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vintage road trip

I believe Darryl has upwards of 300K on his oilheads, just as a point of reference. Of anyone I know, he's uniquely qualified to comment with direct experience.

So far, in numerous cross country trips an over 100K miles of riding them, the only failure we've had on an oilhead was a hose clamp that gave it up in Ely, NV one morning. It was leaking gas, so I headed down to the local NAPA and bought one for $.50.

I repaired it with the tools in the toolkit in about a half hour, start to finish.
 
I think the main concern today would be the speeds on the major highways (above what is comfortable long-term on a /2), and the saturated volume of cars and trucks on many roads....and most of them with their attention focused on their cell phones or psychoses. Hal

Most of what you say here is true of motorcycle travel in general. . . obviously the /2 isn't a highway monster but it will cruise at interstate speed limits anyway.

that said the joy of motorcycle travel for me, is to stay off anything more than a blue line hwy. '67 R69S or '02 GS. same.

Aerostitch has a cool little book called Aerostitch Lightweight Touring that focuses on small bike travel. It's more focused on motard type dual sport bikes but most of the info and attitude is right up the /2 idea of touring. I carry one around in my briefcase for an escape moment when I'm traveling. $5.00 Check it out.
 
yeah i've had my R50 out on the highway, but only once, and i didn't enjoy it. i did it mostly just to see what the top speed was, which incidentally wasn't much over the speed limit :) if/when i take the long trip, i plan to steer clear of interstates and big cities all together, if possible.
 
road troubles

This has been an interesting discussion, but the reality is, that, for many of us, whether we are riding an old airhead or a newer BMW, if a break down occurs, the bike is going to have to be trucked to a service centre, or home. I suspect however, that a higher percentage of members who ride old airheads do know how to work on them.

I used to do a lot of wrenching, but the only tool I am qualified to use now is a cell phone, and I hope that there is coverage if I ever have to use it. Knock on wood, but none of my BMW's, and none of my cars, has ever let me down.

Rinty
 
I've ridden my '59, R-69 on a number of trips with no problems... no, I take that back. A luggage rack bolt fell out and was replaced w/a wire tie. Although as I had begun riding in the late 60's on a Triumph, I do has a tendency to "over pack" in the spares and repairs dept. A spare mag.coil, points, cond.,bulbs, an old plug wire, plugs, old cables,which were still good, but had been replaced with new. Although a bit pricey, I did ditch the 6 v. system and replaced it with the alternator conversion. Actually, upon rereading all of the other posts, I think I take one of everything everyone else has mentioned. I blame it all on that Triumph. Truth is, you can have an unfixable problem on any year or brand bike. I try to be as prepared as I can and if worse comes to worse, I figure, get the ANONYMOUS BOOK out and yell for help. That is one big reason I'm a member. I have only used it once for a non-repairable tire cut on my '86 R-65 on skyline drive . This was on a Sunday evening and a fellow member brought me a used tire the right size, which got me to the next dealer bright and early monday morning. I thought I was going to stuck overnight and get eaten by a deer! I have been listed with an alphabet soup of letters after my name ever since. Of course my riding buddy and neighbor doesn't even take a penknife, and doesn't seem to have a worry in the world. I have only one thing to add to this long winded tome, I like the rubber denfeld solo saddle better than any seat I've ever used, so try it first before switching, everyones butt is different! Ride safe, ride often, and watch out for the Buicks,rj
 
VW, ever heard of them?

I just rode my 30 year old /7 to Vermont, 10000 miles all the way around and smiles, smiles all the way. Its not a slash/ 2, but not far behind. 300000 miles to date and, yes, I worry about breaking as much as my newer K1200LT, which I had to truck home a few years back, on a cross country trip, too. I have never had to truck the old bike:)... I was at the wash rack in Vermont, with a /2 rider from Ohio, who rode all the way, too and I was impressed and happy to see the older one there, doing what they did years ago,"best". Anyhow, my title reply, VW? Old VW's are still out there too and you'd be surprised to find the same parts in them as many slash bikes:). Find an old VW supplier house and you've hit gold, regarding some parts for slash bikes. My /7 uses a VW clutch friction plate at about 75 thousanths thicker than the stock BMW one:). My local friction, clutch house actually had them in stock for VW's and I had a wild idea and asked one day....Yep, it worked and a ton of miles later, its still in my /7....Worry little about the old bikes, as they surely are here to outlast us in life. Be resourceful in your parts searches and you'll be shocked to find things(and where you find them) that work for the older bikes. Never set a pace, just go and enjoy something so few will ever have. Vintage on the brain:) Randy13233:usa
 
