An Old Man's BMW

A lot has happened since my last posting, after coming home from the BMW Rally in New Mexico.

About a week after my return, on my way home from the Beehive Beemers club breakfast, after coming over Trapper's loop, my bike all of a sudden started running poorly and would not idle. I thought that maybe it was because I was possibly low on fuel, the light had come on and also I knew that the spark plugs were old. I stopped at a Chevron Station on highway 89 and it was really hard to get the bike to start again. Needless to say, I spent the next couple of weeks trying to figure out why the bike was running so poorly, replaced the spark plugs, bought a bunch of diagnosis equipment, cleaned my K&N air filter and even bought new cap coils, after reading on line that it could be part of the problem. Finally on a ride home in mid October, about two miles from home, the engine made a big pop and there was a solid oil sheen coming out of the exhaust. I decided to ride the bike as far as I could and was able to get to my front gate, before, having to stop to open the gate, I was unable to keep it running or to get it started again and had to push my bike the half mile or so to the garage where I park it. For the first time with any motorcycle, it appeared that I had a major engine problem.

Over the next little bit, I determined that it was one cylinder causing the problem and my the time I tore the engine apart, I determined that the bike had sucked an intake valve on the right side and done major damage to that piston. I decided I would take the bike apart and once I got to the technical part , I would have someone else actually put new valves in a new head and do the piston work etc. This was going to be my winter project and I was not in any hurry to get it done, just wanted to get it done right.

In late December I caught cold and nothing I did, seemed to get me over the cold. I finally went to the Doctor's in early January, and he put me on some antibiotics to kill whatever I had, but after the first round of those, it made no difference. I didn't feel well, was tired all the time and was loosing weight.

We tried another round of antibiotics, some even stronger ones, and that made no difference. Needless to say, the last thing I wanted to do was to spend hours in a cold shop, taking a motorcycle apart.

My Doctor got me an appointment in several weeks to see a lung expert, but I questioned whether I could last that long and finally went to an emergency medical clinic and the observant Doctor there within 5 minutes figured out it was a heart issue and not a lung issue.

In the next several weeks after that I had every heart test you can thing of and even had angioplasty again and was sad to find out that the stents I had in 2005 had become all clogged up and I have some fairly major heart issues to deal with from now on.

Even before all the tests were in , I knew I did not have the energy to deal with a broken motorcycle and started to look at my options, and I even questioned whether it was time to put my helmet away for good. I found a place that would give me X for the bike as it sat, and at the same time I put an ad on the Internet BMW riders forum and ended up selling the bike as is to a man in Kansas, who has the know how and time to rebuild it.

I am feeling much better now, thanks to modern medicine and ace inhibitors and beta blockers etc. and decided in late April that I did feel well enough to think about another bike. Even before then I had been lusting after a new BMW S1000rr and I ended up ordering one and picking it up on the 20^th of May. It is the sportiest BMW I have ever owned and the fastest by far. With almost two hundred horsepower, 450 lbs and clutch less shifting both up and down it is incredible to ride.

So far I have only ventured on rides in the surrounding canyons, but if I continue to feel well, I may plan a getaway to either Southern Utah or somewhere North. Its nice to have a new cutting edge bike to ride. I am also going to take a refresher riding course from the Motorcycle Safety foundation. In my fuelly account for the new bike, where I store my gas stops, and keep track of my mileage, I have named this new bike Lord Acton, because absolute power corrupts.