Category: BMW

Bill’s Old Bike Barn: Guzziland and Motomilitaria

One of the main halls in Bill’s Old Bike Barn features Moto Guzzi and military motorcycles along with other militaria, motorcycle engines, and more.  We know Moto Guzzi primarily as sporting motorcycles.  Back in the day, though (the day being World War II and beyond), Moto Guzzi made motorcycles for the Italian Army.  Good buddy Bill has a few and they are on display, along with military motos from Germany and America and sporting Moto Guzzis.

There’s just so much to take in. I imagine Bill enjoys collecting and curating these things. That’s a cargo parachute, and it fits the collection nicely. There are several airplanes throughout Bill’s Old Bike Barn.

The Harley WL comes to mind first when anyone mentions military motorcycles.  It’s the iconic World War II American military motorcycle.  It’s a 750cc flathead V-twin, OD green, and it has a scabbard for a .45 ACP Thompson (and there’s one in Bill’s WL).

The quintessential American military moto, also used by Canadian forces. When I was a kid, we heard stories that you could buy these brand new, still in the shipping crates, for $25. I never found out if that story was true.

The German counterpart was a 750cc flathead BMW and sidecar. Zündapp also provided sidecar bikes to the Wehrmacht.  And BMW also had a 600cc overhead valve model.  Bill has a BMW with sidecar on display in this hall, but it’s a later model (note the overhead valve engine configuration).

A World War II BMW with sidecar.

Here’s another interesting military motorcycle:  The 1946 500cc single-cylinder Moto Guzzi Alce.  You wouldn’t think a motorcycle would be notable for its sidestand, but that’s one of the first things I noticed about it and Bill made the same comment.  If you’ve ever tried to park a motorcycle in soft sand, you’ll know what this motorcycle is all about.

A 1946 Moto Guzzi Alce. It’s also the cover photo for this blog.  Note the passenger handlebars.
A macro shot of the Alce storage compartments.
This is a serious kickstand. I could have used this in a few spots in Baja!

Harley-Davidson wandered into the military motorcycle world when they bought the Armstrong-CCM company in 1987.  Armstrong had a 500cc single-cylinder Rotax-powered bike and Harley probably thought they would make a killing selling these to the US Army, but they were a day late and more than a dollar short.  The Army had zero interest in gasoline-powered vehicles (the US Army has been 100% diesel powered for decades…I knew that when I was in the Army in the 1970s).  The effort was quickly abandoned.  That’s the bad news.  The good news?  The Harley MT 500 military bikes became instant collectibles.   And Bill’s Old Bike Barn has one.

A Harley-Davidson MT-500. “MT” was an abbreviation for military transport; it more accurately was an acronym for sales results (as in “empty”).
Interesting, but for Harley it was no cigar.

The military room also houses the Moto Guzzi Mulo Meccanico, and motorcycle half-track featured in an earlier ExNotes blog.

The Mulo Meccanico, a case study for why complexity for complexity’s sake always comes in second place. Intended to replace live mules in Italian Army service, the real donkeys had the last laugh. Or was it a hee haw?

The Mulo and the Alce military bike share real estate in Bill’s Old Bike Barn, along with commercial and very desirable Moto Guzzi non-military motorcycles.  Here’s an early 1970s Moto Guzzi Ambassador.

A Moto Guzzi Ambassador from the early 1970s, when Bill was a Moto Guzzi dealer.

Bill’s Old Bike Barn includes what has to be the definitive Moto Guzzi motorcycle classic, the Falcone 500.  In case you’ve ever wondered, it’s pronounced “fowl-cone-ay.”  Fire engine red is a color that works well on Moto Guzzis.

A beautiful 1951 Moto Guzzi Falcone, also known as the baloney slicer for its exposed flywheel on the bike’s left side.
A 1000cc Moto Guzzi sports bike.

One of the more unique “motorcycles” in Bills Old Bike Barn is a 1961 motorcycle-based dump truck.   Bill kept it in its original unrestored condition for a number of years and used it to haul manure around on his farm (I used to write proposals in the defense industry, so Bill and I have that in common).  Bill cleaned up the Guzzi dump truck, customized it with a show-worthy paint job, and made it too pretty to use.  This is a three wheeler built around the same 500cc Falcone baloney-slicer motor shown above.

A Moto Guzzi trike dump truck. Gresh and I have a thing for three wheelers reaching back to our ride across China. Bill used this one for hauling manure around the farm.
The Guzzi dump truck’s motorcycle underpinnings are obvious.
Stunning by any standard.