Oh please. First of all, almost no BMW dealers stock any parts anymore. Try buying so much as a throttle cable for an R1200 at your local dealer. Break a cable or need a brake line for your fuel injected BMW and you'll find you're waiting on the same FedEx or Greyhound to arrive. Darryl, you pointed out the resources to contact to get parts. When something on a modern bike fails, any dealer will ORDER it for you from one of two places... BMW's west coast warehouse or their east coast warehouse.

No, you can't get /2 points at your local cage bits place. But anyone with any sense doesn't set out on a trip with failing points. They don't fail all of a sudden without any warning. And yes, you sure CAN get a condensor at any cage parts place. They're all 23 microfarads. One slight modification and it'll work just fine. Brushes can be purchased in any Ace Hardware store. Sure, you might need to buy a piece of emory cloth in order to make them fit.

Failure of the charging system on a /2 is pretty much the same as failure of the charging system on an oil head. Where you end up there will be no BMW dealer. If there IS a BMW dealer, he will have no parts in stock. You will have to wait.

Read some of the horror stories about R12 rear ends burning up or alternator belts breaking and tell me again how wonderful it is to tour on a modern BMW.

What's the difference again between a modern bike and an old bike? IMHO, the difference on a 500 mile ride is simple, the rider of the antique can probably fix his own bike. The rider of a modern bike in most cases cannot.


I'm going to have to agree with Flash on this one. I purchased a (new) 2006 1200GS last year. The wife and I left to go to the Georgia Mountain Rally. The battery went dead 4 times and had to have it jump started. When I got back home I brought the bike to the dealer...They said I had a faulty computer. I don't see to many computers on the old Airheads. I now own 2 Airheads an R90/6 and a 75/5. These bikes are 10 times more dependable then the newer oilheads.
 
I agree, ditto's Flash;

I ride old Beemers,too and find the simpler Airheads, no matter how old, are easy to fix vs. new anything. I have new Beemers in K bikes to some sold Oilheads and my Airheads are the ones I keep! Wonder why? Well, you keep your new K's and Oilheads for 30-40 years and let me know! None are there yet, right? We'll see who wins in our lifetime, I would guess. Do not get me wrong, as I ride newer Beemers too, but do not ever underestimate simpler days and the bikes of that era as not ridable and parts are impossible to find, as an excuse to not go far on one. I support /2 though the last / series Beemer in the /7 series and the riders that ride them far:). They are equally great or perhaps greater than anything BMW has built in recent memory, imo... I am an owner for 30 years of my R100/7 and have experinece riding far on old and new and my last half dozen Beeemrs have gone away after a few years. Anybody remember VW cars? They have parts everywhere in the world too and so many parts are the same as the bikes, if you research the older VW's. My /7 uses a clutch friction plate from one! It lasts a lot of years longer too, as a thicker material and easily adjusted using the stock Beemer adjusting technique. Anyhow, use some sense out there and look around, if riding something a little older. You can find parts. :thumb
 
Actually, next fall (2008) the first K100s will be 25 years old and will qualify as vintage bikes by the Vintage BMW Motorcycle Owners club -- rolling 25 years. I think there are lots of them still out there motoring around. The oilheads have so far had a run nearly 60% as long as the airheads (14 vs. 25 years).

Just as airheads have weak spots like diode boards, rotors, trannies that need a circlip or a spring and bad valve seats, oilheads have surging and K bikes have headers that crack welds. (The /2s have their butterheads, too.) What's really great about BMW bikes is that the parts are still available, and the production runs so long that everyone gets to know what the weak points are, and how to get around them.
 
