Hi Folks.  It's taken 21 bikes, not counting a couple of parts bikes, but I've finally bought my first K bike, a 1991 K1.  I started riding at 17 in 1974 and commuted on motorcycles for the next 35 years, at which point I swapped to a push bike.  My first bike wasa Honda CB250 and I progressed through Laverdas, Moto Guzzis and every brand of Japanese bike, with my last commuter being a Suzuki TL1000.  I've always preferred a sportier riding position as I'm fairly tall at 188cm, and I find wind pressure tiring on upright naked bikes.  I didn't last long without a bike and my son was asking about buying and restoring old bikes to make money.  I explained that you'd never make enough to cover the hours you'd spend fixing them up, and to prove it, I'd buy an old bike and restore it.  I bought a 78 R100S BMW off ebay for $2300AUS (about 1400 euro) and proceeded to restore it.  I spent a lot of time restoring the fairing and tin work when I should have just bought new stuff.  When it came time to paint it, I went for the R90S colours because that was the scheme I had loved since they first came out.  To me, the best looking bikes were built in the early 70s, with the pick being the Guzzi LM1, Laverda SFC, BMW R90s and Ducati 750SS.  The only one fairly easy to find is the R90s, however I preferred the R100S.  You see, back in the 1970s, the best race in the world to indicate what was the fastest production motorcycle was the Castrol 6 Hour held at Amaroo Park just outside Sydney.  Bikes had to be 100% stock and race for 6 hours.  BMW had tried to win it with their R90s and failed.  The Japanese were just unbeatable.  Then, in 1977, they did it with their R100S.  I was there to see it, and loved the R100S ever since.  So, while I loved the look of the R90s, I wanted an R100S, hence an R100S with an R90S paint job.  At this rate, I'll be here forever, so I'll skip ahead to how I came to buy a K1.  Back in 1990 I was working in Sydney and commuting across the harbour bidge on a Kwaka GT750 that cost me $700 (420 euro).  I was struggling with 18% interest on my mortgage and that was all I could afford.  Someone in the office where I worked commuted on a K1.  That was close to $20,000, or 12,000 euro!  I just couldn't imagine how someone could justify spending that much money on a bike when the best bikes coming out of Japan were half of that.  But, I just loved the way it looked.  I just couldn't believe BMW had produced such a wild looking bike.  From that time on, the K1 joined my dream-list of bikes.  My K1 is a 91 model with the boring black paint scheme, but I will add silver decals to jazz it up a bit.  It hasn't arrived yet, so I have never ridden one.  Here's hoping it's not a disappointment.  I'll be selling my 75 GL1000 to make room fo it, so it needs to be better than that.  I know most of you will think that won't be a challenge, bt the 75, first year of the goldwings, was the best.  It was a naked bike, sort of like a honda 750 on steroids, before they tamed the motor for touring.  It's the same weight as the K1, has a motor that feels like a turbine, and has pretty good brakes for its age.  Compared to the R100S, it had a better motor, much better brakes, but not as good a seating position.  I'm sure the K1 will feel a lot better, but I doubt it'll come close to that turbine motor feel.  The K1 I've bought was owned by a pretty successful BEARS racer.  I'm hopeful that a personal bike of someone like that will be well maintained and sorted.  Apparently it's had the exhaust and chip upgraded, but I'm not buying it for horsepower, so that doesn't really matter.  Fingers crossed I love riding K1s as much as I love looking at them. 

I'd planned to add pix of the R100S and K1, but at the bottom it says NO PICTURES.  

Regards

Steve C
Melbourne Australia

Good story! The early GL1000s are fetching good money these days ('it's the one to have') so good luck with that one.

Five posts = pics

i still have a GL1100 and they are a very good bike if you can move the weight (difficult now) the harley is easier   but the K100 perfect . "The K1 I've bought was owned by a pretty successful BEARS racer.  I'm hopeful that a personal bike of someone like that will be well maintained and sorted" or may have been off the rev limiter more than once   however the K100 has no problem with this sort of treatment and i have never known of one to throw a rod or even clip a valve , they are that good , you will enjoy the bike im sure 

stevefzr wrote:I'd planned to add pix of the R100S and K1, but at the bottom it says NO PICTURES.