So there you have it, folks.  This is the last in our series of blogs about Bill’s Old Bike Barn.  I enjoyed my visit to Bill’s more than I have to any other museum, partly because of the content and partly because of Bill.  If you’re looking for a worthy destination and an experience like no other, Bill’s Old Bike Barn should be at the top of your list.  I’d allow a full day for the visit, maybe with a break for lunch.  We asked Bill for the best kept secret regarding Bloomsburg fine dining and his answer was immediate:  The Scoreboard.  It’s only a mile or two away and you can Waze your way there.  Try the chili; it’s excellent.

There are six blogs in our series about Bill’s Old Bike Barn.  Here’s a set of links to the first five:

Our first blog on Bill’s Old Bike Barn?  Hey, here it is:

Bill Morris:  The Man.   It’s a great story.

Military motorcycle half-tracks?  You bet!

With 200 motorcycles in his collection, Bill’s personal favorite might surprise you!

What drives a man like Bill to collect?  Our story on Billville and the Collections answers the mail:

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Devils Tower: Close Encounters of the Motorcycle Kind

Most of us have seen the 1977 movie, Close Encounters of the Third Kind.  It’s what we think of when we see Devils Tower (which I’ll get to in just a bit).  Before I do, consider this question:  Are there close encounters of the first, second, fourth, and fifth kind?   The short answer is:  Yes.

The concept of classifying suspected alien encounters came from a guy named Allen Hynek.  Hynek defined the first three categories, and then two more were added.  Here at ExhaustNotes, we try to formulate the questions you might have before you even know you have them, so we did.   Here’s the answer to what has been keeping you up at night.

    • Close Encounters of the First Kind: These are viewings of unidentified flying objects less than 500 feet away.  They are relatively rare, like seeing a GS 1200 actually in the dirt.
    • Close Encounters of the Second Kind: These involve unidentified flying objects with some sort of associated physical effect, like interference with your vehicle’s ignition or radio, animals reacting to a sensed alien presence, or an alien craft leaving impressions on the ground. They are things for which there simply is no earthly explanation.  I think $1500 freight and setup charges on new motorcycles fall into this category.
    • Close Encounters of the Third Kind: This is the one we all know about. It’s when you climb to the top of Devil’s Tower for an alien rock concert and laser show. Seriously, though, the people who write these descriptions say a close encounter of the third kind involves things like seeing a living being inside an unidentified flying object. In the motorcycling world, I guess it would be like waving at a Starbuck’s-bound GS rider and having him return the wave.
    • Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind: This is when the aliens abduct you.  I imagine it would be a lot like a free weekend at a posh resort, but you have to listen to the time-share pitch.
    • Close Encounters of the Fifth Kind: These involve direct communications between humans and aliens. These actually happen to me a lot, and they usually start with unsolicited cell phone calls for solar power, paying off student loans, extending car warranties, or contributing to a Hillary Clinton campaign. These people have to be from outer space.  No Earthling would ever expect me to go for any of the above.

So there you have it.  On to the topic of this blog, and that’s Devils Tower, Wyoming.  It’s awesome, and if you haven’t made the trek it needs to be on your list.

I first visited Devils Tower when we toured South Dakota’s Black Hills and Mount Rushmore in nearby South Dakota.  Devils Tower was a short 90 miles to the west, I’d seen the movie, and I had to see the place in person.  It was worth the trip.  Instantly recognizable, the dark tower climbs 867 feet above its surroundings.  Eerie is not too strong an adjective.  The thing just looks other-worldly, and attributing the divine, the supernatural, or an extraterrestrial vibe to Devils Tower is a natural reaction.  No fewer than six Native American peoples, Steven Spielberg, and U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt have done exactly that.  I get it, and when you see Devils Tower in person, you will, too.

I also visited Devils Tower when we rode the RX3s through western America with a crew from China and Colombia (that’s what the video above is from).  It’s in a good part of the country…Mt. Rushmore, the Black Hills, the Badlands, and more are in this area and the riding is awesome.  If you ever do Sturgis, Devils Tower needs to be one of your stops, but it’s best to see this part of the world when the Sturgis Rally is not underway (there is such a thing as too many motorcycles, and the tattoos, open pipes, and body odor that goes with Sturgis gets old quickly).