Darryl, you must be right. Anyone would have to be crazy to think that they could ride a BMW motorcycle made before 1996 anywhere more than to the corner bar. Nope, the only way to get a BMW motorcycle anywhere is in the back of a truck.

My pal Dave Tharp rode is 1923 BMW R32 from Denver to Durango and back when the national was in Colorado back in the 1980's. Yup, parts are impossible to find. Funny thing, though, he didn't need any. Oh wait... of course... back in the 1980's there were still BMW dealers in every town that stocked every part for every bike. I forgot. Sorry.

Fear of having something go wrong is paralyzing to some people. The others? We just go ahead and do whatever it is we were gonna do and deal with what MIGHT happen when and if it actually does happen.

BTW... I would stick a failed rubbing block back onto the points arm with some five minute expoxy, Superglue or Devcon and be on the road in no time.

What do you do when your Hall sensor fails where BMW closed the nearest dealership present nearest one is now 300 miles away? No, really, what if there is no cell phone service where the bike quit? Are you paralyzed by fear like a rabbit in the headlights or do you figger something out? My point is, old bikes are actually EASIER for an owner to get going when something goes wrong than the current "no user serviceable parts inside" models. Parts is parts. Some parts are critical and hard to get. Then again, getting struck by lightning is pretty critical, too. How much time do you plan to spend worrying about that? Terrorist attack? Asteroids? Eboloa hemorragic fever? For every part you can name that would spoil a trip on a /2 I can name one or an oil head. Your dick must be bigger than mine since you like oilheads. I concede. You win.

The fellow asked about making a trip that is about 1000 miles each way. Add in some touring and you have a 3,000 mile round trip. What... is it unheard of for a /2 to make it 3000 miles without blowing up and crumbling into a heap? I thought the oil change interval was 3000 miles on /2 and they go twice that far between valve adjustments. THAT is why I don't see what the BFD is.

Heck, last summer I rode my seven year old Cagiva on a trip of about the same distance as Old and Busted's trip. Do you know how many Cagiva dealers there are in the USA? (I sure don't.) It doesn't matter. I maintain my bike in my own garage. If something breaks on the road, I fix it. If I MUST have Cagiva parts for that, then I will just deal with it. Worst case... there's always a truck somewhere that can be hired or some storage arrangement that can be made. I guess I could always set fire to it and walk away.

I took that trip with a pal who was riding a seventeen year old Moto Guzzi. Do you know how many street corners in the USA have Moto Guzzi dealers on them? I mean REALLY... is the BMW MOA's vintage guru suggesting it is folly to ride a /2 on a 2000 mile round trip? Or, Darryl, is it just that you have some issue with me personally and find you must disagree because I think Old and Busted riding his bike is a great idea (not a BFD) and said so out loud?

I ride an F650 when I'm not riding my Cagiva. I regularly ride it to a rally 1000 miles from my home. I think the closest I come to a BMW dealer once I am more than 100 miles from home is about 200 miles. SO WHAT? Dealers don't stock jackshit for a 1998 F650. The difference between having a problem on my F650 that requires BMW parts (Aprilia, actually) and a problem on a /2 requiring BMW parts, is what? In either case parts have to come from someplace that has them that ain't nearby. Rather than tremble in fear of the unknown, I generally ride home from the Jailbreak in a day each year, roughly 1000 miles. It ain't no big thing. A /2 would likely be more a bit more comfortable though somewhat slower on the same trip, requiring two enjoyable 500 mile days, easy.

BTW, Daryll, I'm not the luddite you seem to think I am. My Cagiva is fuel injected. So is my pickup truck. Unlike BMW fuel injection, there IS information available for Cagiva owners and for Toyota owners. THAT is the main issue I have with BMW. BMW's refusal to allow it to even be possible for anyone but a licensed BMW dealer work on the fuel management system or properly bleed BMW's ABS brakes just plain sucks. Who is BMW trying to be, MicroSoft? (We all know how much everybody loves MicroSoft.)

