Q: What’s it cost to own a BMW motorcycle? A: More than it used to!
Nov 11 '04 (Updated May 18 '08)
The Bottom Line Find a used airhead and learn to repair it yourself. It'll keep it's resale value and you’ll spend a lot less on parts and repairs over time.
ABSTRACT
For most of the past century, BMW motorcycles were characterized by elegant engineering, distinctive design, bulletproof reliability, high resale value, and ease of owner maintenance. As of year end 2004, current BMWs are characterized by pedestrian engineering, mediocre design, questionable reliability, modest resale value and profoundly limited support for owner maintenance – thus substantially increasing the cost of ownership of newer BMWs.
BACKGROUND
(Skip this if you already know- or don’t want to know the history of the brand in the US)
Once upon a time - for over half a century between the 1920s and the 1990s – BMW made a line of continuously evolving, highly refined, shaft drive, air-cooled opposed twin cylinder motorcycles – known worldwide for engineering excellence, good performance, ease of maintenance and bulletproof reliability – the latter point conclusively proven in World War II from the North African desert through the mud of the Apennines to the frozen tundra of the steppes of Russia in the 1940s.
American Harleys and Indians proved to be somewhat less robust during the North African Campaign. Harley-Davidson was called upon to build an opposed twin BMW clone to determine if that engine configuration could improved the reliability of the military H-D. It didn’t. As of a few years ago, an example of the unfortunate hybrid - the XA 750 - could be seen in a dim corner of the Harley museum in York, PA - and at http://www.harley-davidson.com/wcm/Content/Pages/H-D_History/history_1940s.jsp?locale=en_US
In the late 1950s BMW began seriously marketing civilian implementations of their battle-tested twin in the US. At a time when imported Brit Bikes delivered relatively high performance and abysmal reliability (and American iron was still characterized by big engines, poor handling, and similarly dismal reliability) the 1956 BMW R60 defined new standards of excellence in ruggedness, reliability and rideability. By 1960 the 600cc R69S had become the best of breed in a class by itself – rugged, reliable and comfortable enough to ride all day – with two up and one in a sidecar – in stunning contrast to other bikes on the road.
In the 60s and 70s a succession of evolutionary refinements continuously enhanced the marketability, maintainability and commercial success of BMW motorcycles in North America. At the same time, BMW produced some of the most brilliantly designed and executed technology marketing publications and sales collateral ever seen in the motor vehicle industry. The machines – R60s, R75s, R90s and the R100 – generally available in either “sport” or “touring” configurations – were all still built around the same fundamentally elegant design point: air-cooled, opposed twin, shaft-driven street machines (even in the face of the “rice-burner” invasion of a chaotic array of Japanese bikes on American shores.)
Things began to change for BMW in about 1980, with the introduction of the first “dual purpose” – or “on-road/off-road” BMW motorcycle: the R80 G/S – not entirely a street bike and certainly not a serious off-road bike – but the first of a breed now populated by machines from almost every non-US manufacturer.
A few years later, BMW made another major break with tradition – introducing the “K” line of machines – still shaft driven, but powered by liquid cooled, horizontally mounted flat four (1000cc) and three (750cc) cylinder engines – supplementing the highly evolved line of air cooled opposed twins.
A decade later, the 1993 introduction of the BMW branded, single cylinder, chain drive Aprilla powered F650 marked another severe break with the long tradition of the rugged and reliable opposed twin airheads – and, at about the same time, BMW effectively did away with the time-tested airhead engine and brought the “oilheads” to the marketplace – opposed twins in which circulating engine oil around the cylinder heads replaced the air cooling fins characteristic of the breed since the 1920s.
Brightly plated valve covers on some oilheads also generated the somewhat derisive nickname “chromehead”.
Other now well-established BMW model nicknames include “gummikuh” or “rubber cow” – a term derived from the tendency of some of the older shaft-drive bikes to rear up or nose dive in response to aggressive throttle twisting – and “flying brick” used to describe the relatively high performance (up to 150 mph) sport touring machines based on the rectangular, horizontally mounted K bike engine.
TODAY (What’s Changed?)
ENGINEERING
As we enter the twenty first century, BMWs have three different engine configurations – liquid cooled flat four “K Bikes”, oilhead opposed twin R bikes, and the one lung Aprilla-powered, chain drive 650s. The legendary airheads that crossed continents and circled the globe for nearly a century are no longer in new manufacture. There is no longer any distinctive engineering design concept associated with the BMW motorcycle. If there is one, it is incomprehensible - and as the distinctiveness of the brand diminishes, so does resale value.
DESIGN
As styling exercises, for most of the past century BMWs were traditionally expressions of the rigorous “form follows function” school – mostly massive black machines characterized by large squarish gas tanks and engine covers, with the distinctive finned opposed twin “jugs” protruding into the slipstream in front of the rider’s shins.
Now, at a time when “retro” and “bare bike” are arguably the most popular themes in motorcycle design – and the newest Triumphs could be taken for costly restorations of Brit bikes of 50 years ago - BMW is fruitlessly casting about in several directions for a design concept that works – from the hermetically sealed bodywork of the high end K and R bikes – to the bizarre styling excess (and inferior chrome plating) of the Cruiser. In many instances function seems subordinated to form.
