Classic Bavarian Bagger

I've been aiming to spin this off the Ride, Eat, Meet Thread for some time. Finally learned how to post pics, kindasorta. I was thinking a bagger airhead might find some interest. Several standard and some cafe racer styles have been done here with good success. If you do a search on BMW cafe racers, quite a few show up. BMW scamblers and bobbers are getting pretty poplar. If you do a search on BMW baggers, usually the now defunct BMW Cruiser is the only bike that shows up. I have allways liked the look of the Moto Guzzi Eldorado. I used to see a fair amount of them at BMW rallies back in the mid 80's. They seemed to get a good amount of attention from the Guzzi crowd as did the V7's also a MG model from the same era . I also never heard an Eldorado or California owner say they wished their bike was a V7 or Le Mans. I've heard a lot of /6 riders say they like their R90/6 but wished it was a R90S. Which leads to the bike of this thread, a '74 R90/6.

I bought my 1st motorcycle, a '71 R50/5 back in '85 or '86; loved it. By '88 I thought I was ready for a bigger bike. Pursued the idea of buying a Kawasaki Concours, a poor man's K100RT. I asked my buddy Leo what he thought about it. He kinda liked 'em, then he told me about a buddy of his with a '74 R90/6 for sale. Windjammer fairing, 30,000 miles, small rear rack and trunk, $1500. Scibbled it down on apiece of paper. Told me it was listed for sale in the Memphis Auto Exchange. Pickup the mag and saw it for sale in side with a pic. Called Jerry a couple of days, went by test rode it, I was interested and in a short dickering session it was mine for $1,250.

Riding became apassion. Commuting to work, local runs, riding to rallies. Got the bigger tank, added Krauser saddle bags. Rode it to the MOA National in York, Pa.. Work, ride and fix, rally, ride, work commute, fix, repair, replace, change, ride fix, rally etc. Became a charter member of the Naturally Beemers of Ar. Rode to Daytona Bike Week '90 on to Key West, Fla. Became the first member to complete the County Seat Tour of Ar. in 1990. More ride, fix, change, work, commute, rally, fix, repair, commute, repair, fix, repair, fix. Wait a minute, too much fixxen and repairin going on here. A bubby of mine had a big garage over in West Memphis, Ar. My plan was to mostly dissasemble the bike and do a economy resto and get back to ridin with a lot less fixin and repairin at home and on the road. He gave me a spot and a week later the bike was mostly in pieces. The Windjammer as ditched, and most everything was cleaned repaired, replaced in as much as my pocketbook could stand. A year later I was back on the road, to riden ,rallies, commutin, riden, rallies, riden. 30,000 miles of almost pure fun and no real problems. The bike got a fair amount of attention, it looked good. Then I moved on to a K100RT and an R1100RS. The bike got pushed to the back of the garage and was pretty much forgotten.

Classic Bavarian Bagger.

After a few years, I decided I wanted to do pretty much a ground up refurbish of the bike and get the look of the bike like I allways wanted it to have. I started parts searching. Scavenger hunting all rallies, looking for all the period pieces to get the look. New, used, common, unobtanium. In the mean time I had several starts on the bikes, but job changes, family illness, crazy events all seem to set the real start back numerous times. Kept parts hunting to keep my interest up. I found a neat Moto Guzzi site called Cycle Garden. I wanted my R90 to minic the Eldo's they were building. One thing the Guzzi had was a cool name, Eldorado. Somehow /6 didn't seem all that cool. I was going to build a bagger, the '6 have been fitted into the Classic BMW nomenclature. Bavaria has a exotic ring to it. Classic Bavarian Bagger. I finally had a name worthy of the bike.

Great thread so far! I'm originally from Arkansas (living out in SoCal now). Cool to see other BMW owners out there!


Keep us posted with more photos, etc!

Well, you'll never hear a BMW car owner say s/he wishes BMW made less sporty cars.

There's a reason BMW dropped the R1200C and that the K1600 isn't much like a K1200LT.

I'd think most BMW riders insulted by their bikes being called "baggers."

It's perfectly OK to run old Airheads, but not so much to be afraid of or dismissive of BMW's new stuff. You simply can't do that without appearing obviously jealous.

And, aren't the Moto Guzzi Norge and Triumph (whatever) blatant R1200RT copies? And, Moto Guzzi has a GS copy, too, and the newer GS are probably the best motorcycles anyone will ever ride. And, they don't look that bad with ammo cans for bags if that floats your boat.

lkchris said:

Well, you'll never hear a BMW car owner say s/he wishes BMW made less sporty cars.

There's a reason BMW dropped the R1200C and that the K1600 isn't much like a K1200LT.

I'd think most BMW riders insulted by their bikes being called "baggers."

.

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Right there with you Kent...........+2.........They will always be Saddlebags...........For me, the yuppified "pannier" is bad enough without going the Easy Rider route and calling the fine machines that Airheads are.......A Bagger??????.......to each his own if Jesse James and the Orange County bunch are your role models then by all means show your stripes.......God bless........Dennis

The other side of the coin is the fact that what you are doing is YOUR vision and YOUR work. Gotta appreciate what YOU are doing, the time, effort, and money that you are obviously putting into the project...........SO MUCH BETTER than what we had to suffer through for a couple of years of a guy paying for another guy's vision of "customization" of an airhead, and then calling it HIS.......lol.....and the guy is not even a rider/biker........So......keep on truckin but it's just the label "bagger" that possibly bothers some..........God bless........Dennis

lkchris said:

Well, you'll never hear a BMW car owner say s/he wishes BMW made less sporty cars.

There's a reason BMW dropped the R1200C and that the K1600 isn't much like a K1200LT.

I'd think most BMW riders insulted by their bikes being called "baggers."

It's perfectly OK to run old Airheads, but not so much to be afraid of or dismissive of BMW's new stuff. You simply can't do that without appearing obviously jealous.

And, aren't the Moto Guzzi Norge and Triumph (whatever) blatant R1200RT copies? And, Moto Guzzi has a GS copy, too, and the newer GS are probably the best motorcycles anyone will ever ride. And, they don't look that bad with ammo cans for bags if that floats your boat.

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"It's perfectly OK to run old Airheads, '.....

Well it is so nice that he & we have your permission....



" You simply can't do that without appearing obviously jealous."

Jealous ? Of what ?

http://forums.bmwmoa.org/showthread.php?71958-What-were-they-thinking

Have fun with your project, but think long and hard before you rotate the engine 90 degrees.

akbeemer said:

Holy cow, start a thread and have your squabbles on it. Let Barry have his thread about what is obviously a labor of love to him without it turning into another bicker fest.

I'll delete this post in a day or so, hope you guys do likewise and if you wish to continue to "discuss" airheads-jealousy-new bikes, then do it on a thread started for that purpose.

Please.

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I'm all in favor of the "labor of love" project. .. I was merely commenting on a reply .

I'm going with a Teutonic 1000 mile style solo springer seat. a lot of the old timers ran them back in the day and still do. I didn't like the hose clamp style mounting system, so a buddy of mine fabbed up a little better set up. The 2 seats I have are, I believe, Teutonic knockoffs. Anyway a lot of the oldtimers liked them.