Old and Busted, ride your bike. Have an adventure, just like everyone else at the rally. The cell phone and credit card crowd that wouldn't know an oil slinger if it bit them in the ass will look at you with awe and admiration for your "accomplishment." Meanwhile, the old farts who maintain their own bikes without help from a dealership will look at it as just another guy riding just another cool old motorcycle to another rally 1000 miles from his home, just like thousands have done in the past. Us old farts may even have more intersting stuff to talk about with you than which latte machine is compatible with CANBUS and how much the dealer charges to install it, or which BMW Motoman(tm) logo sweater pills up the least when actually worn under a riding garment.
WOW!!!
 
vintage touring

I had some of the same reservations about taking off on a 1000 mile trip one way on my 1975 R90 S which I had owned for a short time. I had ridden it enough to know about what to expect in terms of oil usage which was minimal and that it started quite well if you got the technique down even on a puny battery. I rode it the afternoon before departure and then loaded up the side bags and a top bag except for the comb and toothbrush. Next morning at 5am I was in the shower and at 6am I fired the old gal up and warmed her up just enough to kill the choke and get a decent idle. Closed the garage door and climbed aboard and hit the light switch to find that overnight my headlight had stopped functioning.
After a short deliberation with myself as to whether to unlatch my bags and put them in my truck and carrry on or not, I decided to pull her back into the garage and check things out. I narrowed it down to the handle bar switch or the headight relay. Since the relay was quicker to deal with, I tried that first. It took care of the problem.
That got my confidence up so, armed with my laminated wiring diagram, some wire and crimp connectors and spade terminals as well as a spare starter relay, headlight relay, points, tire patch kit, a quart of oil, my tools, tire pump, rain suit,
a pair of spark plugs, mini volt meter, a few metric fasteners, and a couple shop rags and a few clothes, I pulled out on the road just as if I had good sense.
What I had determined as I was diagnosing the problem was that I could always thumb my way in, rent a vehicle and haul the bike, fix it, put it in storage til I could come back and get it or a multitude of other things IF I needed to but I would deal with that when the time came.
As it turned out I made the 1000 miles in about a day and a half with no problems at all running 75+ most all the way and did some riding around while I was there visiting friends and relatives and then turned around and rode the 1000 miles back home with never a missed beat. I was surprised that I never had any problem of any kind in over 2000 miles after my driveway experience and the bike used about a pint of oil. Now I have no qualms about starting out to wherever I desire armed with a few spares that I know are likely to cause an occasional problem and take it as a little challenge to see if I can do it. I have ridden a lot of miles along with my fellow Beemer friends with their K's, F's, oilheads of recent years and have yet to have any of them leave me behind due to mechanical failure or lack of speed. When we arrive guess what the folks are looking at and taking pictures of and asking questions about. On two occasions I saw people stop at gas stations where I had filled up, stopping to take pictures of the bike.
Several people don't believe this Daytona Orange machine can be 32 years old. It does my heart good to leave stock Harleys in my mirrors.
I'm looking for an older bike rather than a newer one. I think I could use an R69S if I can find the right one.
I guess I'm just crazy but I seem to enjoy it.

dph552002
1975 R90 S times 2
 
is the BMW MOA's vintage guru suggesting it is folly to ride a /2 on a 2000 mile round trip?

In his post he describes a nice long trip through a remote area on his /2, with none of the "paralyzed by fear" thoughts that you came up with.

We took the /3 down to Asheville for the RA rally, it did just fine but as Darryl says, we'd be on our own if something went wrong. Which is normal; as far as I'm concerned we're ALWAYS on our own, no matter what we're riding. BTW it had no functioning charging system for the entire trip.

I've been stranded three times by newer bikes (HES failure, fuel pump failure, and FD failure). The HES failure I could have easily fixed on the spot had I known more about it at the time. The FD failure, no. I had a friend ship me a final drive and I was off and running again. The fuel pump can be easily NAPA-substituted with a minimum of ingenuity. The HES is a known weakness, the pump is not, and the FD was not (on that model). Two are preventable, one (the pump) isn't.

