Bmw K1

BMW K1

THE STAR-BEEMER COMES TO EARTH

THE LOOKOUT ROADHOUSE ON ORTEGA HIGHWAY IS not a very popular place this morning. Cold, intermittent showers have kept most riders away from this usually bustling hangout. But the hardy show up. Of the five riders who have stopped to fill up on coffee and commiseration, four have been astride BMWs: These Beemer guys take their motorcycling very seriously. The subject at the moment is BMW's latest wunderbike, the K1.

“What a motorcycle,” says one, a retired military man in his 60s who pulled-in on a road-stained, high-mileage R 1 OORT tourer. “If I was a younger man. I'd have one.” His friend, a younger man on a tastefully modified R100RS sport-tourer, disagrees. “Too radical.” he huffs, “I'm just not interested.”

That’s the Kl for you. Controversial, even among the faithful.

The Kl is a very different motorcycle from anything BMW, or anyone else, has heretofore produced, but it has its feet firmly planted in BMW's past. Dig deeply enough, and what you find is a bike whose hardware heritage is K 100. itself fairly controversial when introduced in 1984.

But the K 100, even in its racy RS guise, was more sporttourer than sportbike. BMW intends the new Kl to be thought of as a pure sporting weapon rather than a sporttouring implement, though it is nowhere nearly as hardedged as, say, a Suzuki GSX-R or Yamaha FZR.

The element which sets the K1 apart from its Open-class sportbike brethren has nothing to do with its running gear, or with its eye-popping bodywork. It has to do with engineering philosophy, with how far towards the outer limits of ultimate streetbike performance a rational machine should reach. If, in your mind, the best Open-class sportbike is necessarily the fastest, most-powerful one, then you're not synchronized with BMW-think.

To get yourself in step. it helps to begin thinking about the K 1 not in terms of how it looks-because certainly its styling is argument-provoking-but in terms of how it works, which, it turns out, is very well, if a bit differently from other bikes in its class. The dissimilarities between the K! and other large-bore sportbikes. in fact, start with the bike's controversial skin and go right to its core.

That core is the bike’s 987cc, lay-down engine, essentially the K100 engine motor with an all-new, 16-valve cylinder head. As with the K100. it uses double overhead cams to actuate its valves, but where valve adjustment is accomplished by shims and buckets on the eight-valve K100 head, the 16-valve Kl head uses buckets, but no shims. Valve adjustments will be required so rarely, say BMW officials, that the job will be done by replacing the bucket on the loose valve with one of a different thickness.

BMW’s engineers also reshaped the head’s combustion chambers to provide a better burn of the air-fuel mixture, and then they put some time in on the engine’s bottom end before plugging it into the Kl, lightening the crankshaft by 3.3 pounds, accomplished by removing metal from its throws. And while the engine uses the same pistons as the K100, its connecting rods are each 50 grams lighter than those used in the K100. All of these changes result in an engine that is quicker-revving than the K 100's, and makes 1 3 additional horsepower.

That the U.S. version of the K l's engine is rated at 95 horsepower—down five from the Euro-version of the bike due to valve-timing and ignition-advance changes needed to pass U.S. emissions tests—is another important departure from standard sportbike-think, especially when other Open-class machines are producing upwards of 130 horses. Besides the fact that in some European countries, manufacturers have voluntarily agreed to a 100-horsepower cap. the Kl makes no more power than it does because of BMW's long-standing philosophy that midrange torque is more useful than peak horsepower.

The K1, therefore, won’t smoke down a dragstrip like its Oriental counterparts. But because its power delivery feels almost constant from 4500 rpm to the bike’s 9000-rpm rev limit, with a horsepower peak at 7500 rpm and a torque peak at 6250 rpm. it is not as intimidating to ride quickly as can be the more-powerful beasts with which it shares the Open-class label. Those bikes are by no means overly difficult to ride, and their power production can produce marvelous rushes of adrenalin. But gassing one of them too hard during cornering, especially in the lower gears, and especially when the engine already is in the fat part of its power curve, can cause a rear wheel to step out.

A Kl rider, with a smooth, seemingly peakless flow of power to deal with, with double-digit—not triple-digit— units of horsepower on tap, and with a bit more flywheel to govern rapid changes in engine speed, is free to spend less of his attention modulating the bike's throttle, and more of it thinking about the other tasks of sport riding.