One of the things that makes Devils Tower so dramatic is its distinctiveness; it just doesn’t look like it should be there.  Even the experts can’t agree on how it came to be. The rock docs agree that it was formed by magma (molten rock) forcing itself up between other rocks; what they argue about is how this occurred. One camp holds that the formation was pushed upward by molten rock below, another that Devils Tower once was a larger structure worn down by erosion, and yet another feels the tower is the throat of an ancient volcano.  To get geologic for a moment, it is a laccolithic butte (a wonderful term that could be applied to a few people I know) comprised of phonolite porphyry (dark-colored rock).  Devils Tower is comprised of sharply-defined trapezoidal columns with four, five and sometimes seven sides. They look like they were machined, and in a sense, I guess they were.

The Lakota, Cheyenne, Crow, Arapaho, Shoshone and Kiowa Native Americans all treat Devils Tower and its surrounding regions as sacred ground.  Theodore Roosevelt designated it the first U.S. national monument in 1906.  Native American names for the monolith include mato tipila (bear lodge), the bear’s tipi, the bear’s home, the tree rock, and the great gray horn.  An 1875 U.S. Army expedition misinterpreted one of the Native American names as Bad Gods Tower, and that became Devils Tower.

The Tower is visible from great distances — there’s no missing it or mistaking it for anything else — and the ride in provides varying perspectives.  Once inside the National Park, you can walk to the base, you can take a hike around Devils Tower, or you can climb to the top.  I’ve been there several times, and I think it’s one of our great destinations.

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BMW’s R 18: The UberCycle

A colossal motorcycle, and I generally don’t like colossal motorcycles, but the BMW R 18 is somehow strangely appealing to me.  It’s beautiful, actually.  It’s the first one I’ve seen.  Gresh did a Dream Bike piece on this bike when BMW first released the concept.   Unlike most concept vehicles, the R 18 crossed the great divide and made it into production.   This was the first one I’ve seen.   I wouldn’t buy an R 18, but that doesn’t stop me from admiring it.

Did I mention this thing is colossal?

I recently stayed in Alpharetta, Georgia, while on my latest secret mission.   While on the Alpharetta assignment, my digs were a fancy hotel called the Avalon.  It’s in a high end mall with outdoor shops and a setup intended to evoke feelings of an earlier time.  You know, Main Street USA, with downtown shops and apartments above the shops.  It’s a trend in new shopping malls that I like and apparently so do a lot of other people.

In the evening the Avalon mall is a place to be seen with high end driveway jewelry, and the R 18 seemed right at home parked between a Mercedes UberWagen and a Rolls Royce SUV while Ferraris, Lambos, and McClarens growled by at 10 miles per hour.  For you BMW types, not to worry:  Avalon has the requisite Starbuck’s.

I did mention this motorcycle is huge, didn’t I?  How’s a 68-inch wheelbase and a 761-pound weight sound?

The idea behind the R 18 was to create an obese cruiser evoking BMW’s earlier history.  Not too far back, mind you.  They didn’t want to put swastikas on the thing (something BMW doesn’t really mention in their history…I suppose it wouldn’t be “woke”), but the ’60s were safe and the R60 styling works.  Take a look at this R60 I photographed at Bob Brown’s So Cal BMW shop and you’ll see what I mean.

BMW is obviously positioning the R 18 against Harley and other lardass cruisers, and they more than succeeded. In fact, I’d say they out-Harleyed Harley. To me, the last Big Twin Harley that had the right look was the Evo-engine Softails.  Everything since from “The Motor Company” looks out of proportion to me.  And for the uninitiated, “The Motor Company” is how rugged individualists who dress alike, have the same belt size and tattoos, and shop at the same do-rag supplier refer to Harley-Davidson.  The implication, of course, is that there is only one company that matters manufacturing internal combustion engines.  Ah, ignorance is so bliss.  Anyway, the R 18 is kind of like the Evo Softails: It is colossal, but all the pieces seem to fit well with each other and it successfully chasm crosses to an earlier, presumably better, Horst-Wessel-free time.  I like it.

A few more styling comparisons between the old and the new…

Like Harley and the whole Made in ‘Murica shtick, BMW is capitalizing on a “Berlin Built” mantra.

Berlin Built.  Seriously?

Berlin Built.  I can’t make this stuff up, folks.

