Been riding BMW airheads since 19; now 52 and still riding airheads. Oh, there has been a couple K bikes, a bad experience with a Cruiser BMW that was the biggest POS I had ridden in a while, but I had always thought the R850R was pretty interesting.
Over a lot of campfire talk over the years, I came to the conclusion that the R850 would be a good addition.
Little did I know...
I bookmarked a bunch of /5 /6 and even one /7 (my first BMW being a 1977 R75/7 I put 100,000 on) and then an R850R showed up. I added that to the list.
Over the course of a couple days, the airheads started disappearing at prices I wouldn't pay. I wouldn't say it's silly season, but still... Then I noticed the R850R had no reserve, had 2 hours left, and it was sitting at $1800 US. I thought for a moment and then said "what the hell" and bid $2400 and went to work.
As soon as I opened my iPad, *bing* mail. Well I'll be damned.
I won. $2318.46. 1997 R850R, with bags, Parabellum Scout, new Michelins and an Odyssey battery. I sent the $500 deposit and made a visit to the Enterprise site to reserve a truck.Two days later I was heading to western IL (not far from the recent shooting of Michael Brown) in a Dodge 1500 4x4 with a 5.7 Hemi. 20 miles from the pickup site, it started raining buckets. I found the address. A BMW Cruiser sitting in the garage. "My wife said I could have only have one bike..." He admitted he lost "about $1500" on the deal. We managed to get the bike in the back of the truck (why in hell are new trucks so #$E#$@ high?) and I set out.
Then the real deluge started. I made it to Du Quoin, IL and found a Super 8 with my name on it. It was raining so hard I couldn't see 20 feet in front of me. I slept hard.
The next day dawned clear. I made it home by 4pm EST. 23 hour trip. As there was no service history on the bike, I decided to have a Level 2 service down. A quick call to my old mate Troy at Trophy Motos (Tigerville, SC) and a service was scheduled. The day before I dropped it I did a mid-week ride up the Blue Ridge Parkway to US276 to Brevard and home. Sweet.
Post service, with all fluids changed, new brake pads, valves right, I replaced the 20" screen with a 12". Much better. The final addition BMW R1100GS hard guards.
Nothing left to do but ride. It'll keep miles off my R100RS, R100RS Das Beast beater, and my '66 R60/2. The more the merrier
