Look at that rats nest cluster of unnecessary wires & garbage BMW managed to fling onto a bike that is “supposed” to be able to go anywhere. Adventure bike my ass. It weighs 549 lbs wet. You take that off the beaten trail too far and you’re a glutton for punishment.

Having to remove a gastank to remove a dead battery is an indicator that your designers smoke crack.

This is why zee Germans lost the war. Unnecessary mess like this.

That and B-17s.

What year GS is that? I had an '89 and currently have a 2006, and certainly never had to mess with the fuel tank to remove the battery.

It's hard to have a heart when you've got to pop a gas tank to get at a battery, but try to have some compassion. If there's one raging curse that BMWs - motorcycles, cars or airplanes - just never managed to shake, it's electrical and wiring gremlins.

And I mean they suuuuuck. Especially since everything else tends to work pretty damned well forever.

Years ago a did a bunch of work of two Porsches that belonged to friends of mine. I'd still like to sit down with one of their engineers and have him try explain some things to me.

"I can see WHY you did that, but I don't understand why you'd WANT it to do that?" (Like make it so if the oil pump seized up, the engine could keep running. Seems like you went through a lot of extra effort to allow something to happen that you wouldn't want to be allowed to happen!)

Honestly it doesn't look bad to me. Nor like a rats nest to me. Just about any m/c I've seen, removing the gas tank is almost always among the simplest things you can do to one.

And where else on a motorcycle are those connectors going to generally be drier?

quote:

Originally posted by cas:
Years ago a did a bunch of work of two Porsches that belonged to friends of mine. I'd still like to sit down with one of their engineers and have him try explain some things to me.

"I can see WHY you did that, but I don't understand why you'd WANT it to do that?" (Like make it so if the oil pump seized up, the engine could keep running. Seems like you went through a lot of extra effort to allow something to happen that you wouldn't want to be allowed to happen!)

$25 spring valve to retain gasoline in the tank in case of rollover. If it actuates you cannot put gas in the tank.

$1200 in labor to tear everything apart to get to it.

Spark plug number two requires a specialized wrench.

Oil change in turbos is 50% more

Yeah if you think thats bad don't ever get into Can-Am SxS. Ain't anything easy to get to.

quote:

Originally posted by 83v45magna:
Honestly it doesn't look bad to me. Nor like a rats nest to me. Just about any m/c I've seen, removing the gas tank is almost always among the simplest things you can do to one.

And where else on a motorcycle are those connectors going to generally be drier?

Ummm maybe under the effing seat where Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki and Yamaha somehow all collectively realized was an obvious place to put a battery…


For the record removing a gas tank isn’t incredibly hard to do but it involves quite a few more unnecessary steps to follow and IMO it shouldn’t be necessary for something as trivial as putting in a new battery.

quote:

Originally posted by stickman428:


Having to remove a gastank to remove a dead battery is an indicator that your designers smoke crack.

This is why zee Germans lost the war. Unnecessary mess like this.

That same design team went to work for HK.
They managed to make a striker fired pistol with more parts (VP9) than a DA/SA (USP).

CanBus!

quote:

This is why zee Germans lost the war. Unnecessary mess like this.

Quite a bit of truth in that, Germany built some bad ass tanks in WW2, Tiger, Panzer, in combat we'd lose 10 tanks to their 1, hellofa design, 80mm cannon, stronger steel, magnificent specimens of engineering design.

Problem was, while they built 10,000 tanks, the US cranked out 250,000 tanks.

You can be the strongest guy in the room, but 1000 people bum rush you and you'll lose.

I've wrenched on Porsches and BMWs (bikes and cars) for many years. I don't think they're too bad. There's definitely a method AND mindset to the madness. Once you get it, a lot of other stuff makes sense. Porsche's design work has some of the engineers' arrogance built into it. It's almost like they want it to be difficult to modify stuff they think they got right the first time. BMW is a little more forgiving here.

I can't remember if my K1200R came stock with quick disconnects for the tank or the previous owner added them. But, as long as the tank isn't full, it was pretty easy to remove it and not make a mess.

quote:

Originally posted by stickman428:
Adventure bike my ass. It weighs 549 lbs wet. You take that off the beaten trail too far and you’re a glutton for punishment.

I made a similar comment last night to my wife.
Commercial for the Ducati Multistrada V4
$20k & 530lbs. Doubtful any of those will see anything but pavement.

quote:

Look at that rats nest cluster of unnecessary wires & garbage BMW managed to fling onto a bike that is “supposed” to be able to go anywhere. Adventure bike my ass. It weighs 549 lbs wet. You take that off the beaten trail too far and you’re a glutton for punishment.

Having to remove a gastank to remove a dead battery is an indicator that your designers smoke crack.

Just be happy SAAB didn't build that motorcycle...

A friend almost bought a 2019 Honda CB300R for his wife. But then found out the battery was under the gas tank. No bueno did not buy it. He could believe Honda did that.

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:

quote:

This is why zee Germans lost the war. Unnecessary mess like this.

Quite a bit of truth in that, Germany built some bad ass tanks in WW2, Tiger, Panzer, in combat we'd lose 10 tanks to their 1, hellofa design, 80mm cannon, stronger steel, magnificent specimens of engineering design.

Problem was, while they built 10,000 tanks, the US cranked out 250,000 tanks.

You can be the strongest guy in the room, but 1000 people bum rush you and you'll lose.

Yep. Not only were German vehicles unnecessarily complex and overly costly/time-intensive to produce, they were also notoriously underpowered and unreliable.

Well there's your problem, they attached a bicycle seat to the battery.

I recall when you bought that GS Stickman. I had the same R1150GS, in fact it was the same color, I bought mine in 2000 or maybe 2001. It was one of those bikes I never really bonded with though and sold it after a few years. My biggest issues were it was geared too tall (especially 1st gear), too heavy, and constant surging under light throttle that I could never get rid of. I was also concerned about final drive failure which that generation was prone to. OTOH with an aftermarket seat it did make for a comfortable and relaxing highway tourer.
As far as replacing the battery, which I did right before selling it, I simply removed the two rear tank bolts, propped the rear of the tank up, and removed the battery.