I was getting into photographing the R 18, and as I was doing so, I hoped the owner would appear so I could ask him a few questions about the motorcycle (maybe that’s sexist; for all I knew, the owner might be a woman).  That didn’t happen, but I sure had fun working my iPhone magic on this two ton Teutonic twin…

The R 18 styling works for me.   I like the old-style BMW roundels, the steelhead trout mufflers (my term, not Berlin’s), the exposed shaft drive, and more.  If it were me, I would have made the bike a bit smaller, I would have found a way to incorporate a finned version of the GS1250 engine, and maybe I would have used Earles forks rather the R 18’s telescoping front end.  But hey, I don’t sell zillions of motorcycles a year and the Boys from Bavaria do.  As UberCycles go, the R 18’s approximately $20K entry ticket doesn’t seem out of line.  It’s not my cup of kartoffelsuppe, but I think the bike is beautiful.

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Tough Rides: Brazil

We recently wrote a review of Tough Rides China, and as it turns out, that was one of three rides Ryan Pyle did that are available on Amazon Prime.  A couple of days ago I watched Tough Rides Brazil, one of the other two.  It was a six-part series about a circumnavigation around Brazil, and Ryan did this one without his brother Colin.

Although I enjoyed it, I didn’t think Tough Rides China was as good as the Himalaya Calling series about going overland from Germany to India, and I said so in my earlier review.  Tough Rides Brazil, however, was stellar, and it was every bit the equal of Himalaya Calling.  I thoroughly enjoyed it.

A gold-lined church in one of the mining towns in Brazil. Pyle took us into many worthy destinations on his Tough Rides Brazil series.

You know, it’s a funny thing.  I’ve been down on motorcycle adventure stories that focus too much on mysticism, philosophy, and other wordcount-inflating bullhockey and not enough on motorcycle riding (which is why I didn’t think much of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance but I loved Dave Barr’s Riding the Edge).  Somehow in Tough Rides Brazil, Pyle focused only a bit on the riding and spent most of his time on the things he did in each of perhaps a dozen destinations on his 14,000 kilometer journey around Brazil, and it worked.  I watched all six Tough Rides Brazil episodes in a single sitting (it was that good).   It’s easy to do; they are each not that long and the story line and photography are superior.

You might check out Tough Rides Brazil on either Amazon Prime (by buying each episode) or by joining Amazon Prime and watching it on your TV or your computer.  Tough Rides Brazil is included with Amazon Prime.  Trust me on this:  I think you will enjoy it.  It’s got me thinking about visiting Brazil.  This is heresy, but I don’t think I’d want to do it on a motorcycle.  I’d like to fly there and see the place as a regular non-moto-borne tourist.  Brazil looks like a fascinating place and the Tough Rides Brazil series has me thinking deep thoughts in that direction.

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Jeff’s Guest Blog

We love guest blogs.  This is one from good buddy Jeff, who rides a BMW with his teddy bear Jay.   It came about from a comment Jeff made on one of Gresh’s blogs, and in that comment he included his YouTube channel address.   Being a curious sort, I went there and I was blown away by the content and the quality.  One that caught my eye immediately was on Utah’s Highway 12, which runs from just east of Bryce Canyon National Park to Capitol Reef National Park.  I’ve ridden it several times, and I believe it is perhaps the finest motorcycle road in America.  The Highway 12 video is posted at the end of Jeff’s guest blog, along with a link for his YouTube channel.  And with that, let’s get to the main attraction.  Over to you, Jeff!

Jay is a teddy bear and my constant companion. I’m a guy. And 58 years old. How did this happen?!?

Usually this sort of personal revelation involves a phrase like “…Well, there was tequila involved, ok?” or something like that. For once in my life that was not the case.

I started riding motorcycles in college. I was born and raised Mennonite, so a red 1978 Yamaha XS 400 got me a lot of attention at a Mennonite school. I was hooked!

40 years later I’m riding more than ever. In 2011 I moved to Salt Lake City, UT and met the Lovely Laura the 4th day I was here. We’ve been together ever since.

Very early on in our relationship I gave Jay to Laura as a gift. Her family didn’t know about me yet. Her Mom was born and raised Mormon and dating a man with a MOTORCYCLE just wasn’t done in the 50’s and 60’s. Luckily I caught her daughter at a weak moment, so occasionally I’d steal Jay (we didn’t call it breaking and entering) and take him on adventures.

It would be 2 p.m. and Laura would be in a meeting somewhere and her phone would ding. There on her phone would be a picture of Jay having some grand adventure in Park City, UT, or having a beer at one of our favorite restaurants. Once he even went to Las Vegas! I loved making her smile like that.

When it came time to ride home to Indiana for my girls’ graduation from high school and college, one of my daughters asked, “Well, is Jay coming too?” – and so started Jay’s first Big Adventure.

