Another year on an R27
Posted: Tue May 30, 2023 9:39 pm
Last May I rode a freshly recommissioned R27 on a Motogiro, a spirited 300 miles over two days through mountainous back roads. I wrote about it on this forum (viewtopic.php?f=7&t=17519), and in the Summer 2022 VBMWMO magazine. The bike had only been on the road for a few months at the time, after sitting for almost 40 years. The little single was fairly well sorted and I was confident it’d finish the ride intact, but I had no idea how capable it would prove to be. What I’d expected to be a quirky toy had quickly become my favorite bike ever.
I put another thousand miles on the R27 after the Motogiro when some some leaks began, and the main seal and pushrod seals needed to be replaced. The initial recommissioning work was limited, just to get it back on the road, when I was thinking it’d get ridden a few hundred miles a year. No engine or transmission work, only a new wiring harness, wheel bearings, tires, suspension and all the usual rubber parts.
The odometer said 10,000 miles when I got it, but I don’t know the history before about 1976, when it was last ridden regularly. It had a few oddball parts, like mismatched levers and a later-model throttle perch. It also had heavily ground down center stand feet, likely from vibrating at idle on concrete. All a little weird for the mileage - who knows if it was correct, or what it went through for those first 10 years?
I decided to do the right thing and get the engine rebuilt. I was fortunate to find a small shop not far away that could do the work, and even more fortunate that the only issues were a fairly full slinger and iffy bearings, all replaced along with the cam chain. Another few thousand dollars invested, and the bike has cost me well more than I could sell it for, but it’s been worth every penny. I’m not a rich guy, but I’m proud to know this R27 is ready for its second 60 years.
I got the bike back just in time for another Motogiro, this time in the Berkshires of Western Massachusetts. I loaded it on a borrowed trailer, and headed north out of Virginia.
Like a lot of you, I’m really interested in the bike’s history. While I’m missing about a decade of my bike’s story, thanks to the BMW archives and a faded dealer label, I know it’s beginning. Built in 1964, it was delivered to Butler & Smith in New York in early 1965. It’s titled as a ‘66, the year it was first sold and registered in New Jersey. On the front mudguard is a splotch of white, and if you squint just right you can see the name Hecky’s Cycle Shop. Some research shows this was a small Triumph and BMW dealer operating in Glendora, New Jersey, throughout the ‘60s, owned by a George Heck.
My route from Virginia to the Motogiro in Massachusetts would just happen to take me right past Glendora, and a 10 minute detour found me in front of a hairdresser’s at 1001 Black Horse Pike, a small white building that used to be Hecky’s. I don’t name vehicles. I know they are machines, and that their personalities are mostly carb tuning and imagination. But I have a good imagination, and I think my R27 appreciated the visit. Motogiros are loose competitions based on Italian races of the 1950s, limited to smaller displacement motorcycles from the late 1960s or earlier, with extra classes for sidecars and scooters. The big draw is that they cover hundreds of miles of the best (and worst) back roads, navigated with simple route sheets. I rode 400 miles in Massachusetts this year, including a few wrong turns. Between the tight roads, sketchy weather and long climbs, that’s about 12 hours of saddle time over two days. There were lots of Japanese bikes, capacity is maxed at 305cc so Honda Scramblers, Dreams and Super Hawks are popular choices. A few Italian bikes added some color, along with some Brits and one lone Italian-American Harley. Three other R27s competed as well, all shinier than my weathered bike. I was fortunate to ride alongside each of them several times over the weekend, and was impressed with how evenly matched we were for speed and gumption up the hills. There were some other German bikes too, including at least two NSUs, and while the displacement restrictions mostly limited BMW to the singles, the sidecar class had two more, a white 1960 R69 rig and a K-bike rig. Like last year’s event, the R27 ran flawlessly through pouring rain, over miles and miles of dirt roads, up steep climbs and down twisty descents. Frost heaves and potholes were the worst of the obstacles, violently bottoming out the front suspension a few times. The single never coughed or sputtered, it purred like a new bike with a few rattles, and finished as strong as it started. The engine rebuild was an absolute success.
Unlike last year’s event, I wasn’t surprised at how well it went, but I was still impressed! An oil change, a fresh rear tire, and a good cleaning and the bike is ready for more.
The odometer said 10,000 miles when I got it, but I don’t know the history before about 1976, when it was last ridden regularly. It had a few oddball parts, like mismatched levers and a later-model throttle perch. It also had heavily ground down center stand feet, likely from vibrating at idle on concrete. All a little weird for the mileage - who knows if it was correct, or what it went through for those first 10 years?
I decided to do the right thing and get the engine rebuilt. I was fortunate to find a small shop not far away that could do the work, and even more fortunate that the only issues were a fairly full slinger and iffy bearings, all replaced along with the cam chain. Another few thousand dollars invested, and the bike has cost me well more than I could sell it for, but it’s been worth every penny. I’m not a rich guy, but I’m proud to know this R27 is ready for its second 60 years.
I got the bike back just in time for another Motogiro, this time in the Berkshires of Western Massachusetts. I loaded it on a borrowed trailer, and headed north out of Virginia.
Like a lot of you, I’m really interested in the bike’s history. While I’m missing about a decade of my bike’s story, thanks to the BMW archives and a faded dealer label, I know it’s beginning. Built in 1964, it was delivered to Butler & Smith in New York in early 1965. It’s titled as a ‘66, the year it was first sold and registered in New Jersey. On the front mudguard is a splotch of white, and if you squint just right you can see the name Hecky’s Cycle Shop. Some research shows this was a small Triumph and BMW dealer operating in Glendora, New Jersey, throughout the ‘60s, owned by a George Heck.
My route from Virginia to the Motogiro in Massachusetts would just happen to take me right past Glendora, and a 10 minute detour found me in front of a hairdresser’s at 1001 Black Horse Pike, a small white building that used to be Hecky’s. I don’t name vehicles. I know they are machines, and that their personalities are mostly carb tuning and imagination. But I have a good imagination, and I think my R27 appreciated the visit. Motogiros are loose competitions based on Italian races of the 1950s, limited to smaller displacement motorcycles from the late 1960s or earlier, with extra classes for sidecars and scooters. The big draw is that they cover hundreds of miles of the best (and worst) back roads, navigated with simple route sheets. I rode 400 miles in Massachusetts this year, including a few wrong turns. Between the tight roads, sketchy weather and long climbs, that’s about 12 hours of saddle time over two days. There were lots of Japanese bikes, capacity is maxed at 305cc so Honda Scramblers, Dreams and Super Hawks are popular choices. A few Italian bikes added some color, along with some Brits and one lone Italian-American Harley. Three other R27s competed as well, all shinier than my weathered bike. I was fortunate to ride alongside each of them several times over the weekend, and was impressed with how evenly matched we were for speed and gumption up the hills. There were some other German bikes too, including at least two NSUs, and while the displacement restrictions mostly limited BMW to the singles, the sidecar class had two more, a white 1960 R69 rig and a K-bike rig. Like last year’s event, the R27 ran flawlessly through pouring rain, over miles and miles of dirt roads, up steep climbs and down twisty descents. Frost heaves and potholes were the worst of the obstacles, violently bottoming out the front suspension a few times. The single never coughed or sputtered, it purred like a new bike with a few rattles, and finished as strong as it started. The engine rebuild was an absolute success.
Unlike last year’s event, I wasn’t surprised at how well it went, but I was still impressed! An oil change, a fresh rear tire, and a good cleaning and the bike is ready for more.