R1200 GSA Handguard issue

[Anonymous]

#4197

Hi guysSome of you will have seen a post about seven weeks ago revealing my unfortunate attack of loss of traction and gravity issue which resulted in some fairly serious bodily damage to both machine and rider.For many weeks now I have been mulling over the fact that I went down without any warning,I had no time to react at all, I just simply went down like a sack of spuds onto the freshly graded gravel repair in the road at very low speed.I had put the blame entirely on the fact that the repair was 300mm deep of dry metal which had not been soaked and rollered and therefore that was why the front wheel dug into it so deeply and pitched me off.One thing that has always bugged me though was the fact that prior to being pitched off, as I rolled off the gas to prepare to cross the gravel section the bike lost power and felt like it was being starved of fuel so I knocked it down a cog and gave the throttle a blip, this made it worse as I rolled the throttle off again and at that point I came off the tar seal and onto the metal and the rest is history. I have a friend staying with me at the moment who knows me better than I know myself and he made a statement when he heard I had had a serious off, which prompted me to look a bit deeper into the accident, Phil said, " I have known you long enough to know that with your experience you would have had time to react and take evasive action at such a low speed, are you sure it wasn't a problem with the bike"At first I just shrugged it off but then I thought back to something I said at the dealership as I dropped the wounded bike off before going to hospital.I noted that the brake light was permanently on and thought that maybe some grit had jammed up the rear brake light switch........the dealer said it was most likely the front brake lever was fouling the handgard and operating the switch and this would have happened as a result of the contact with the ground.Well yesterday I did a bit of research and it seems that I have been yet another victim of a BMW design fault and I feel I have to share this in case anyone else falls prey to the same issue. If you own a R1200GS or GSA that falls in between the manufacturing dates of the information in the following link I suggest you replace your hangards for the latest specification ones to avoid the possibility of a serious accident.http://www.webbikeworld.com/BMW-motorcycles/r-1200-gs-hand-guard-problem/My Machine is a 2006 GSAMy stupidity was to ignore an ABS warning light on the dash, which I figured was just an electronic glitch on a machine that I had just purchased.I could have avoided all this pain and insurance cost by just simply twisting the handguard away from the brake lever.The warning light had been on since I left the ferry at wellington and I suspect that the additional strap that a helpfull ferry employee put over the RH handle bar to give the bike a bit more stability altered the angle of the hanguard.My lack of experience with electronic wizardry lead me to discount the warning light as something I would have to sort out when I got the bike home ......I got that wrong.Why BMW didn't recall all of these machines and replace the handguards is beyond me, the best they could offer was to provide an advisory sticker to put inside the guard. ( mine didn't have one, and even if it did,I would not have been aware of the serious consequences that could prevail if the angle of the guard was altered by a few degrees.

[Anonymous]

#17385

I believe it was a recall for those era bikes? Up to the owner whether it gets done of course…I'd suggest you replace the levers as well, if they're similar to the '10. I had a decent off and the lever snapped off INSIDE the perch... which meant an entire master cylinder unit was required - something in the vicinity of $1k. I've put on cheap levers from Ebay, folding, extendable and adjustable, to hopefully take the pressure should something like that happen again.

[Anonymous]

#17386

I will certainly address the lever situation Gremlin, when I get the bike back I will post a picture on here and maybe you can advise if they look the same as your originals.Perhaps you would then let me know the model/Type to order off ebay as replacements.My main reason for making this post was to bring the problem to the attention of anyone else with one of these machines and make them aware of the catastrophic consequences this design fault could lead to, if someone hasn't already died as a result of this I would be very surprised, I wonder how many crash investigators would even take any notice of the position of the handguard on a machine that had gone down on the right hand side,given that the rest of the bike would have a fair amount of other bent parts on that side too. They may note that the ABS system check failed when the ignition was turned on, but they would also note that as soon as the handguard was moved to the correct position the system check completed sucessfully. Even if the bike left them a nice black rubber line on the road they could conclude that the rider may have grabbed a handfull of front brake, (Although this may lead them to suspect that the ABS malfunctioned and persuade them to dig deeper)What if the front hanguard was completley munted in the accident and the front brake was now free and the system check completed faultlessly !!!I wonder how many guys have come to grief simply as a result of knocking the handguard against a tree branch, or leaning on it when putting a boot or a waterproof leggings on!I am to say the least very dissapointed that I didn't stick to "my old fart policy" which has stood me in good stead throughout my life with regards to things mechanical....."KISS"..."Keep It Simple Stupid". It seems ironic that the very thing that was supposed to make my riding experience a lot safer and compensate for any errors of judgment in road conditions I may encounter, was the very thing that could have ended my life !!!!Is there anything else I should be aware of !!!!!! ( I know about the fuel pump issue and will be carrying the necessary bypass cable to to prevent me from being stranded in the middle of nowhere at some ungodly hour in the pouring rain)RegardsRincewind