Packing for 3 weeks on the road left no room for Jay in my luggage, so I strapped him to the side of the duffel bag I had strapped to the back seat. What I learned, was that when a motorcycle goes by a sleepy driver in a car at, say, something approaching triple digits, if I ran across them at a gas stop, they were rarely pleased. But with Jay along it always started a conversation instead. From that moment on, he always traveled with me and it got to be my ‘thing’.

I have been a driving instructor for BMW, Porsche, Ferrari, and a host of other groups for over 35 years with over 15,000 racetrack miles and a quarter million street miles. I joined a bunch of sport-bike groups to ride with here in Salt Lake City and invariably I’d get these strange looks showing up for a canyon ride.

“Dude! Who invited Grandpa on the touring bike? OMG he’s got a teddy bear with him!”

After blowing them all off in the twisties, I slowly earned their respect. In the pre-ride bench racing sessions, it would all go great until one of them would say, “Uh oh, Jay’s back!” For a fuzzy little bear, he has serious ‘street cred’.

Anyway, in 2017 the stars aligned, and I planned the trip of a lifetime. I decided to ride from Salt Lake City to Los Angeles, CA to dip my toes in the Pacific Ocean and then head east to repeat the toe-dip in Portsmouth, NH, not far from my twin sister. The ride was dedicated to raising awareness for the Alzheimer’s Association as by now Laura was the Director of Development for the State of Utah. Jay and I stopped at Alzheimer’s Association offices all across the USA. That trip is documented on our Instagram page #jaysbigadventure.

I’ve always enjoyed helping people with car and motorcycle maintenance and started our youtube.com channel to continue to teach people about cars, motorcycles and to raise awareness for the Alzheimer’s Association’s fight to cure this terrible disease. It is the only one of the top six killers in the USA that has no treatment, no cure, and no way to manage or control the symptoms.

Therefore, the end credits of every one of my videos has contact info to help people learn that there is help not only for the sufferers, but the supporting caregivers as well. 100% of their services are free.

Nine years ago, buying Laura a cute bear at a BMW dealership, I had no idea what a profound change he would bring to my life. I can’t wait to see what he comes up with over the next 9 years!

Jeff, that’s an awesome story.  Our readers, Joe Gresh, and I thank you for sharing it with us.

Here’s the Highway 12 YouTube video I mentioned above:

Jeff and Jay’s YouTube channel is here.  I subscribed to it; you might want to consider doing the same.

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Stranded in Baja, Hearst Castle, and more…

Every once in a while we do a blog that covers a bunch of topics, and this is one of those times.

Good buddy Mike Huber and his friend Bobbie motorcycled Mexico (Baja, to be specific, almost another country all by itself), and he most recently published an excellent story about being stranded down there by the Covid 19 pandemic.  It’s not often that we recommend another blog, but hey, Mike’s writing is outstanding and it’s a great story.  Take a look; it’s very good.

My favorite motorcycle magazine (that would be Motorcycle Classics) sends out marketing emails on a regular basis, and in those emails they include links to past (and sometimes recent) articles.  I write for MC, and the most recent email that slipped into my inbox included a link to my Destinations piece on Hearst Castle.   You might want to read that story; I love Hearst Castle.  It’s closed for the pandemic, but the pandemic won’t last forever.  Hearst Castle will be there when it’s over.

We’re having a heat wave (both here in the Peoples Republik of Kalifornia and at Tinfiny Ranch).   That prompted us to start a piece on riding in extreme heat.   My first recommendation would be:  Don’t.   But things don’t always work out the way you want them to.  I once rode the length of Baja on a Mustang replicas with several friends, and due to a lack of research on my part we did the ride in Baja’s hottest month (and that’s September).  You can read about the 150cc Baja ride through Hell here.  Do you have any advice for riding in high temperatures?  Please share them with us (info@exhaustnotes.us) and we’ll include your recommendations here on the blog.

We have more motorcycle, gun and other stuff coming up, including info on Ruger’s new Custom Shop and their Super GP100 .357 Mag revolver, favored loads in the Henry .45 70 Single Shot, a piece on Turnbull’s iconic color case hardening and restoration services, a stunning (and tack-driving) Kimber with exhibition grade French walnut, the wrap-up of our ride through the Andes Mountains in Colombia, the Canton Fair, and for you fans of The Ten Commandments, making bricks without hay and mortar.  And a whole lot more.

Stay tuned, folks.

Michigan State Police 2020 Motorcycle Test Results

Think you know how to ride?

