So the love affair starts.... BMW

I picked the BMW up this arvo. I know it is mine now. I broke the right hand mirror off on Canterbury Rd. I was trying to adjust the mirror and didn't know that it was really tightened down hard. It gave as I pushed it. Moved to where I wanted it. Then as I am riding along it flung itself off onto the road and was run over. At least the cops didn't mind me doing an illegal U-Turn so I could park and get the mirror. I shudder to think how much it will cost me to replace.

Handling is way different than the MuZ. I was used to the fat small front tyre. The front end seems to be squirming around on the BM. The steering head bearing seem ok with no chunkiness. It might just be me. I did find that the front tyre pressure was too high. So this might help. Will know tomorrow when I take it out for a ride.

The engine is of course like a tractor in sound and pulling. Man this thing has torque. I am not used to riding around in top gear at low revs and then opening the throttle and off it goes. Engine is making noises that I am not used to hearing. This will take time to get used to. Hopeful I can get at least 100k on top of the 148k it has before anything major has to be done.

The shaft has no where near the lift under acceleration that my Virago had. Must be some of that BMW trickery in there to stop this.

Gearbox is not like a Japanese bike one. It changes slower and is a bit clunky. Not that super slick changing as a Jap.

The bike has a Koni rear shock. Until I can fiddle with it and adjust the spring loading I will pass judgement on it later.

Nonfango topbox that has the stop light wired into it. Fits at least my open face helmet so far.

Heated grips that I put on by mistake and nearly fried my hands till I could work out what position to but the rocker switch to.

The mufflers are stainless Staintune ones and sound so good. Loud and grumbles nicely. It is popping on overrun a bit though.

I love the centre stand. It is so easy to get the bike up onto that stand. So easy to get off the bike too with the weight down so low. The side stand I hate. I can’t push it down as my leg gets caught up in the fairing lower. Therefore I can’t kick the stand out far enough to have the bike lean on it.

After owning it for 3 hours now I am happy. But riding it heaps more will show how much the BM and I will like each other.

Comments

Tuning 40mm BING CV carburetors for BMW motorcycles by ear.

Steve Doyle has put together this great and simple guide to tuning your Bing carbs. No need for expensive tuning equipment. So over to Steve...... Any feed back on this How To please email me and I will pass it onto Steve. There are 3 common methods to syncing the carbs. They will all work 1. Shorting the plugs. http://bmwmotorcycletech.info/synchcarbs.htm and http://www.airheads.org/content/view/216/98/ 2. Using a manometer of some sort. Carbtune, Twinmax or home made http://www.airheads.org/content/view/183/98/ 3. Using your ears. No comprehensive articles that I could find.. In the spirit of learning to service and tune at home and after lots of reading, I decided that for me the "by ear" technique might be the most useful, as it doesn't require any special tools and can be performed anywhere. There is no risk of electrical damage to the bike or the one doing the adjusting. It was very difficult to find a comprehensive description of the procedure, so using the combi...

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Wrench'n Ride'n

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