Still, even aware of BMW's design philosophies, we were a little disappointed in the K l 's performance. With a top speed of 143 miles per hour—admittedly 12 miles per hour up on the last K 1OORS we tested—the K 1 would have finished as only the third-fastest 600 in last month’s 600ce comparison test, tied with the Honda CBR600, and trailing the Yamaha FZR600 and Kawasaki ZX-6. We expected a little more out of such a high-tech piece of machinery.

We had also hoped that the K 1 wouldn't he as afflicted by vibration as some of the K100’s that we’ve tested in the past five years, but no dice. The engine is buzzy through most of its rev range, though our test bike at least had a smooth spot between 4000 and 5000 rpm. luckily corresponding with a speed range of between 70 and 80 miles per hour. But below 4000 rpm. the engine was moderately vibratory, and revving the engine beyond 5000 rpm produced an electric tingling in the seat, handgrips and footpegs. It seems a shame BMW’s engineers haven't applied a counterbalance shaft, which smooths out the threecylinder K75 so nicely, to the K1/K100 engines, which need the help badly.

Another complaint made about the K 1 will be familiar to K100 riders. When CIVs test bike was fired-up after having been parked on its sidestand overnight, it emitted dense smoke from engine oil which had leaked past the piston rings and into its combustion chambers while the bike was at rest. This has been a characteristic of the K100. particularly during the bike's break-in mileage, but BMW's engineers say they’ve redesigned the K 1's piston rings to solve it. With 1 500 miles on its odometer, our test bike was still smoking—albeit not as dramatically as some KlOOs we’ve had—so apparently there's more work to be done on the problem.

At least the newest Beemer doesn't have to make apologies for its handling. BMW engineers knew the K1 would require more frame rigidity than the K100, but they weren't ready to throw out that bike's tubular, steel frame. Instead, they just made it stronger by using thicker frame tubes. Because of the resulting stiffness, and because of its 17-inch, Z-rated Michelin radial tires and well-calibrated suspension, the Kl handles markedly better than the K100.

EDITORS'NOTES

PUT OFF BY A BIKE THAT'S AS UGLY AS Albania? Well, listen: Dear old Mom always told me, "Pretty is as pretty does." From that perspective, the K1 is, uh. well, attractive. Sure, it's slow compared to the rest of the literbike class, but it handles with a quickness and security that makes it nearly as nimble as a 750 sportbike. That makes it a blast to ride, especially in the twisties. And fun, you probably recall, is what motorcycles are sup posed to be. In fact, about the only problem with the Ki's differentness from the generic wonderfulness of the rest of the sportbike crop is its high visibility'. Speed cops will see you. Brats in station wagons will stare at you. pointing, their mouths gaping in amazement. Controversial? The Ki? Maybe a little. But that's okay. nothing wrong with a little controversy. Especially when it's as much fun to ride as this bike is.

Jon F Tho,n1so,j. Fewure Ediior

I DIDNT SAY ANYTHING. BUT I thought Camron was nuts. He went to Italy to ride the early BMW KI. and he came back with pictures of this titanic, red-and-yellow jugger naut that looked like something John Deere engineers mocked up the night that someone dropped rhino tran quilizer in the water cooler. "It handies great' Camron~ said. `it's fun to ride.

I just nodded, went back to my office and called Camron’s parents. I figured they should know about him.

But now that the Kl is in this country, I realize that he was right after all. Despite that it looks like a tractor from Mars, the BMW is an absolute blast. On the K1, it’s easy to go fast, it’s fun to go slow and it’s entertaining to be seen. The BMW is the most pleasantly surprising bike of the year.

Camron was surprised , too. when his parents started acting so concerned. I just hope they ride a K1 sometime. Then maybe they'll stop trying to get him to move back home. —Ron Lawson, Managing Editor

HEY. HEY, HEY. ENOUGH ALREADY WITH the gripes about the K I `s looks. For years. the company gets slammed for being too conservative, and then, when BMW uncorks something radi cal, people act like there's an 11th Commandment, `~Thou shalt not paint gearcases yellow." that's been broken.