If you’re into large touring bikes and you want to get a realistic assessment of what their capabilities are, there’s no better place to go than the annual Michigan State Police test report.  These folks can ride and you’ll see what Harley, BMW, and Yamaha motorcycles can do in capable hands.

Good buddy Mike is a retired police director who was right in the middle of this kind of stuff, and he sent the link for the latest MSP report to me.   There’s no advertising and it’s all presented clearly and in a way that’s easy to understand.  It’s fascinating reading and the results are presented in a no-nonsense engineering format.  Check out this table of results for the 0-100 mph acceleration tests:

The Michigan State Police report has similar displays for 0-60, 0-80, top speed, braking distances, fuel economy, lap times, and more.  I couldn’t put the report down.  In their best days (days that are way back in the rear view mirror), none of the motorcycle magazines did this kind of outstanding work.   And there’s more…they have all of the above and more for police cars, too.  Check out the stats on the Ford EcoBoost vehicles.

The best part?  The report is free, and you can get to it here.   You can thank me later.

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Wild Conjecture: BMW R18 Concept

BMW’s R18 Concept is that rare thing in the motorcycle world: a BMW that doesn’t look like the contents of the junk drawer in your kitchen. Most of the GS series have a rubber band, plastic-handled corkscrew and expired AA batteries look about them. Cluttered and stolen-valor-military-ish, the big GS’s take a concerted effort to look at without smirking and feeling superior. Except for the very first ones. The early GS800 was much cleaner and actually was pretty good off road.

Concept bikes are a great way to get the reaction of the riding public without spending a bunch of money on a bike nobody likes. It’s smart to ask your customers first. Personally, I love the thing. It has a vibe that goes all the way back to the beginning of BMW. Back when they were still trying to kill us all.

The engine is huge and air-cooled because that’s what cruisers are supposed to be. Liquid cooling on a cruiser is a negative. Four cylinders on a cruiser is two too many. The whole point of a cruiser is laid back and relaxing. This is not to be confused with comfortable.

The seat on the R18 is a concession to the Brat trend that is slowly but surely vandalizing Honda’s entire production output from the 1970’s. I would prefer a dual seat more like the old R69 came with. It seems a waste for such a long bike to neglect the pillion accommodations. The long reach to the bars is another styling cue that will probably make it into production. Motorcyclists have proven time and time again that they will put up with any silly riding position as long as it makes them cool.

And you will be cool on the R18. It’s long and low and black, all these are good things to be. I hope the exposed driveshaft makes it past the product liability wonks at BMW. I like a dangerous spinning bit on a motorcycle.

The front end has about 1-inch of travel, generous for the cruiser segment. I hope BMW replicates that crazy-huge, aerodynamic skeleton key when they design the keyless proximity fob for this bike. Come to think of it all those keyless entry thingies are too big to fit in the skintight leather rockabilly pants you’ll be wearing on the R18. Maybe a plain old key would be better. The headlight nacelle looks great if a bit Royal Enfield Bullet-ish. Hey, that’s ok.

My biggest concern about the R18 is not the bike itself but the manufacturer. BMW puts entirely too many electronic doodads on their modern bikes. The excessive reliance on E-trickery to protect the rider from himself has created heavy motorcycles. BMW used to pride itself on lightweight motorcycles. It was in their advertisements! The damn things may be safer as long as they don’t land on you but reliability has suffered with the additional complexity.

Here’s hoping BMW can pull their heads out of their…ahem…you know, and build a strong, simple machine that won’t cost a fortune to buy or maintain because it would be a crime for such a pretty motorcycle to be restricted to Starbucks parking lots and BMW service centers.

German Military and Police Motors: Part I

As you know, I wrote The Complete Book of Police and Military Motorcycles a few years ago.  One of the things I found interesting was how these motorcycles categorized along national lines.   Three nations stood out: The United States, Japan, and Germany.   This blog (one of two or three) focuses exclusively on the German bikes and their derivatives.

Here’s a World War II German 350 DKW motorcycle. The Wehrmacht used these two-stroke 350 cc motorcycles for dispatch duty. I grabbed this photo at the World War II Museum in New Orleans.

One of the more interesting military motorcycle applications occurred in the German Wehrmacht during World War II. In most other military motorcycle applications, the motorcycle has been used primarily as an escort or messenger vehicle. The Germans actually used motorcycles as infantry weapons. Each motorcycle in a German motorcycle battalion (that’s right, the Germans organized motorcycle units up to the battalion level!) carried three soldiers: A driver, a rifleman on the back seat, and a machine gunner in the sidecar. The Germans used these motorcycle units when they invaded Russia. By the time the Russian winter rolled around, they figured out this was not such a bright idea.