[Dave Ross]

#17387

Just to see if I got this right. Your hand guard had shifted at some stage and ended up applying pressure to your brake lever. When you hit the soft gravel it was enough to lock the front wheel and you went down?  Does your bike have the ppwer brakes as well? That hand guard problem has been around for a while. It really does pay to investigate when a warning light comes on. It obviously a stupid design. I've been caught out riding someone's R1200GS on rough ground, to help the person out after they'd dropped the bike. The hand guard had also shifted and this caused the power brakes to stop working. It's not nice to go down hill in a rut, with no feel in brakes.I am surprised some one in the States has sued them to high heaven.

[Anonymous]

#17388

You're in Auckland ain't cha?I've got a spare set and we can compare side by side if you like, I'll bring the bike round, just let me know when you get it back and we'll T something up. You can have a look at the levers, see if they suit you etc.I think they're different between 06 and 10... but I just went on Ebay and searched for my year, folding extendable... scotch that, same levers I think. One such example: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Adjustable-Folding-Extendable-Brake-Clutch-Levers-BMW-K1200-R1200-Black-/310395318303?pt=UK_Motorcycle_Parts&hash=item484500b01f You can choose colours to suit etc.

[Anonymous]

#17389

You're in Auckland ain't cha?I've got a spare set and we can compare side by side if you like, I'll bring the bike round, just let me know when you get it back and we'll T something up. You can have a look at the levers, see if they suit you etc.I think they're different between 06 and 10... but I just went on Ebay and searched for my year, folding extendable... scotch that, same levers I think. One such example: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Adjustable-Folding-Extendable-Brake-Clutch-Levers-BMW-K1200-R1200-Black-/310395318303?pt=UK_Motorcycle_Parts&hash=item484500b01f You can choose colours to suit etc.

Thanks Gremlin,yes I am on the shore in Albany, and that would be a great help.I won't get the bike back now untill the new year but as soon as I get it back I will PM you and pick your brains!!!I can't believe that with all the research I did before buying this bike that I didn't come across anything about this issue. I can kick myself with my good leg for ignoring the warning light and I feel like a right dumb prick for not realising why the bike was down on power, however I had only had 7 Hrs in the saddle and the first four and a half were perfect and as I bought it off Trademe I just figured I'd bought someone elses trouble.

[Anonymous]

#17390

Just to see if I got this right. Your hand guard had shifted at some stage and ended up applying pressure to your brake lever. When you hit the soft gravel it was enough to lock the front wheel and you went down?  Does your bike have the ppwer brakes as well? That hand guard problem has been around for a while. It really does pay to investigate when a warning light comes on. It obviously a stupid design. I've been caught out riding someone's R1200GS on rough ground, to help the person out after they'd dropped the bike. The hand guard had also shifted and this caused the power brakes to stop working. It's not nice to go down hill in a rut, with no feel in brakes.I am surprised some one in the States has sued them to high heaven.

Your Spot on there,I was realy Stupid to ignore the warning light but I figured it was an ABS failure and that there was some sort of safety latch in operation allowing me to continue without the function.The front brake could have only partialy been applied and while I was driving hard up the SHWY the power of the forward motion was overcomming the resistance of the friction on the rotors.It was only when I approached the roadworks in third gear that the bike started to stuggle noticably as I came off the throttle and back on again,so I knocked it down a cog,when It didn't respond in second I pulled the clutch in and the motor revved freely,so I dropped into first just as I left the last bit of tar seal and entered the gravel, I didn't stand a chance the bike just dug in as the front wheel locked up and pitched over spontaneously as there was no friction between the tyre and the road surface.At the time I just thought I had come off because the roadworkers had put too much deep metal down without rollering and wetting it. I also of course questioned my riding ability !I am so angry that a machine that is in essence 6 years old, and has been dealer serviced from new that this issue was never addressed by either of the previous two owners, or indeed BMW Motorad in Wellington or Christchurch where it had its last service just a couple of weeks before I bought it.

