noise, and earplugs. She goes into first with a thick clunk, and I manage to make it to the next off-ramp and into a parking lot.

She will keep running as long as I do not fully engage the clutch. As soon as I release the clutch and try to ride her in 1st, no matter what the RPM's, she shuts down with a jerk. I didn't try to force her into 2nd. Always when I try to find neutral, she ends up in what feels like this in-between zone and clicks loudly when I let off the clutch slightly, until I fully disengage, and then I can click (or clunk, rather) into first. I can't put her into 1st gear or any other gear while shut off.

More details: (1) The oil temp wasn't high -- only around 200. (2) I noticed when warming her up before the ride home that she was idling unusually low at 1300 or so. (3) Yesterday morning, I topped her up with oil when I (apparently) didn't need to -- rode about 1/2 block, and she shut down. I saw that the oil was above the max line and didn't drive her any more until I was able to drain about 9 oz of excess oil out later that evening. Now the oil level sits squarely between the max and min. This morning she seemed fine for the ride in to work. (3) The gas light went on (I expected it to) as I was riding home tonight. I rode about 8 miles with the gas light on. I was actually trying to reduce the amount of fuel in the tank because I wanted to check the airbox for oil (due to yesterday's over-ambitious top up), and the manual says to make sure there's less than 1.3 gallons of fuel in the tank before lifting it or it will leak out. (4) She's due for an oil change (about 3 mos since the last) but the oil doesn't look thick at all -- just brown. Was planning to do that this weekend. (5) Last week I think I put bad gas in her, since she shut down about a mile after leaving the gas station, but started up again and has been fine since then. I topped her off with another gallon from a different station, but it's basically the same tank of gas. (6) I can't see how this could be related, but it's other hands on my bike, so I'll throw it out there: I had a kid detail the bike while I was at work today. (And he did a great job!)

I rode her pretty hard through the canyons on Sunday. She felt in great shape then! I'm bummed and hope to get her to a mechanic soon. Thoughts?

[Howie]

You can try bypassing the clutch switch and see if you can now let the clutch out and ride.  Then you can ride the bike to the mechanic, use it with the switch bypassed (safety issue since you can now start in gear) or attempt the repair yourself, your choice.  Oh, before bypassing it make sure the wires are connected tightly.

Follow the wires down from the switch.  When you get to the connectors undo them and connect the wires on the frame side.  The switch is now bypassed.  If the bike now runs in gear with the clutch engaged either there is a problem with the tap that engages the switch or the switch is bad. 

[Shatrat]

This sounds like a bad kickstand switch to me? The bike thinks the stand is down and shuts off as soon as it's in gear and clutch out.

If so, I'd replace it, don't just bypass it, for safety.

[Bianca]

I let the bike sit for a couple of days and started her up on Friday morning. She seemed to run fine. So this morning, I rode it in to my mechanic and after telling him that the incident happened right after I had her detailed, he said "oh that makes sense."

He said that when ducs get water in around their switches, they can shut down and refuse to start. To clean around there, you need to use air to blow all the junk out. The last couple of days has given it time to dry out, and she runs fine again.

This was just his best guess, since he checked her out said she seems to be in great shape now. So if it happens again, I'll update y'all!

[Raux]

put some dielectric grease in the exposed fittings.

but ask the detailer if he used hipressure water hose, big no no

[militar3rd]

Most detailers use high-pressure water hose and can knock off a lot of components. In my case, it completely knocked out all of my rubber spacers in my cooling fins. 

First and last time I'm gonna have it detailed by anyone but me.

[sofadriver]

There's a possibility of this happening on several connections on Ducati bikes. The most obvious being the rubber boot on the starter cable. It's a natural water trap. I have pulled all mine back so they're still on the wires, just not over the connection. The only one still in place is the hot side of the starter solenoid. Don't even want to think about bumping that with a screwdriver