Zen and the Reality of Motorcycle Repair
I just returned from the first long motorcycle trip I have taken with either of my two motorcycles. The 2019 BMW R1250GS Adventure was bought last year from old and recently incapacitated pal Lee Barba (no, he was not injured on a motorcycle, but rather while getting exercise on his racing bicycle). I now have 7,000+ miles on it, all from local day trips. My other “spare” or “guest” bike is a 2015 Kawasaki Versys 1000 on which I had racked up only about 1,200 miles before this recent ride. That bike now has almost 3,000 miles on the odometer. While I went on a great ride in Turkey in October, 2019 on a rented BMW R1250GS, we last did a domestic ride in May, 2019, and neither of these bikes made that trek.
Before this ride, I did the best I could as a non-gearhead to prepare the bikes for the ride. That meant that I looked at the tires and found them with plenty of tread, I filled the tires to the maximum pressure indicated, and I test rode the bikes and felt they were all performing quite well. I got no complaints from Chris, who rode the Kawasaki, and I, myself, had nothing to be concerned about regarding my bike during the trip either. While putting the bikes back up into the trailer and taking them out back here at home, I began thinking about their service history.
I don’t actually recall ever taking the Kawasaki in for service on Staten Island, where it sat for two years before I had the dealership ship it out here. they may have serviced it then, but I doubt it. Even then, that was three years ago. I didn’t even know where the Kawasaki dealership was out here, so I’m sure it hasn’t been serviced in at least those three years. The low mileage is no excuse since a sitting bike that is under-ridden is just as likely to take on problems as one racking up mileage.
As for the BMW, I did have it in for service and new tires not so long ago, but when I crossed over the 6,000 mile mark the bike started telling me to take it in for service. Just to be sure, I think I will do that for an abundance of caution and because that bike is the best bike I have ever owned and I prefer to keep it that way.
So, while driving back from Las Vegas last Friday, pulling my Ironhorse Trailer with the two bikes strapped down inside, I booked maintenance appointments for both. I know the BMW dealership very well, so that was a routine call for me and that is set for tomorrow. As for the Versys, the Kawasaki dealership told me that they only sold bikes and that I should call the Escondido Cycle Center to get it serviced. That struck me as unusual for several reasons. To begin with, from my brief experience as a part-owner of a BMW dealership, the money mostly got made not on new bike sales, but on service and especially warranty work. The other unusual thing is that I am entirely unclear if I would buy a bike from someone who was not willing and able to do the future servicing. That strikes me as a distinct sales disadvantage.
Today I took the Kawasaki over to the Cycle Center and checked it in for its “small service” as scheduled for 3,000 miles. The service guy filled out a bike condition checklist and rated both my tires and chain.sprocket as “Worn”. That is not “Unsafe”, but it is also not “Good”. I quickly looked up tire life for the bike on Google and found that 4,000 – 5,000 miles is the norm for original equipment tires. I think being at 3,000 miles already combined with the five-year-old nature of the tires made me think it would be better to be safe than sorry. So, I sprung for new tires thinking that my son and visiting friends ride that bike and better to have a new set of tires on it than to have to pay another visit to the Cycle Center. I rode the bike home this afternoon and must say that I could really feel the difference. I went with high-end road tires because although it is a dual-sport, I know I am unlikely to ever want to ride it off-road.
Tomorrow is BMW dealership day. Let’s see what they try to sell me on since it wasn’t that long ago that I was in for service. Generally, I trust the BMW of Escondido team. I like the sales guy, the parts guy and the service guy. I also like the owner, who seems to be a relatively straight-shooter. Unlike the Mercedes-Benz Escondido sales and service crews that I consider far less than reliable and competent, BMW Motorcycles in this town seem to be in luck with a good dealer.
I am capable of checking tire pressure and what I would call general and light repair work on my bikes, but with all the electronics and computer control systems involved with high-end bikes these days, I wouldn’t dare do anything beyond that for my own bike. When I was a kid first starting out on motorcycles, I could field-strip my Lambretta 50, my Ducati 50 and my Gilera 125. I could even do about half of the work needed on my Triumph TR6R Tiger 650. Two-strike and simple 4-stroke repair (anything north of the camshafts and gears) was part of the fun and requirement for motorcycling. Now a days, you can buy these magic diagnostic tools that read the systems and tell you what is needed. I know brother-in-law Jeff has one of those, but I always figured that while knowing what’s wrong has some value with an untrustworthy dealer trying to make-work on your bike, knowing isn’t fixing. Therefore, I choose to trust the dealer and perhaps pay the added price, but sleep better at night in the knowledge that I have not gotten too far out over my technical motorcycle repair skis.
I have noticed that there are two types of motorcyclists. There are those that like to fiddle with their bikes and upgrade this and that from stock and make the bike better in ways that give them street-cred with other riders. That is decidedly not me. The other type of rider is the person who just loves to ride and generally couldn’t give a damn about tinkering other than to the extent that he maintains a safe bike on which to ride. That is me. I love to ride and have no pride of gearheadedness. I will debate the merits of a road or a riding style or an on-the-road procedure (oh, say, like keeping the bike in gear whenever parked or stopped). That was a heated debate just this past ride as one bike was almost toppled by a lean (that was me doing the leaning onto my own Kawasaki that was sitting in Neutral), and a big BMW K1600 that rolled down a slope on the Burr Trail to its master since it too was not ready to sit still parked in Neutral. I could discuss that issue all day, but ask me about this type of suspension or that and I am lost.
Motorcycling to me is the truest form of Zen. I get into the zone when I am riding and I feel little or nothing and just turn into an instinctive beast that just does what it knows to do from 53 years of doing it. I know that a broken bike can derail my Karma, but I would rather try to stay in my Zen state and leave the fixing and the reality associated with motorcycle repair to those who enjoy it or do it for a living.