[Anonymous]

#17391

You woulda thunk, given the trouble this fault can cause, that BMW would have tried harder to get all the affected machines, world wide, fixed. As Rincewind describes, new technology can be confounding and confusing, and warning lights that will send a clear message to those with the background knowledge to interpret them are just a big X for unknown to riders new to the machine. (My bro-in-law with his Duke Multistrada that still hasn't played with the various engine modes springs to mind.)I never really begrudged the money I spent to keep my second Beemer - R-eleven-hundy-ess - on the road: everything I had to pay to fix was a (to me) known issue with the model before I bought it, and it was just such a fun toy, that was the price I had to pay to enjoy it. But to be trapped by a fault you don't know about is a financial pain: to be hurt as badly as Rincewind was is more pain than you need to get to know your bike.And to discover that Stella is not as efficacious as bona fide pharmaceuticals for pain management is a cruel life lesson indeed!

[Anonymous]

#17392

I believe it was a recall for those era bikes? Up to the owner whether it gets done of course...

I have spoken to both previous owners of the machine,The bike was purchased new from Motoraad in Wellington and the buyer was never made aware of the issue,the bike then passed on to the next owner who had the bike serviced recently at Motoraad in CHCH,he was also not made aware of the issue. It would seem very few people are aware of this problem, which is pretty dire realy, I guess someone has to die first before someone in Germany decides to issue a world recall notice. I have looked at the recall history on these machines and there is no mention anywhere of the hand guard problem.Wouldn't it have been a good idea to have had it out in the open so that people who were researching the bike prior to purchasing could at least keep it bubbling to the surface.It would have certainly saved me from all this bloody pain and trauma. It is I agree up to each individual owner to decide if they feel it is a risk worth taking, and to be honest if you are aware of the issue your half way towards it never being an issue....but if you don't pass the info on when you sell the bike and the new purchaser has never heard of the issue, that is where the danger lies.

[Anonymous]

#17393

Wouldn't it have been a good idea to have had it out in the open so that people who were researching the bike prior to purchasing could at least keep it bubbling to the surface.

Need to look at it from BMW's point of view. They're german, they designed it brilliantly and there is no problem. If you think there is a problem, it's because you did it wrong  ??? Only have to look at the joys of FD experience in the USA (and it's finally getting traction with their authorities). When you get to know parts better, you can see the handguards are only one of several items which have problems (FD, ABS, Headlight, handguards etc) where it takes a monumental shift before BMW will actually admit a problem and issue a recall...

[Anonymous]

#17394

Well in my book they get a "Must try harder" I am not looking for compensation or an apology, I bought into the 1200gs after having a great experience with my 1150gs,which at this present moment I rather wishI had kept.My only wish by going as public as possible is to try and leave an electronic footprint for anyone who cares to look,which is actually more than BMW have done.AMEN

[Anonymous]

#17395

My only wish by going as public as possible is to try and leave an electronic footprint for anyone who cares to look,which is actually more than BMW have done.AMENWell said Rince, someone needs to be made accountable at BMW HO. As you have said in the past we don't want to lose one of our own to a stupid little cheap fix. Blimey, in this day and age of technology why not use our own forum to alert owners. I'm currently running the K1200GT locked (Experience BMW - thanks Seb) on two up with luggage in sport mode because the ESA is kaput and way too expensive to repair. If anyone currently residing in heaven reads this then please come back to me quickly and I'll get Frau Baron to put in a few more hours at work to cover the repair. In the mean time fingers crossed it behaves itself mid corner  :-[  Get well soon Rince  8)

[Dave Ross]

#17396

Those loaded bikes are nice while new and under warranty. A few years down the track nobody wants them, for the same reason that nobody wants an older luxury car. That's why I like my R80GS, no depreciation and for what I save, I can buy some good parts for it.  The 1150 has been good, too, but only because I've had for 10 years and have done lots of k's on it. If you want to afford it, no worries, we can't take it with us. But if you can't it pays to think twice. At the end of the day (what a nice phrase), all you really need is two wheels and a bit of time to actually use them.  I sometimes look at my two bike and think to myself "would you be happier if they were brand new? The answer has been no, but I would be happier if I had more time to ride.

[Anonymous]

#17397

I'm hoping it's a case of mistaken identity, but does someone have Rincewind's number?I believe it could be his bike back in Experience again, after another incident, possibly involving a car...If it is him, pass on my thoughts, poor bugger is in the wars...

[Anonymous]

#17398

Yes, it will be his bike, and he and his wife are very badly hurt.I understand that just at the moment they prefer to keep a bit of distance between them and the biking fraternity, which I find entirely understandable and will respect. Please don't quiz me, I only know they are hurt, so can't provide details

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