Vintage BMW Motorcycle Owners

Thanks, Chuck! Now the trick will be to find one. Some units have the Veigel logo in script, as was the case on prewar product. As some point, they updated their logo to modern block lettering, as on the repops. The answer to whether my ‘51 should have the script logo is interesting to me as a desig...

Thanks, Kurt!

Here's what I found inside the old VDO unit I have:
I think I could fix it if I could get a replacement for the shredded brass gear. Probably not much hope for that though, right?

James and Vech, On the Veigel unit, it looks like there is a separate shift point "ring" that floats in front of the faceplate. If the ring is clamped into the bezel, it may be possible to rotate the speedo guts independently of the ring. This is definitely possible on the VDO unit I have ...

Thanks Ken and Vech!

Seems like a good plan would be to buy one of the reproduction units while continuing to search for a correct original unit.

Good to know Vech's knowledge is still available out there!


Cheers!

mh

I just got a nice reply from the guy at Barrington who is one of the authors of the book I linked to you. He said that my bike probably had a Veigel speedo, and his book lists the manufacturer/model #/markings and face styles, indexed to the year/model/gearing of the bike. I'm ordering the book now....

Hi Kurt! I noticed a link before - maybe this one - when I scoured the forum before. Too bad the info is no longer there - things have a way of getting lost on the interwebs. There's a book that includes various changes that happened during 4 years of the R51/3... something on the order of 8 rear fe...

Ken, good idea about contacting BMW Heritage. The Ebay dealer has a slew of "1951" R51/3. Some of them are really whacky and not even BMW parts - possibly they disassembled a "bitsa" based on a '51. For example, they have a headlight shell listed as 1951, but it's clearly a later...

Thanks, Ken - beyond the gear ratios, any advice on how to find out which speedo model that would have been installed on this particular bike? I've seen several different face styles on various R51/3 bikes - all VDO or Veigel - I think even one with a scripted Veigel logo from a guy in the UK with #...

Bike is: 1951 BMW R51/3 Frame # 525439 Solo gears 35/9 What is the factory correct speedometer? 1951 BMW May 10 2008 027.jpg The one that was with the bike when I bought it is a VDO 160 KMH IMG_7979.jpg Markings on housing: W 1.0 9,51 I'd like to fix this one if it might be original to the bike; or ...