Had an 1150GS..great machine...know lots of folks with the 1100...they love em too.....

the 2006 GSA is a bag of crap because (in no particular order)

(ps I own one...and am sick to the teeth of it)

1) EWS fails!.... nuff said.... can happen any time anywhere.....for no reason....happened me on the border of Colombia and ecuador...thats it...600 bucks in a truck to Cali

2) Throttle position sensor location.... tourtech make a fortune making accessories for BMW because they've a crap design....

3) Vitamol for clutch fluid...and oh yeah if you put in dot3/4 the seals leak....now for the bike you can take anywhere supposedly...do you think you can get Vitamol anywhere? you can in your hole!!! Someone should find the gobshite who came up with this beaut and say to him...ok..now your in Mongolia...go find some vitamol (I happen to be in mongolia looking for vitamol!)

4) Final drive.... currently running at about 2000 bucks worth of repairs to my final drive...yep I'm a fat bastard so this may be my fault....

5) The poxy seat... unless your a leprechan your arse end dangles between the gap...and you have to keep WD40'ing the catch to get the seat off...what the hell was wrong with the old seat? one piece...came off handy pandy

6) The headlight...try and change it without breaking the assembly!... i dare ya.... I know guys who really know there stuff who've done this...another 250 bucks out of you sky rocket

7) The CANBUS... try and pump up the tires using the electric socket beyond 30psi...the canbus says screw you on account of the current load....

8) Add basically any electrical component, gps, etc...CANBUS kicks you in the nuts

9) Fuel gauge / Range monitor...about as good as a chocolate firegaurd....never work..not just on my bike others too....don't put em on there if they dont work

10) No dumb dumb switch on overheating....and they overheat like a whores bastard in a hot climate in a city

11) How the hell do you take off the hand spoilers? what tool is that? do you have one in your kit? like would you bring one with you to Mongolia?

12) Battery drops below 12V..the bike is fubar...totally fubar....stops working completely

13) No overvoltage protection to jump it off a car....none do...but this is the bike that supposed to go anywhere..what the hell do you do if you get a flat battery...(always park uphill?)

14) Piston head protection bars aren't worth a shite compared to the 1150

15) Just way too many specialized tools, electrics, etc....for a bike that will end up in remote conditions you can't ****ing fix it.


WAS: BMW's are great, bikes built to take you anywhere; they'll never let you down = 1150/1100

IS: BMW's are overpriced bags of ****story; they will **** you at your most vulneralbe = 1200


Yeah I know thats 15 reasons!.....

Comments on a postcard please.

Thats why Ewan and Charley took an entourage whenever they went anywhere!!!



Airhead BM's are still the only 'real' tourers !!

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'He who laughs last, was too slow to get the joke'

OOOOO there's going to be a lot of heated garage, touratech account holders jumping on this thread... Their 1200 never break down on the way back from the coffee shop.

Sorry to hear your woes. It's horrible when the marketting doesn't match up to reality !

I hope you get your problems sorted and are able to sell it when (if) you get it home so you can buy something more suitable !!

Something Japanese !!

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www.touringted.com

Hello
I've had a little gaze into my crystal ball and have seen higher blood pressures, tantrums and other verbal nastiness. It always happens when the BMW in general and GS in particular get called into question on the HUBB (interestingly enough, there is only a 0.0001% chance of it happening regarding any other topic).

It would be nice if my prediction were wrong.

Chris

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Brighty's website: TheBrightStuffDotCom

you guys are right...
have to admit to being caught up in the whole bmw thing...... post the long way round...great bikes blah blah...and i think the 1100,1150 are amazing machines.... have the 1150 and love it...

but this 1200....the love affair soon wares off when you down a couple of grand on parts and labour...and weeks of your life waiting around in shitholes for parts...

when i get back to ireland i'm going to burn it out along with all the bmw apparel.... f$%k them...and f$#k the horse they came in on.

LOL !!! The 1100 and the airheads are great bikes. I'd take an 1100 around the world myself anyday.

The 1150's were showing the way downhill. The rear drive bearings had problems, subframes would crack etc. Getting too electrical for some people. Still, pretty reliable though. I'd have one for the road (maybe).

The 1200 is where BMW fired all their old school engineers and got in a load of snotty nosed University graduates who loved their Ipods more than spanners ! That and swapping mechanical common sense for marketing bullshit finished it for me.

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www.touringted.com

I'd heard the opposite.

That the 1100s had the weaker subframe when comparing the 1100 and 1150...

Can't comment on the 1200 subframe...