This is a BMW with a sidecar.  This picture came from HP-Hommes in Germany.

A World War II Wehrmacht Motorcycle.

The Russians, realizing a war was coming in the late 1930s, purchased a handful of BMWs from a dealer in Sweden and secretly reverse-engineered the German machines in Moscow. The Russians actually fielded a copy of the BMW military motorcycle during World War II, so troops in Russia on both sides of the front lines were fighting atop essentially the same motorcycle.

After the war, the Russians continued to build these machines. The Russians shifted production to the Ural mountains, and the Russian BMW copies became known as Urals.  The Russians continued to improve the machines, and after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the motorcycles were offered for sale to the public. Prior to that time, Russia sold Urals to eastern European and other third world communist nations.

You can buy these machines today in the United States, without the machine gun, and own a brand new World War II-era motorcycle. The Russians also make a civilian version. The civilian versions are available with whitewall tires and with or without the sidecar.

This picture came from the Ural brochure.

In the past, Ural has not been hesitant in showing their motorcycles in extreme applications. This is another photo from the Ural brochure. Ural has also showed motorcycles with rocket launchers, grenade launchers, and the 7.62mm PK machine gun.

Just the thing for LA traffic!

I grabbed the next shot on a trip to China in 2001. Note the OHV BMW-clone engine.  In 2001, China had several companies making clones of the older BMW-boxer engine bikes, including some with early-1930s-design flathead engines!

A LongTech-mounted police officer in rural China.

I travel to China on business regularly, and I noticed that you don’t see the Chinese BMW clones any more.  The companies that manufactured them stopped offering them many years ago or went out of business, but I thought I would still some Chinese boxers plying the streets and alleys Shanghai, Guangzhou, and other spots.  Nope.  They’re gone.

In China, you can’t register a motor vehicle more than 10 years old, and if you have one and don’t turn it in to the government for destruction, they will come and take it from you.  There are, I suppose, advantages and disadvantages to this approach.  The disadvantage, obviously, is that there are no classic vehicle collectors or collections in China.  The advantages are that it gets vehicles that don’t have the latest emissions control equipment off the street, and it stimulates the economy.

How about the country where the boxers originated?  BMW is still going strong, and BMW police bikes (in many variants) are in service in both Germany and other parts of the world.   The photos that follow show both vintage and current (in 2001) Beemers.

Back in the early 2000s, German police BMWs were green and white (they may still be; I haven’t been to Germany in a while).  The BMW factory provides the bikes in a range of standard colors, and for an additional $400 per motorcycle (early 2000 pricing) they will paint the motorcycle any color already in the BMW system (for either their cars or motorcycles). Based on the research I did for Military and Police Motorcycles, I believed the then-current BMW R1100 RT-P to be the most advanced police motorcycle in the world.  It had a range of officer comfort features, a torquey 1100 cc twin cylinder engine, and unlike all other manufacturers’ police motorcycles, an antiskid braking system. Every motor officer I interviewed for Military and Police Motorcycles spoke highly of this machine.

This is the BMW R1100 RT-P, on duty at night somewhere in Germany.  Photograph courtesy of Willi Nagel at BMW in Germany.
The photo above shows the BMW R1100 RT-P, but this time in the CHP colors. I photographed this motorcycle with a film Nikon N70 and the 24-120 Nikon lens while visiting CHP headquarters in Sacramento, California.
A couple of CHP officers checking out the classic bikes at the 2004 Hansen Dam Norton Rally. Note that the lead bike has LED strobe lights, while the trail bike is equipped with conventional police lighting. These are BMW R1150RT-P motorcycles.

In the early 2000s, the BMW R1100 RT-P, in black and white, was used by the California Highway Patrol and many other U.S. police departments. If Harley-Davidson wasn’t nervous, they should have been. The BMW was a wonderful police motorcycle.   BMW later upgraded this motorcycle to the R1150RT-P (with the 1150cc engine), and then the R1200RT-P (with the 1200cc hex head engine).

Here are more early BMW police motor photos…

It’s not too hard to guess who these French motor officers are escorting.

The photograph above, which came from BMW in Germany, shows the Pope in France a few years ago, accompanied by a group of earlier BMW police twins. BMW has been the dominant police motorcycle in Europe and many other parts of the world.

My friend Ben sent this next photo to me from Paris, France. This is a vintage photo showing the Gendarmerie from the presidential escort group.

