Right Turning Tendency

After digging a bit deeper into the turning tendency of a small percentage of K16's I thought it's time to look here.

I am the 2nd owner of a 2012 K16GTL with 18,000 miles. I've added an additional 5,000 miles over the last twelve months and have found that the bike has a fairly aggressive right turning tendency. Aggressive may be described as not being able to take hands of the bars at any speed without the bars turning right and the bike falling left, loud front tire noise while cruising down the freeway, and tire tread abnormally wearing to the left of center line. Elaborating on 'falling left', at 65MPH I can just about take both butt cheeks off the right side of the seat and it'll ride straight (I weigh 160 LBS).

While diagnosing this issue, I discovered that the right edge of the front tire is about 1/4" - 1/2" closer to the inside of the fork than the left side, and swapping the axle spacers does not seem to change this. One report found suggested turning the axle 180 degrees, but this did not have any effect. It's almost like the jig that drilled the axle holes through the fork at the factory was off and the axle is not true in relation to the fork. With this thought, I'm considering buying another lower fork to swap out.

Any and all thoughts are welcome.

Rick

I have a 2012 GT and have never experienced this.
But then again, I have never had a reason to remove my hands from the bars.
However, that said, it would appear to me that someone may have smacked up the front end.

Joe

61996 said:

I have a 2012 GT and have never experienced this.
But then again, I have never had a reason to remove my hands from the bars.
However, that said, it would appear to me that someone may have smacked up the front end.

Joe

Click to expand...

To have a quarter every time someone has said, "...I have never had a reason to remove my hands from the bars". lol


Yes, the previous owner might have caused this damage...but nothing else indicates as such, and I know the previous owner.

Left Pull

There are many threads on K1600 Forum where you can search and read


https://www.k1600forum.com/forum/bm...ourt-orders-bmw-buy-back-k1600-left-pull.html

Are fighting the handlebars to go straight? Or is it you can not ride with no hands on the handlebars? I also have an 2012 (#600) and it will drift to the right also. Or left if I ride on the oppitsit side of the road. Many have tried to fix this (tires, axle shims weight in paniers) I found it not an issue. I also found when accelerating it pulls to one side and decelerating it pulls to the other. That's just the way it is. 2012 also had clunky transmissions. I still love the motorcycle every time I ride it!

The OP states that the wheel is not centered between the forks, is yours centered or offset?