That (NO PICTURES) refers to a document-only uploader here that doesn't seem to be operating right now anyway, and doesn't refer to your ability to post images using one of the two icons in the menu above to the left of the link icon. The leftmost one is for images stored on your computer; the one next to it is for images stored at a third party host.

If you've read instructions available in the Forum Functionality forum about how to upload photos, give one of those methods a try right now, or when you believe you've contributed enough posts.

I
'm sure those image icons weren't there when I originally posted ! (I'm sounding like my 96YO mother )  In order above, although I guess you'll work it out :-) R100S as purchased and R100S after being recomissioned. K1 just purchased,

stevefzr wrote:In order above, although I guess you'll work it out :-) K1 just purchased, R100S as purchased and R100S after being recomissioned.

The K1 is missing, steve. Reduce its size to one or two MB, or less and try again.

Gday Steve

Thanks, fixed

Welcome Steve.   Nice K1!

What exhaust is on it? Motad probably in Auz I'm guessing. Nice K1 , good luck with it

Welcome Steve,

I know what you mean about yuppy prices in later years, but when the K75 came out, I think it was cheaper than a Yammy Virago, which I used to use as a yardstick. Soon you will see value and many money saving features of a brick. Parts interchangeable between models, new parts backwards compatible, compared to the planned obsolescence we've become so used to. They could do 200km/h and 20 km/lt, not many could do that.

They were designed so that a non mechanic rider could do the repairs. A neighbour with a Honda Boldor stopped riding after it developed a  rattle from the primary drive chain, he is handy but that's a bit too much and would cost more to fix than the bike is worth. If the primary drive (clutch) on a brick needs replacing, that's doable. Another neighbour with a similar vintage Suzi cruiser almost completely restored it but he couldn't get a replacement for the rusted muffler or the exhaust. I thought I'll be able to find one but no, I couldn't. How many bikes or even cars have not only a stainless steel muffler, but the whole exhaust as stainless steel, like bricks do? Because it's stainless steel you probably don't need one, but that's also why they will be available second hand, and that should also make them cheap.

daveyson wrote:How many bikes or even cars have not only a stainless steel muffler, but the whole exhaust as stainless steel, like bricks do?

My old Suzuki GSF600K4 Bandit! Mind you, the exhaust system support structure was poorly designed and they used to snap where the silencer pipe left the collector box. It happened so often that Delkovic would sell you a complete new stainless system (exhaust pipes, collector box, silencer pipe and silencer) for as little as £320. I know...

Welcome Steve from a fellow K1 owner. I bought mine new in 1990. Its the red and yellow one, Known here in the UK as the Fast One. I have just dug out the paperwork to find how much I paid for it. £8200. That was a hell of a lot of money then, and still is. I had a K100RS at the time which had a recall for cracking front wheels. I had bought the RS as a trade in on a  R100RS that had also had cracking wheels. Anyway whilst the local BMW dealer was sorting out the K, I went for a test ride on the K1, and liked it straight away. I picked up the K1 the next day. For about 10 years it was my only bike. I bought the dedicated soft luggage for it and spent  a week or so touring Europe with a couple of mates every year for several years. We were lucky enough to blast up and down Alpine passes before they became traffic jams. Many times the throttle was on the stop on German autobahns, hitting the rev limiter on and off for several miles, the speedo showing 150 mph. It would fly past one mate on his FJ1200 when we got to about 80mph, but we would then be over taken by the other mate on his derestricted 147bhp EXUP who disappeared up the road. At those speeds the K1 was absolutely stable and smooth. I had it chipped in the early 1990's which put it up to about 115 BHP, and really makes a difference from 6000 rpm upwards. It still pulls from tickover in top gear if you want it to. 
I have always done my own maintenance so I am the only one to have put a spanner on it. Other than tyres and 2 sets of brake pads its only had new front and rear Master cylinders. There was a slight leak from the cylinder head so that was an excuse to take it off. I was amazed at how rough the inlet and exhaust ports were. I took some time smoothing them out. In 60,000 miles I have only had to change buckets on 5 exhaust valves.
Hope you enjoy it as much as I have for 34 years.

Hi Steve,

to our community!


Bernie

Welcome steve .