After a quick inspection it became apparent that at least bolt had come loose or had snapped.  With less than half a mile to go home we carefully carried on and got safely home.  That afternoon I stripped for the rear luggage rack, carrier, and the plate under the pillion seat.  What I thought was one loose bolt turned out to be three snapped bolts, that’s of a total of five that hold the rack and carrier on the bike – boy am  glad they didn’t give way when I was pulling a lift or riding on the stoney beach!!!!

Thanks to Max BMW Motorcycles and their on-line parts fiche system, I was quickly able to track down all the parts that need to do a complete replacement of all the fixings for the carrier and rack:

71607689889	ISA SCREW – M6X25	x2
46547705577	OVAL HEAD SCREW – M6X35 MK0.02	x2
46637684768	BUSH – DI=7 L=8.5	x2
46547688015	BUSH – DI=7 L=9,8	x2
46547684770	ISA SCREW – M6X350.02	x1
07119903791	WASHER – A6,4	x1
46547673774	BUSH – DI=20 DA=300.01	x1
46547673777	BUSH – DI=8 L=5,20.01	x1
46547685249	FOIL LEFT	x1
46547685250	FOIL RIGHT	x1
46547685251	FILM CENTER	x1

A quick call to Jacksons CI and all the parts were on order.  I decided to replace all the parts as it became apparent when I looked up the parts on the fiche that some parts didn’t appear to have been fitted when I took the rack appart and there was a fair amount of corrosion.  I figured it was better to be safe than sorry.

Finally, for anyone that is thinking of doing any work on a GS, I’d highly recommend bookmarking the Max BMW Parts Fiche. Not only does it make ordering parts simple if you’ve already got the part numbers but it’s also useful when working on the bike as I’ve often found that the Haynes manual diagrams, pictures and descriptions can be a little vague.

The first two sections of the trip were over the Riff mountains in the very north of Morocco and then over the Atlas mountains.  I’ll post more on these later, so to cut a long story short, the side stand foot is somewhere in the Cedar Forest in the Atlas mountains.  All I can say is that the bike went arse-over-tits a couple of times…. ouch!  On my return to Guernsey my first mission was to sort out a replacement.  Thankfully Altrider was able to do me a deal!

This evening I finally got around to fitting the side stand foot on my R1200GS.  Altrider supplies just about everything you need in order to fit the foot.  The only thing you need to supply is the bike and a T25 torx tool – I used the torx tool from my CruzTOOLS BMW tool kit – A They even supply Loctite to keep the bolt tight.

One the basis that I don’t intent to loose another side stand foot, I decided to not use the Altrider supplied medium strength Loctite 242 and instead use Loctite 2701.  Hopefully that should stop it disappearing any time soon.

The foot is a piece of cake to fit.  Weh fitting it, however, I’d advise putting it on without Loctite and make sure it doesn’t interfere with the exhaust or centre stand  when the side stand is up.  Once you’re happy it all fits, then apply the Loctite and do the bolts up securely.

Here’s the full set of pictures from the installation (click to enlarge):

Well, I’ve been having yet more problems. And once again I’ve managed to solve them myself without needing to take the bike to the garage. The symptoms of the issue I experienced was the brake warning light coming on after use of the rear brake lever. The light remains on constantly until the bike ignition is switch off and then back on, at which point the warning light remains off until the rear brake lever is used again. The warning light is the only symptom, the power-assist servos come on as expected, the rear brake engages and the ABS kicks in under extreme braking. Also, the front brakes worked as normal without the warning light coming on.

The first step on the diagnosis trail was to find out exactly what worked and what didn’t.  This should be done as one of your daily checks (hands up anyone that does that after doing their CBT?)  but I must have forgotten to do it recently.  This immediately indicated that whilst the brakes were engaging when using the rear brake, the brake light wasn’t coming on, although it did come on when using the front brake lever, so whilst the light is working something was wrong with the wiring for the rear lever.

The easiest place to look for a problem, and therefore the first place, is the little switch that the brake lever makes contact with to tell the bike it the brake is engaged or not.  This switch is a bit of a liability as it’s a thin strip of metal that’s not very well protected.  In fact, it’s not at all protected!!!  Luckily it’s not critical for the operation of the brakes… just for switching on the brake light (although that in itself is a legal requirement!)

