Interesting experience at a repair shop

[schrader7032]

Joining the Airheads Beemer Club is certainly a good idea; even joining the email forum that is not directly attached to the ABC is a good idea...it's free. Most of the good tech gurus post there quite a bit. I have posted the link to the list of Airhead friendly shops many times here on our forum.

[RickR90s]

Sorry if I missed something in your post, but why would you think a R80 would feel as "powerful" as an R100?

All things being equal, more displacement always equals more power. (torque and hp)

[paulepeterson2000]

Yep, my anticipation probably got the best of me. The shop owner said the bike was only running on battery power, so very weak spark to the plugs. Sounded plausible to me at the time, but as an old guy probably getting gullible. I had just finished rebuilding the carbs, also including the newer float bowl setup and re-coating the inside of the fuel tank. Having it now start up with one press of the starter was just too much, so I happily rode off. Not sure what I could have done at that point. He also supposedly checked the valve clearances. I wonder if anything he did/did not do regarding taking off the valve covers could have caused the issue? I had checked the clearances myself many times in the past, sometimes replacing the gasket. Thanks to all for the helpful commentary.

[khittner]

Your engine damage resulted from the oil/filter change they did that you say you didn't ask for, not from valve cover removal/replacement for valve adjustment. Unless you get more pleasure from wrenching than riding, you may be better off with a newer bike of a marque (I know---heresy!) that's locally serviceable by the available dealerships or shops.

[paulepeterson2000]

Just an update for you. In December 2017 I had Re-Psycle build me a bottom end. Somewhat entertaining watching the UPS guy carry it up my long steep driveway, but he was young. Swapped bottom ends out with a group of Airheads Beemer guys, and I put the rest together. The engine runs strong. I am considering repairing the old bottom end as a long term hobby project.

[Andey]

Just an update for you. In December 2017 I had Re-Psycle build me a bottom end. Somewhat entertaining watching the UPS guy carry it up my long steep driveway, but he was young. Swapped bottom ends out with a group of Airheads Beemer guys, and I put the rest together. The engine runs strong. I am considering repairing the old bottom end as a long term hobby project.

Amazing you managed to get back on the road..! A 3 year update is a lengthy one!

[srankin]

In this month's BMWMOA magazine, Matt Parkhouse of the Keep em flying fame tells how he replaces, and rebuilds main bearings. He also has a photo of the tools he uses.

I always get peeved when I change my oil filters on my /7 bikes because of BMW's bone headed filter housing design. For a short time I had a 90S, the filter housing on that was far better designed. Leave it to BMW to decide to make things cheaper to build without a thought to the mechanics who have to work on them.

The motto of modern manufacturing should be "design to build fast cheap and sell for the most money". St.