BMW R 100R

BMW R 100R

So what did BMW do? It found some rounded-off valve covers trendy some 40 years ago — good start — but then furnished their new old timer with Japanese Showa suspension (a first) and eight Brembo pistons biting on a pair of floating discs (a radical departure). There are also 40mm Bing carbs, an emissions afterburning circuit, Paralever and a socket into which sophisticated electronic diagnostic equipment can be plugged. Out popped the R100R; the most advanced boxer-powered BMW in its 69 year history. Result: future retro? Something strange at any rate.

Unofficially, all the horizonatally opposed flat-twins (the Rs, aka boxers) are retro bikes anyway. Someone needed to say it out loud, that's all, which, with a liquid-cooled four-valve flat-twin due to launch next year, BMW can now do — cashing in on the stampede for modern classics in the process. There is, however, more to the R100R than a junked fairing and wire wheels. At 20 paces it's a random bitsa, at ten it's a R100GS trailie wearing street running gear and chrome. Not quite Supermotard but not full-blown retro either.

That monolith beneath the tank is 980cc of Paris-Dakar inspired GS motor and five-speed gearbox. It gets GS big-bore carbs (other street Rs have 32mm Bings) and a smidgen more torque than the R100RS/RT — 60 snoozey bhp at 6500rpm, 56 fat lb.ft at just 3750rpm. The double-loop steel frame is GS, too: same laid-back wheelbase (longer than street Rs), same trailie rake and trail but with 18 and 17 inch wheels, road suspension and narrow bars (because the suffix R is for "road").

The forks, so often too long and soft on BMWs, are not only Japanese but have recalculated spring and damping rates over much reduced travel  135mm compared to the R100RS' 175mm. The rear unit has a longer than normal stroke but is adjustable for rebound damping as well as preload. GS/K1 Paralever, the double-jointed swing-arm/drive shaft which effectively reduces torque-induced pitching, finds its way onto a pure-roads R for the first time. It has the lowest of all BMW seat heights and only the plain R80 weighs less fuelled up — and that hasn't a capacious 24 litre tank swiped from a GS and given a golden oldie amethyst paint job.