fxray
New member
Hi all,
I actually joined this forum last November because I was thinking about buying an R90/6 barn bike. So -- I've been lurking for a while, but this is my first post. What prompted me to introduce myself is that I finally actually did buy the bike and then a friend bought me a one year membership in the MOA. They've given me a number (186677) and taken away my name -- is anybody here old enough to remember the song "Secret Agent Man"?
. I plan to attend the first meeting of my local club this evening.
I'm another old retired guy who started riding motorcycles circa 1969. I have never (until now) owned a BMW or had any inclination in that direction. But . . . I like motorcycles and am not predjudiced against really any brand. I have a small collection of motorcycles, the common theme being that they are all twins. I have only had one four cylinder bike, and that was back in the 70's. This R90 fills a niche for me in several ways. I had at least one vertical 180 degree twin, vertical 360 degree twin, 45 degree vee twin, and now I have the flat, opposed boxer twin. Not only that, but I have all the major elements of the WWII combatants. I already had American, British, and Japanese. Now, for better or for worse, I have added the German element. My bikes range in size like this: 250cc, 350cc, 450cc, 650cc, 900cc, and 1340cc. You can see that without the Airhead, there was a big gap which is now nicely filled in.
Knowing that forum people generally like motorcycle pictures, I will throw some your way. At one time, I had three 45 degree Vee twins, like this:
The 1992 FXRS on the left in the picture above was my smallest and also my oldest bike. Ironically, it is now my largest displacement bike and also my newest bike. The Ultra Classic was the first to go. It was too big, took up too much space in the garage, and was an early twin-cam which soured me on the Motor Company. I did like it and ran it a bit over 60K miles, but it gave me a lot of headaches.
After it was gone, I got interested in crusty old barn bikes. When I retired for the second time, I brought home two of them in the same week. One was a little CL350 Honda, 1971 vintage, that had been in a barn for thirty-three years:
It's now a daily rider, and was a lot of fun to fix up. I learned quite a bit along the way:
The other one was a 1964 Triumph TR6, which had sat in a barn for thirty-nine years:
It is also now an alternate daily rider. In fact, I rode it today to meet some BMW friends for lunch. I learned even more while fixing up this old Triumph. I made a fairly detailed build thread on BritBike.com for my TR6, which now has close to 86,000 views. If interested, you can see it HERE
My other Japanese bikes are a 1970 Honda CB450K3 and a 1975 Yamaha RD250 (doesn't everybody need at least one two-smoker?). Both are project bikes, but have been shunted aside for now while I work on the German addition:
So, having rattled on long enough, here are some pictures of the Airhead in the rough:
Like the Bible says, "Now we see through the glass darkly". Well, plexiglass in this case:
I have already found that the more stuff I take off this bike, the better it begins to look.
I should now either be awarded the prize for the longest introduction thread, or get banned for wasting too much band width. You decide. I'm almost late for my first MOA Club Meeting. I hear there is beer and food involved.
See ya!
Ray
I actually joined this forum last November because I was thinking about buying an R90/6 barn bike. So -- I've been lurking for a while, but this is my first post. What prompted me to introduce myself is that I finally actually did buy the bike and then a friend bought me a one year membership in the MOA. They've given me a number (186677) and taken away my name -- is anybody here old enough to remember the song "Secret Agent Man"?
. I plan to attend the first meeting of my local club this evening.I'm another old retired guy who started riding motorcycles circa 1969. I have never (until now) owned a BMW or had any inclination in that direction. But . . . I like motorcycles and am not predjudiced against really any brand. I have a small collection of motorcycles, the common theme being that they are all twins. I have only had one four cylinder bike, and that was back in the 70's. This R90 fills a niche for me in several ways. I had at least one vertical 180 degree twin, vertical 360 degree twin, 45 degree vee twin, and now I have the flat, opposed boxer twin. Not only that, but I have all the major elements of the WWII combatants. I already had American, British, and Japanese. Now, for better or for worse, I have added the German element. My bikes range in size like this: 250cc, 350cc, 450cc, 650cc, 900cc, and 1340cc. You can see that without the Airhead, there was a big gap which is now nicely filled in.
Knowing that forum people generally like motorcycle pictures, I will throw some your way. At one time, I had three 45 degree Vee twins, like this:
The 1992 FXRS on the left in the picture above was my smallest and also my oldest bike. Ironically, it is now my largest displacement bike and also my newest bike. The Ultra Classic was the first to go. It was too big, took up too much space in the garage, and was an early twin-cam which soured me on the Motor Company. I did like it and ran it a bit over 60K miles, but it gave me a lot of headaches.
After it was gone, I got interested in crusty old barn bikes. When I retired for the second time, I brought home two of them in the same week. One was a little CL350 Honda, 1971 vintage, that had been in a barn for thirty-three years:
It's now a daily rider, and was a lot of fun to fix up. I learned quite a bit along the way:
The other one was a 1964 Triumph TR6, which had sat in a barn for thirty-nine years:
It is also now an alternate daily rider. In fact, I rode it today to meet some BMW friends for lunch. I learned even more while fixing up this old Triumph. I made a fairly detailed build thread on BritBike.com for my TR6, which now has close to 86,000 views. If interested, you can see it HERE
My other Japanese bikes are a 1970 Honda CB450K3 and a 1975 Yamaha RD250 (doesn't everybody need at least one two-smoker?). Both are project bikes, but have been shunted aside for now while I work on the German addition:
So, having rattled on long enough, here are some pictures of the Airhead in the rough:
Like the Bible says, "Now we see through the glass darkly". Well, plexiglass in this case:
I have already found that the more stuff I take off this bike, the better it begins to look.
I should now either be awarded the prize for the longest introduction thread, or get banned for wasting too much band width. You decide. I'm almost late for my first MOA Club Meeting. I hear there is beer and food involved.
See ya!
Ray
I remember back around '73 and buying a CB450- it was the big deal back then....Wish I had it now.