Today, most BMWs look embarrassingly like their UJM (Universal Japanese Motorcycle) alternatives. At a glance, the very top of the BMW line (the K1200LT) could be mistaken for a somewhat larger version of the Honda “Pacific Coast” of a few years ago – the motorcycle that was ashamed to show its motor – ending up looking like some futuristic multi-function indoor plumbing fixture – part bidet, part flush toilet – with handlebars!
From a styling point of view the current BMW line – rather than being distinctive – is largely derivative, and either blatantly imitative of other machines or – in the case of the 1200 Cruiser – essentially unsaleable – much like the ill-fated Harley cafe racer of 30 years ago and the current Porsche powered H-D V-Rod: People who buy cruisers don’t want to ride BMWs (or Porsche-powered machines) – and people who buy BMWs just don’t want to ride cruisers.
RELIABILITY AND REPAIR
Although it’s understandable that the demands of modern emissions controls have forced manufacturers to adopt computer controlled ignition and fuel injection systems, the “law of unanticipated consequences” demands that a severe price be paid if such systems are not intelligently implemented. BMW motorcycle electronics are characterized by a singularly inept implementation.
In short, if the on board computer senses an irregularity in a monitored condition – like the exhaust gas oxygen content – the bike shuts down without warning! No amount of roadside repair will enable the motorcyclist to resume his journey – even on one cylinder – regardless how far it is to the nearest BMW service facility.
More benign and “user-friendly” implementations of computer control systems provide idiot light early warning of a potential system failure – or enable the rider to continue to ride for some distance under some limitations (speed, RPMs, # of cylinders active) in order to get off the highway and seek assistance.
OWNER MAINTENANCE
Some years ago I was riding at night in a severe thunderstorm in upstate New York. About 20 miles east of Roscoe on Route 17 - at the height of the storm, far from home and late at night - the electrical system on my 15 year old BMW R60/5 failed. I was able to coast to a stop under an overpass, and dismounted to assess the situation. I knew that only days before I had replaced the alternator rotor, and suspected that something in that repair action had gone amiss. Using the on board tool kit and by the light of a flashlight (and the continuous bolts of lightning outside the overpass) I removed the front engine cover. Then I discovered that the rubber gasket sealing the cover had not been seated properly, and that the ignition points were wet. I used a pocket handkerchief and a cardboard matchbook cover to dry off the ignition points, refitted the gasket, replaced the cover, remounted, started the engine (using the “electric assist” kick starter) and continued my journey home.
Today, a hard stop of the electronic ignition system on a modern BMW would be impossible to diagnose or correct on the roadside.
Not only have once routine troubleshooting and owner maintenance tasks been replaced by diagnostic routines requiring access to a BMW shop computer – but the layout of the bikes and the layers of bodywork make simple tasks like checking the oil level or replacing an air filter a major chore! Example: on most airheads, an engine oil fill hole about 1 inch wide with a cap mounted dipstick was located on the top left side of the engine cover. A rider could actually unscrew the cap, remove the dipstick, and check the oil level without even dismounting.
Today, on a typical oilhead like the R1150RT, the oil fill hole seems little more than a half inch wide – and is mounted on top of the near side cylinder. The cap is plastic – with a rubber gasket that typically seeps oil continuously – and there is no dipstick! Oil level is checked visually, by inspection of the level visible through a sight glass mounted near the bottom of the engine – about 8 – 10 inches above the pavement – and on many models, only visible using a flashlight while peering through a small opening in a body panel that conceals the level indicator from convenient view. Naturally, the bike must be level when the reading is taken – but on at least one recent model (my 1997 R1200C) the lack of a center stand made “checking the oil” a two person operation!
From a human factors/ergonomic/ “user friendliness” point of view, this kind of convoluted and inept implementation of a simple function is an abomination. Other inconveniences abound.
CONCLUSION
A brand that was once characterized by elegant engineering design and execution in which form followed function and riders were respected has lost direction. The newest BMWs are in fact expensive to buy and owner maintenance is either inconvenient or impossible.
From a relatively simple and elegant product where the majority of essential preventive and corrective maintenance could easily be performed by the owner with a set of hand tools, BMWs (and probably all newer motorcycles, to be fair) have evolved into machines demanding dealer maintenance by trained technicians with access to computer diagnostic systems and highly specialized and costly tools.
I’ve always been enamored of BMW motorcycles. In the past quarter century I’ve owned half a dozen – 4 “airheads” and two “oilheads”. I’ve also had the chance to ride most of the recent K and F models for a day or more.
My current advice to a potential first time BMW owner? Find a good used airhead and learn to repair it yourself. You’ll save a lot of money up front, you’ll save a lot in depreciation when you sell it, you’ll spend less on repairs, and – if you ever find yourself alone and under an overpass with a dead bike in a thunderstorm, you just might be able to find and fix the problem yourself and make it home that night!
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frebo3
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