Having seen the results of having the body work painted professionally and I'm stunned, frankly, at how dramatic the difference is going from the original weary Baja Red to a gloss black with a pearled white stripe, finished with layers of clear coats.  

I place the parts on my bike and, well, the frame looks a bit ragged in contrast. So, seeing how riding season (for me in the Pacific NW, USA) is drawing to a close, I'm seriously thinking about taking her down to the frame for a fresh powder coating. 

I'm fairly competent (spline job, timing chain install, alternator upgrade) and terminally anal, but I'm asking those here in the know how big of a job is this? Removing the loom horrifies me, as does visions of many a tearful night groping at pieces of a large and complex puzzle. 

Feedback, advice please. I'm on the fence with this.

Jump down off the fence grab your camera and tools, take heaps of pics and into it.
Basicly the job entails lifting the frame off the top of the engine. Support it under the sump and start removing bits and put them in bags with labels. You will need to support the rear of the engine/gearbox because if the support is just under the engine it will want to fall over backwards.
Have fun and you will learn a lot about what is where.
With the wiring,label the different connectors with numbers on male and female. There aren't many connectors that can be mixed up and photos of the loom as to where it runs will be invaluable.

Rick has hit the nail on the head but I will give you my 2 cents anywayz.

What I did was a complete stripdown to the frame, sandblast, powdercoat and refurbish everything, I took 9 months to resurface and recond / overhaul the entire machine (you will probably do it a lot faster than I) but man was it worth it. I have done quite a few bikes but I have to say that these K Bmw's are probably the easiest I have ever worked on.

If you do it in stages you will be fine, so Remove the body work (Painted bits) first and, with the seat, fairing and tank off then your job of suspending the bike in mid air will be made that much easier. Once you have figured out the suspension side then you can remove both wheels and the job will look much much less daunting

The only real big advice I can give you is this:

Take a roll of masking tape and a felt pen and LABEL EVERYTHING YOU REMOVE. Keep separate boxes for the separate sections of the machine or at lease partition storage space and place all the screws and nust and bolts back on to the parts they came from if you can. When it comes to the wiring loom simple take good photos of the undertank connectors etc and trace what they go to and label each end of the connectors as you remove them

If you do these things, with the resources available by way of Haynes workshop manual and this forum it is really hard to go wrong for any length of time

Best of luck if you decide to proceed.

Honestly - the wiring loom isn't going to be a problem (almost - I'll come to that). BMW have used unique connectors for all main connections and where you might get a couple of two or three pin connectors together, you can normally use the wire colour codes as a guide.

There are exceptions (aren't there always...). The ones that you will absolutely need to label are: clutch, rear brake, front brake and speedo. Why? Because BMW's suppliers have seen fit to use purely yellow wires for all of these and they're all two-pin connectors.

That's because they are the same parts and interchangeable - brakeswitches, choke and clutch. Don't know about the speedo?

The speedo is an encapsulated pickup. Of course, you're right about the other three switches (four - choke on/off switch too) but it could be fun if you cross-connected them!

Off the fence, then. 

Copious notes taken from here, more to follow as I proceed. Nervous but as anywayz stated I'm anticipating a rewarding feeling for job done on this. 

Thanks everyone to chipping in, means a ton to me.

Kyle10 wrote:Thanks everyone to chipping in, means a ton to me.

That's why we are all here . .  :-))

Best of luck and take courage. If I can do it anyone can