Post a picture of your oilhead

[froggy]

My first BMW motorcycle.
My boys R trying it out.The wife will not let them ride it any other way

[148491]

Still steaming years later.....

[froggy]

Spring has Sprung and my 94' RSL is ready to go.

Attachment 22645

Great pic and the perfect color 4 a bike

[k75s]

IMHO hardly a better looking bike around, that's fer shure! LOL

Notice that you also owned a 750F (sohc) Honda....that was a long time ago and sort of a quantum leap to today. LOL

Cheers! Bill J

Yeah, it turns a lot of heads around here. Many bikers have never seen one before and think it's a sport bike because of the exhaust pipe exit location.

I have just over 10,000 miles (yeah I know that is pretty low), bought it used 3 years ago.

I had a strange thing happen with it. Last year after taking apart the rear drive and lubing the drive shaft splines, it seemed like the bike picked up a lot of vibration. I took it apart 2 times after that just to make sure I had put it together correctly. Still vibrated. I was at the end of my expertise and ended up taking it to the dealer.

After the dealer inspected my work on the rear drive, they were sure the rear drive was not the reason for the vibration. And besides, the vibration was more related to RPM. It was almost unrideable above 4000 RPM and would occur in any gear.

They fixed it by doing 2 things-
1. Their main theory was that the pistons and/or connecting rods were out of balance with each other. They said they had seen this occur before and not just on BMW's. They found that one piston weighed a lot more than the other, initially they thought it was mostly due to carbon build up. So the pistons were sent to a machine shop for balancing.
2. Balanced/synced the throttle bodies

So I got the bike back before the end of riding season last year, took it easy for a while like a break in period, and then started riding normal.

All I can say is that the excessive vibration above 4,000 RPM is gone and the bike just runs great. I hope that all that money I paid for the piston balancing was part of the solution, and not just the throttle body work.

I imagine some of the oil head experts on the forum will let me know if the piston balancing was a likely cause or not. I imagine piston balancing is something people that race motorcycles might do as part of an engine "blue-printing" step.

Just thought you might like to know in case you have the same symptoms.

[SeabeckS]

Yeah, it turns a lot of heads around here. Many bikers have never seen one before and think it's a sport bike because of the exhaust pipe exit location.

I have just over 10,000 miles (yeah I know that is pretty low), bought it used 3 years ago.

I had a strange thing happen with it. Last year after taking apart the rear drive and lubing the drive shaft splines, it seemed like the bike picked up a lot of vibration. I took it apart 2 times after that just to make sure I had put it together correctly. Still vibrated. I was at the end of my expertise and ended up taking it to the dealer.

After the dealer inspected my work on the rear drive, they were sure the rear drive was not the reason for the vibration. And besides, the vibration was more related to RPM. It was almost unrideable above 4000 RPM and would occur in any gear.

They fixed it by doing 2 things-
1. Their main theory was that the pistons and/or connecting rods were out of balance with each other. They said they had seen this occur before and not just on BMW's. They found that one piston weighed a lot more than the other, initially they thought it was mostly due to carbon build up. So the pistons were sent to a machine shop for balancing.
2. Balanced/synced the throttle bodies

So I got the bike back before the end of riding season last year, took it easy for a while like a break in period, and then started riding normal.

All I can say is that the excessive vibration above 4,000 RPM is gone and the bike just runs great. I hope that all that money I paid for the piston balancing was part of the solution, and not just the throttle body work.

I imagine some of the oil head experts on the forum will let me know if the piston balancing was a likely cause or not. I imagine piston balancing is something people that race motorcycles might do as part of an engine "blue-printing" step.

Just thought you might like to know in case you have the same symptoms.

Thanks very much for the heads up, my bike only has 15,000 miles, but it runs very smoothly. The fella in Louisville that I got this machine from 2 years ago only put 5400 miles on it in about 3 years....I put 3800 on just getting it home.

The carbon buildup to me sounds more like a TB problem than anything, perhaps combined with some low quality fuel along the way. And with the heavy carbon deposit on the piston, the cleaning and subsequent balancing was definitely part of the solution. One thing I've become committed to with all of my vehicles is using one of the so-called top tier gasolines, Chevron is the most widely available one in my neighborhood. My F-150 has 190,000 miles and our mechanic says that a fuel injection system as clean as this one is VERY rare in his experience. The spark plugs with this model are designed to last 90.000 miles, but he tells me that in most of the fleet of trucks he's maintained that 70 K is more like the average. My trucks plugs weren't changed out until 115,000... In my book a bit more expensive fuel seems to be worth the investment long term.

But enough discussion about theory....time to ride now!

Cheers! Bill J

[johnrobbo12]

Picture taken at one of the best motorcycle camp sites in France www.lecampingmoto.net

John

[DrGonzo]

[JochenWoern]

2002 R1150RT; 2005 R1200RT which does not belong with the Oilheads.

[JochenWoern]

Near Lake Berryessa, CA

[landfellow]

My two RTPs, all original with all the lights sirens etc. an o4 with 21K and an 05 with 15K

[landfellow]

rear view..

[canadianbrummie]

I'm the original owner, and she's a keeper.

Nice bike. Same as mine but I don't have the funny bit at the front.

[adooley]

My two RTPs, all original with all the lights sirens etc. an o4 with 21K and an 05 with 15K

Nice Landfellow! I have a 2002 RTP and love it.

[landfellow]

Nice Landfellow! I have a 2002 RTP and love it.

Thanks!!! I am lucky enough to commute 1hr a day on them. One of my joys in life

[6count7]