When the rear brake is not being applied,  the brake pedal is in the “up” position and a bolt head on the pedal pushes the metallic stip up, closing the switch.  When the brake is applied, the bolt head is moved away from the metallic strip and so the switch opens.  There are two common issues that may occur with this type of switch that could cause problems.

Firstly, mud, grit or gravel could become trapped between the metallic strip and the switch unit.  This would result in the brake light remaining on when the brake pedal is released.  If you do a lot of off-road riding this could be quite common – so always check you brake lights before riding on the road again!  However, this was not what I was experiencing.

The second possible problem is that the metallic strip could become distorted and result in the strip not releasing from the switch when the brake pedal is engaged.  In this case the brake light would not come on even though the brake is on… bingo!!!  So how do you resolve the problem?

With the bike on its side or centre stand, press down on the brake pedal and at the same time carefully bend the metallic strip down towards the bolt head that it makes contact with.  Don’t bend it too much, just enough so it doesn’t make contact with the switch when you release it.  Once you’re happy it’s restored to it’s normal shape, switch on the ignition and check that the brake light comes on when you engage the rear brake.  When I did this on my bike I also stripped down the rear brake pedal and cleaned and greased everything, just to make sure everything was in working order.

The search hasn’t been easy. Given that the bike only cost £100 we didn’t want to spend to much on the tyres. The hunt started with the usual brands, Continental TKC80s, Michelin T63, Metzler Karoos. However, getting the right size combination at the right size was proving a little difficult. I’m looking for a 130/80/17 rear and a 100/90/19 front. The best offer I found was from a local garage that could supply a paid TKC80s for £218 plus fitting! For a £100 bike that’s gonna blow the budget.

Finally, with a little thanks to the latest issue of Adventure Bike Rider magazine, I discovered Mitas tyres. Mitas is a tyre company based in the Czech Republic, although it’s 75% owned by Michelin, so they’re basically Michelins. The UK distributer is Trellesport supplying Mitas tyres to, amongst others, Simon Pavey at the BMW Off Road Skills school in Wales. The main, possibly only, contact is Gwyn Barraclough. Speaking to him on the phone he seemed knowledgable about the tyres and was also interested on what I was planning to do with them, the bike they’d be used on, type of usage, etc.

The tyres that I ordered are the E-09. I’ve gone the tubed type tyres as they’re a bit cheaper and, apparently, BMW ORS are running them without tubes. If my local garage can’t get them to seal without tubes then I know they can supply tubes.

Having owned my R1200GS for nearly 3 years, one of the modifications that I’ve been meaning to do for some time now is replace the original sump guard with a Touratech extended sump guard. However, I never quite got around to it, even after I ripped the original sump guard off the first time round – for some reason I just bought new rubber mounts, bent the original guard mostly back into shape and bolted it back onto the bike.

About two months ago I broke two of the four rubber mounts for the sump guard again, and have been riding around with it cable tied in since. Eventually my girlfriend took the hint and bought me a Touratech sump guard for my birthday about two weeks ago

Having had previously experience of fitting a sump guard I was expecting to fit the Touratech one pretty quickly. Unfortunately that wasn’t to be the case. The first problem occurred when I went to remove the old sump guard. To my horror one of the bolts was snapped off inside the engine block. It also had thread-lock on it so there was no chance of screwing it out. A call to CW Motorcycles the next morning confirmed my fears – the broken bolt would need to be drilled out and the the thread re-tapped.

I’m not a person to panic unnecessarily and for good reason on this occasion, as I knew just the person to help – fellow RideArounder Shane! A quick tweet of my problems and he came up trumps with the offer of the use of his thread tapping kit for the very reasonable fee of £160 (I read that as a beer/coffee).

Saturday afternoon and I met up with Shane & Dave at RideAround HQ (Shanes house!) for an afternoon of bike maintenance, as they had to prep their bikes for their Bucket List Tour in just under two weeks. After a quick trip to the local hardware shop we had all the tools required for the work on my bike: Drill, Drill bits (1mm, 3mm, 6mm, 6.5mm), thread tap, hex keys and a 10mm spanner.