Wow.

This is Ben’s personal bike, a former French police BMW. It’s a 1977 R60/7, in a configuration never made available to civilians.

Good buddy Ben’s personal motorcycle. The French police ordered these with a 600cc engine, the RS fairing, spoked wheels, and leather saddlebags. These were the first bikes the French police ordered in blue; before that they were all black. This is pretty cool stuff.

And folks, that’s a wrap for today.  Watch for more in another day or two.   This blog is already getting long, and we have enough vintage BMW police motors stuff for another blog or two.

Don’t forget to visit our Police Motors page and check out our other police motorcycle posts!

The 2005 Three Flags Classic: The Intro!

Feel like going for a motorcycle ride? How about the Southern California Motorcycle Club’s Three Flags Classic?

Headed for Canada…nope, we were not draft dodgers. We were riding in the 2005 Three Flags Rally! That’s Marty on the left and Joe on the right.

This is one of the best motorcycle runs in the world, spanning (as the name implies) three countries: Mexico, Canada, and the United States. My friend Marty and I, along with 457 other motorcyclists, rode the Three Flags in 2005. It was the 30th Anniversary of this grand event, and it was a hoot.

The Route

What a run this was! We rode our motorcycles from our homes to Tijuana (Mexico), Gallup (New Mexico), Grand Junction (Colorado), Driggs (Idaho), Whitefish (Montana), Calgary (Canada), Penticton (Canada), Portland (Oregon), Roseburg (Oregon), Davis (California), and back home…a 12-day round-trip sprint spanning just under 5,000 miles.

The map. GPS? We don’t need no stinkin’ GPS!

It was a grand ride. Speeds ranged from slogs through traffic to a few times when we cruised at speeds north of 130 mph. Temperatures ranged from ungodly hot to subfreezing. We had sunny days and we had rain. It was grand. I’ll do my best to tell the story with pictures and words, and you’ll have to imagine the rest. Did I mention that it was a great ride?

The Bikes

Marty rode his K1200RS Beemer (with close to 100,000 miles on it when we left) and I rode my ’95 Triumph Daytona 1200 (the only Triumph motorcycle in the entire event). At the banquet in Calgary, Charlie Coyner (the event director) announced that there were 218 Hondas (most of these were Gold Wings), 90 Harleys, 90 BMWs, 34 Yamahas (mostly FJRs), about a dozen Suzukis (mostly DL1000s), about a dozen Kawasakis, and one Triumph.

Yep, one Triumph, and that was me!

The Equipment

I used my Nikon N70 film camera with just two lenses (the 24-120 Nikon, and the 17-35 Sigma). Yep, in 2005 I was still shooting film. The photos were okay…not as good as I would be able to do in later years with my Nikon digital cameras, but not terrible, either. Hey, you go to war with the Army you have, and in 2005, that was my trusty old N70.

Other gear included included Joe Rocket pants, jacket, and gloves, a Firstgear rain jacket, a Gerbing electric jacket (it was worth its weight in gold as we continued north), an HJC helmet, Haix boots (from Australia; they are wonderful!), a Nelson Rigg tank bag, and Oxford saddlebags.

The Guys

That would be Marty and me, and four other guys we rode with who were part of the Brown BMW First Church of Bob. Everybody but me was on a Beemer.

Did I mention I was the only guy in the entire Three Flags Rally on a Triumph?

Most of the time it was just Marty and me. The other three guys were off riding their separate ways, but Marty and I rode together for the entire trip. Marty is a retired Superior Court judge. At the time, I was heading up Layne-Christensen’s western US water treatment business sector. Marty told me about the event and I wanted to go. You had to pay for tickets and hope  your name was drawn, and ours were not. I thought that would end it, but nope, Marty told me that happens. You just wait and some of the guys who had been drawn would be selling their tickets, that’s what occurred, and Marty and scooped up a couple.  Then I had to ask my boss at Layne for two weeks off, and I thought that would kill it. But nope, he was a good guy, too, and he told me I should go for it. (A side note: Layne was in the drilling business, too, and when those Chilean miners were trapped underground a couple of years later, this same guy ran the drilling project that reached and retrieved the miners…how’s that for “genuine good guy” credibility?)

So, we were off. But I don’t want to force feed you through a fire hose and try to cram the entire 5,000-mile Three Flags Rally into a single blog.  We’ll present this story in six or seven separate blogs. This is just the first one…the introduction…something to whet your appetite, as they say.

Stay tuned!