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Adventure: it's an experience, not a style!
(so ride what you like, but ride it somewhere new!)

I'm not 100% sure, maybe you're right !!

__________________
www.touringted.com

Yes... Why is that I wonder...? At least we know it isn't unilateral...

__________________
Adventure: it's an experience, not a style!
(so ride what you like, but ride it somewhere new!)

I only say that as I remeber when researching the two I was warned to get the rear subframe on the 1100 reinforced if I decided to get that and travel two-up loaded...

I was never given such advice for the 1150, which is what I eventually went for. I know that Margus got his braced on the 1100 for a the trip he is currently on. Unfortunately, I don't think they're interchangeable, not that that would be a cheaper solution anyway...

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Adventure: it's an experience, not a style!
(so ride what you like, but ride it somewhere new!)

It's quite good of machine what have been orginaly design for water pumping. You cant accept that there is anything else coming out than ,,,,,,,,

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http://ktmadvr.wordpress.com/
http://www.dustywobbls.com

Sorry to slightly hijack this thread and also to dig out this old thread again...

http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...mw-r100gs-7766

IMHO, even 10 or 20 years ago (or 30 years, as it's their 30th this year) the real life GS experience didn't match the marketing/hype. Airheads were just as bad as the modern day 4 valve.
Chris

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Brighty's website: TheBrightStuffDotCom

Finally a write-up from someone who has first-hand experience. That's not common here!

It's a shame that you bought a bike that doesn't meet your expectations. Some people like it and handles it faults, other don't. It's not the bike I would have used for an extended trip, but quite a lot do.

Times are changing. EWS and CanBus will be the norm even on Japanese bikes in a few years but most of todays riders are not familiar with the technology.
The next generation of riders will be more pleased to diagnose the bike via a cell-phone and bluetooth then smashing things with big tools. It would even be possible to hook up your bike to a diagnose-computer in Germany (or Japan or india..) when you are stranded in places like Ulan Bator.
This is the future, believe it or not.

On the other hand I'm not pleased with BMWs quality-control and if a Japanese company can make something equal or better then the 1200GS they can make a lot of money. So far this has not happened and the GS has been a best-seller for 30 years.

So I stick to my airhead, mileage will reach 225kkm this week.

I couldn't agree more concerning the BMW marketing nonsense. However, progress can not be stopped. No question, with all the electronics, it is more challenging to diagnose and repair in the field. On the other hand, tools to diagnose problems are getting more sophisticate too, i.e. GS-911 . So, the content of the bag of spare parts for long distance trips changes, i.e. ring antenna, fuel pump controller by-pass cable, ...

But, lets be honest, nobody on here is typing their rants on a DOS based computer either...

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Thomas

"Hey, ...I'm just ridin' shotgun"

It takes an Irishman to express these things fully, a far better effort than I could have managed, well written Sir and sorry to hear about your troubles. Hope it isn't going to ruin the trip.

My own experience of BMW's ended with an F650 waterpump and head gasket in North Africa. Faith in the brand becomes less useful at that point. I usually don't mind a little walk but there are exceptions. That IMHO is where BMW learned all they know about cheap, third rate design. No airhead or K designer would have put a gravity return fan switch on it's side, or used a lip seal to support a shaft. Fair enough, they knew all about cheap alloys and wiring you wouldn't risk on your door bell, but they never took the design risks I saw on the F. The R1100 I had before the last F BTW was better put together than the one I bought later.

As for diagnosis by mobile, I've done that. When I started on truck brakes there was a compressor, a footvalve, a few bits to fine tune the pressure and the brakes. You could diagnose these with an adjustable spanner and a packet of woodbines. Today they are on the verge of brake by wire and the diagnostics are easier than ever if you have a laptop. What happens between is a mess due to the spanner weilding woodbine smokers trying to fix stuff that needs the PC and the PC programmers not really knowing what the system is supposed to do and how it might go wrong. The diagnosis though is only half the problem. When you found the bit that leaked fag smoke you could bodge it together with poxy resin or a whatever until you got hold of a real bit. When the PC says "replace module B" your next call is to UPS (unless the PC does that for you too). While a software error is fixed, or put into limp mode, a monkey metal drive shaft needs replacing. I predict a fine future for Touratech in that game.

CANbus on a bike BTW is totally pointless. The idea is that functions are split between modules and weight and cost is saved by having 4 wires do all the work over the long distances. A good idea when your 75-seater has individual controls for the passenger air con and four doors with multifunction ramps. Not so useful when the whole shabang is under 2m long and needs nothing more complex than brake lights.

Andy