Once the rear bracket was fitted it was plain sailing. All the mounting bolts were fitted and the torqued up to the standard torque settings of the original sump guard. Job done!

James Pratt added the following comments.

We are using BMW rear gear oil in the differential, I believe it is 70/140 or so. We are using NAPA anti-seize compound on the rear drive splines. Some people say to use moly-based grease in the drive splines, but our very skilled local BMW mechanic recommended this thicker anti-seize compound. He said the moly grease tends to disappear much faster when it gets hot, and the anti-seize is thicker and remains in place longer. The key is just to make sure you lubricate the splines with some type of thick grease in some fashion.

Normally when switching on a BMW R1200GS the Brake failure light with flash quickly (4 times per second) for a few moments and then flash slowly (once per second) until the bike has started moving and the ABS self-test has completed. Also, during the bikes ignition start up, the brakes servo motors for start and then stop quickly, another self-test feature.

If there is a problem with the ABS system, the Brake failure light will keep flashing quickly (4 times per second) and the ABS servos will not start. This is what happened to mine this morning. Whilst the bike still has the residual braking function, i.e. no ABS and no power assist, it is still possible to ride the bike and the rider’s manual says to take the bike immediately to a BMW garage for them to run diagnostic tests.

However, experience has told me that BMW garages charge a lot of money and there is a simple 2 minute test you can run yourself to try to get the ABS re-enabled. Note: this should be done on firm level ground.

1. Switch the bike off.
2. Flick the brake levers (front and rear) several times.
3. Switch the bike on.
4. If servos still do not work:
5. Switch bike off.
6. Whilst pushing front lever out & holding rear lever up…
7. Switch bike on.
8. If servos still do not work:
9. Switch bike off.
10. Check the rear brake light switch by the back level, ensure there isn’t any grit in it.
11. Switch bike on.

The reason for doing these checks is to ensure the bike doesn’t think the brakes are engaged when the bike is being switched on. As indicated in the rider’s manual:

Warning: Self-diagnosis is not performed unless both brakes levers are in their fully released positions. Only the RESIDUAL BRAKING FUNCTION is available until self-diagnosis is completed.

The mostly likely time for this to occur is during or after off-roading when dirt and grit can become lodged in the switches. However, I have known it to happen for seemingly no reason at all. So before you spend your hard earned money at a BMW garage, run a few simple tests yourself.

Having given away my old luggage when I sold my Bandit 600 to Shane, I thought it was about time I got a new tank bag for my new BMW R1200GS. The first bag I got was a Cargo Endurance Tank Bag. Whilst it gets great review, what I didn’t realise was that my R1200GS has plastic and aluminium panels covering the tank and therefore the Cargo bag wouldn’t stick, it being magnetically mounted.

Thankfully I was able to return the Cargo bag and get a credit note. After a bit of hunting around I turned up some info on Baglux tank covers and bags. Rather than being magnetic, the Baglux system has a cover for the tank which is permanently attached to the bike and the tank bag then clips into this cover. The tank covers are also colour matched to the bike so that, from a distance, it looks like there is nothing there.

Fitting the cover to the bike is fairly easy but it does pay to prepare a little before hand. I found some instruction specific to the BWM R1200GS which I read first, although I thought they could be clarified a bit so here are my version of the instructions (with my own pictures):

1. Wait for a warm sunny day. The tank cover is best attached when warm so either leave it in the sun for a while, or warm it next to a radiator… but don’t get it too hot.
2. Remove forward side fairing panels. This is done by undoing the two D-Ring clips on the outside of the panels and a twist clip on the inside of the panels just inside the bottom front edge. The panel can then be gently pulled off.
3. Remove the front seat.
4. Remove the small black fairing panels just in-front of the seat. These can be just pulled off carefully.
5. Clean, dry and polish the tank fairings, this is critical as any dirt under the tank cover will damage the paintwork.

The Baglux cover can now be placed over the tank. The first step in the installation is to use the existing fairing bolt to attach the cover to the fairings. The bolt should not be tightened too much at this point as the cover will need to be able to move during installation.

The one downside I’ve found with the Baglux is the bag itself but that is more my own fault with bag choice. I went for the small Minea bag. Off the bike the bag is really good as a small back pack – it comes with built in solder straps – but on the bike it’s small size doesn’t fit the shape of the tank terribly well, I suspect the newer Rider or Impact bags would be a better fit.