On a functional basis, yes. there are some legitimate criticisms. A serious liter-class sportbike ought to produce more than 95 ponies and at least be able to crack the 150-mph barrier. And my esteem for the Kl would soar about 100 percent if, when I zinged it hard through the gears, it didn’t tingle like an out-of-phase egg-beater.

Does it cost too much? I don’t know. There are plenty of big sportbikes out there that cost less, but none of them have shaft drive or the Paralever system. None of them have three storage compartments or classy-looking badges and emblems. None of them have fuel injection or anti-lock braking.

And not one of them has yellow gearcases.

—David Edwards, Editor

To help provide the Kl with its stability, BMW’s engineers equipped it with a Marzocchi fork assembly. This non-adjustable unit has 41,7mm tubes and Teflon-coated bushings, and it delivers 5.3 inches of travel. The bike’s rear is suspended by BMW’s Paralever single-sided swingarm system and a single gas-filled shock absorber with three spring-preload positions. The Paralever system greatly reduces the rear-end torque reaction common shaft-driven motorcycles, meaning that a rider can chop the throttle in mid-turn and not have to worry about the K1 dropping on its suspension and grounding out.

OF's test riders all found the shock’s middle preload position about right for fast riding, well matched for the response of the fork. At low speeds, the resulting ride was smooth but firm, with the steering quick but not too sensitive. And at high speeds, the Kl became a German-style magic carpet, mowing down sweepers with ease. Pressed to near-racetrack velocities, the K-bike does loose some of its composure, but there’s little else to complain about.

What handles also must stop, and the Kl’s forward progress can be brought to a sudden halt by its very powerful, very sophisticated braking system. At the front wheel are a pair of 12-inch discs, with a double-action, fourpiston caliper per disc. The rear disc is an 11.2-incher and the caliper there is a single-piston unit. What sets this system apart is that it is operated through an electronically controlled anti-lock system. The system adds both price and complexity to the K1, but BMW should be applauded for being the first manufacturer to bring this safety-oriented arrangement to motorcycling.

Another factor which contributes to the bike’s feel of security, and to its smooth ride, is its long 62.2-inch wheelbase. The longer the wheelbase, the less choppy any chassis is over surface irregularities, and the Kl illustrates this to good effect. But the Kl’s stretched wheelbase, plus a heaviest-in-class dry weight of 591 pounds, means that the K1 is a big, heavy motorcycle. The blocky, angular styling of the Kl’s fairing contributes to the bike’s massive appearance. But the bike’s styling makes sense from an aerodynamic standpoint, with the pie-shaped front fender opening a hole in the air that the rest of the bike flows into, and the tail-section contouring allowing the air to close smoothly around the bike.

The Kl’s bulky appearance aside, the bike is surprisingly nimble and light on its feet. Because of the positioning of its engine, the considerable mass represented by the cylinders, head, pistons and cams all rides down on about the same plane as the crankshaft, instead of high in the chassis, between the rider’s knees, as is the case with most other sportbikes. Situating the engine’s weight low in the chassis means there’s less inertia to be overcome when the rider flicks the bike into a corner, or from side-to-side in a series of turns. So, the Kl may weigh 591 pounds, but it feels as though it weighs much less.

But no amount of engineering sleight of hand can reduce the bike’s overall dimensions. The stretch from the seat to the Kl’s tubular, down-turned handlebar is a long one, and the seating position is fairly aggressive, certainly more so than any bike yet from BMW. This, along with its firm low-speed ride, makes the Kl somewhat less than wonderful for freeway runs at 55 miles per hour. Ah, but that isn’t what it was built for. It’s built for lonesome, curving backroads, and there, the Kl excels. Apparently enough people have already realized that fact that BMW is running short on K l s. The company originally planned to import 300 1990 models, but initial reaction to the bike, in spite of its $ 12,990 price tag, has been such that the company has revised that number upwards to 500.

Those bold enough to buy a K1 will be riders for whom the best Open-class sportbike isn’t necessarily the fastest, or the best handling, or, for that matter, the most expensive. They will be those looking for a sportbike alternative, something state of the art, wrapped in styling-studio bodywork, something that works wonderfully well, but is not soullessly perfect, and, perhaps most important of all, something that is magnificently different from anything else. If that’s what you’re looking for. then the K1 may be your bike. S

BMW K1

$12,990