I've been stranded twice on older bikes; once by a rotor failure on an Airhead and another time by a catastrophic transmission failure. The first was random (and able to be limped away from) and the second was foreseeable but absolutely not field-repairable. Both are known weaknesses for their time; the tranny is preventable and the rotor is not.
 
i'm considering riding a 1955 R50 out to the wisconsin rally (from vermont) and wondered what technical issues i ought to be aware of here (or if it's just a bad idea). maintenance i should do before i go? tools/parts to pack for the trip? things to watch out for? for example, i wondered if, being the middle of summer, i would be in danger of overheating it, if i ended up stuck in traffic somewhere. it's the first air cooled vehicle i've owned :)

i'm currently in the middle of stripping the engine down to clean the oil slingers. also, i plan to do the obvious stuff like new brake liners, clutch plate, tires, etc. as well as packing extra spark plugs, oil, maybe extra light bulbs, bunch of generic tools (no original tool kit came with it sadly)...
Good Luck. I am bringing my 1955 R50 also. I will enter it in the Vintage display. Perhaps we can compare notes. You will be riding much further, as I live in Wisconsin. Have a good trip.
 
Trips on old bikes

First off, I am an Airhead: 1967 R60, 1979R100RS 1995R100GSPD

But back in 2004, planning for Alaska after the Spokane rally, my wife and i purchased an F650Gs for her, and since I was not sure that I would like to pay big bucks for a BMW GS type, bought a 1989 HONDA TRANS ALP!! You know the rest of the story: 13,000 miles, 4 oil changes, two sets of tires, etc. And not one damn thing went wrong!! { Plus the bike DRAWS bikers to it} Will never get rid of it.

So go out there and take what the trip gives you. It could be worse, you could be on a couch somewhere not able to ride.

Jim Faucher
beer garden co-chair:drink
 
i did it, and made it back home safe, but i'm glad i brought tools with me :)

headlight dimmer switch needed opening up. contacts weren't making contact and the headlight was going out. high-beam on the bulb burned out in the first day. left it out in the rain overnight once and got some water in the float bowls, but not the tank, somehow. one spark plug cap came partially disconnected from the wire, which was my fault. biggest problem was that one of the washers on the bolt that connects the lower left rear shock to the swingarm just disappeared. dunno how such a large flat piece of steel could break in half neatly and disappear, but it did. the shock rode on the head of the bolt for a while and caused the aluminum lower cover to scrape on the inside of the upper shock mount. luckily nothing else fell off or broke as a result. the biggest trouble i had was from my homemade saddlebags, which tried to detach themselves from the bike several times. they ended up being re-duct-taped to the frame about 4 times over the trip. added a couple quarts of oil over the 2 week trip.

pics here:
http://s113.photobucket.com/albums/n226/RevDrMosesPLester/rally 07/
they're in reverse order, so the first ones are on page 20.
 
Old and Busted

Great Job! Wonderful Photos! You are what its about, the journey!:clap
My compliments!

Mark Evans
 
It sounds like your bike should be in sound condition by the time you're ready to head to WI. I'm sure it goes without saying that it would be wise to rack up some mileage closer to home, if nothing else than to instill a bit of confidence in the bike's roadworthiness and experience in what to expect from it.

I didn't mean to sound like a worry wart, but you are pretty much on your own when you ride a pre-70s bike around. [...]

I took my R60/2 on a 6 day camping trip to Death Valley a year ago and had a great time with it, even if it looked like a rented mule. You should have a good time with your R50 as well!

Quote without comment.

Congrats on what looks to have been a really great trip, one you'll surely remember for a long time! I hope it generally put a smile on your face, and on a lot of people you met along the way.
 
Congrats on what looks to have been a really great trip, one you'll surely remember for a long time! I hope it generally put a smile on your face, and on a lot of people you met along the way.
absolutely. it felt kinda odd getting back home and sleeping in the same place more than one night in a row. i was surprised how comfortable i felt on the road, given it was the first time i'd ever been on a trip more than a day long alone, and only started riding last fall.

it was quite an ego trip, too, because everywhere i stopped for food or gas or anything, i'd get a couple people asking me how old the bike was and then telling me how big my balls must be for riding it that far :)

i'd love to do it again.
 
Great pictures!!! Looks like you had a great time. I really like to see the older bikes on the road.
 
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