Overall it is a quality piece of kit which has served me well for the two years that I’ve had it.

After a bit of Googling and a visit to some local bike shops we settled on the Autocom Pro Duo kits and Kenwood TK-3201 radios.  As Autocom are shortly refreshing their range of comms systems we managed to get a pretty good deal on the Autocom Super Pro AVI kits from here.

Shortly after all of the kits turned up we descended upon RideAround HQ to start the installation.  First up on the installation front – installing the microphones in our crash helmets.  According to the installation manual (which in typical fashion we turned to after half an hour of randomly trying to work out how the cables should be run) this should be a simple 10 minute installation. We eventually managed to get all the cables routed and the earpieces in the right place after a bit of trial and error.

Next challenge was wiring the control unit and radios on the bikes.  This was relatively straightforward to do with just a 12v connection directly to the battery with an inline fuse and rocker switch to enable us to turn the units off when they are not being used to save the battery.  The Kenwood TK-3201 radios were straightforward to connect up thanks to the power interface lead which connects the radio to the comms system meaning no seperate power feed was needed for the radios which makes installation easier.  A few cable ties, a bit of velcro and a dab of soldering and the comms units and radios were all wired without too many problems.

Once everything was fitted it was time to go for a quick test ride to see how the systems performed whilst riding.  Well it would have been if someone had not drained their battery by leaving the system on all afternoon…  Unfortunately the lack of a battery charger or jump leads meant that the only way to get the bike up and running was to push start the bike – a push start which provided the RideAround HQ neighbours with endless entertainment!

The comms systems worked perfectly and speech was clear and audible with very few tweaks required to any of the settings.  The range of the radios was pretty good considering we had mounted them horizontally under the seats of the bikes.  For longer trips we may have to look at moving the radios out from this location though to provide better range.  We did find that if the systems were left switched on then they can drain the battery fairly quickly so if you are fitting one of these units then installing an isolator so that you can switch the systems off is a useful thing to do – although if you forget to switch the units off then you still end up with a flat battery as at least two of us will testify to since fitting them!  The other alternative is to wire the power to the units into a 12v feed that is operated by the ignition which is someting that some of us will be doing soon.  They are not the cheapest bike to bike communication systems around but they do work well. Once we have had a chance to test them out more thoroughly then I will post a follow up review.

The problem occurs when the handguard gets pushed down, for example as a result of dropping the bike or rubbing against something. This can cause the handguard to prevent the brake or clutch lever to fully release. In the case of the brake level, if the brakes aren’t fully disengaged, the brakes can over heat and lockup, potentially causing an nasty accident.

With the brakes, the only warning of a problem is that the brake warning light comes on. This is great but, as I’m sure any R1200GS owner will testify, this could be anything from the ABS failing to the power assist servos not working to the brake light not working. The handbook doesn’t say anything about failure to disengage brakes fully.

In the six months that I’ve been waiting for the replacement handguard bracket (mine is held on with zip-ties at the moment!) I have experienced this problem once on my way home form my parents. Luckily I only had three miles to ride and I took it fairly slowly as I realised the brakes weren’t working for some reason. It was only trawling through owners forums that I found this as a possible cause.

The initial response from BMW was “there is no problem – rides just need to be careful”! However, following warnings from the European Commission and German Federal Motor Transport Authority, BMW has officially acknowledged the problem as has taken action. The new R1200GS and GSA have completely re-designed handguards. Existing owners of older bikes will receive a letter with some warning stickers to put inside their handguards to remind them to check lever free-play, and the old style guards are no longer going to be supported with spare parts but a new retro-fit kit is available for approximately £90 (€110).

Since I wont be able to get the bracket for my existing guards, I’ve checked with my insurance and they’re happy for my to completely replace the handguards. So I’ve decided to go for a nice pair of Touratech guards instead of the BMW ones. My bike repairs might finally be finished by the end of August, only 9 months after the accident.

RAPEX (Eurpoean Commision Warning): http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/dyna/rapex/create_rapex.cfm?rx_id=192

WebBikeWorld article: http://www.webbikeworld.com/BMW-motorcycles/r-1200-gs-hand-guard-problem/