BlueSky

No input from cowpuc yet? He must have the tears wiped from his eyes by now!

It's not a Venture. It's a Stratoliner!

Perhaps the low mileage tells the story. They haven't been ridden much. Not unusual at all for motorcycles to not be ridden much and then the owner sells rather than keep paying insurance and suffering depreciation or making payments in one of those situations. One owner did say he was in the military and was being transferred as his reason. When I bought my 85 Kawasaki in 2009, it had 1k miles on it. When I bought my 89 Venture in 2014, it had 6k miles on it. The drawback to buying a BMW in my opinion is that they are expensive, parts and labor are very expensive and overall I don't think they are as reliable as a Japanese bike. The good part is that the engineering is top notch. I've never test driven a BMW auto because I've been afraid I would buy it! LOL!

I bought my first bike in 1971. Almost immediately afterwards I bought a Sears impact driver that I still revere. Recently, I bought JIS 5/16" shank bits for it from Vessel Tools. Priceless tool!

I looked on craigslist and found a 2014 BMWK1600GTL with 4200 miles for $16,500 and a 2014 with 4900 miles for $15,500. Lusting!

The BMW K1600GTL is as close to the perfect touring bike as you can get in my opinion. I'd love to have one. Bring More Wallet! And it weighs about 200lbs less than the new Stratoliner.

Give Skydoc a shout. He sells a rear caliper for the MKII that has the bleed valve on top. I'm sure he can tell you if it works on the MKI.

I suppose cowpuc hasn't calmed down enough to comment on the forum yet. Riding all the way there to see the historic unveiling of a new Venture with the Vmax engine and being disappointed is a real bummer.

I can understand why they went to a V-twin, much much cheaper and trying to pick off some Harley sales, not BMW or Honda. But, I cannot understand why they didn't use water cooling. At least Kawasaki added water cooling to the Voyager. I know air cooled bikes CAN last a long time. I recently talked to a Harley owner who had over 180k miles on his. He did a lot of touring but he said he never rode over 65 mph even out west. I don't want a bike that I have to baby to get it to last.

A while back I read an old internet article about the Los Angeles Sheriff's dept test of new potential police bikes. One or two of them were Harleys. One thing that really stuck to my memory was that the specifications provided by Harley for acceptable oil temperature was 410 degrees F. That is a mind numbing temp for oil in my opinion and completely rules out a heavy touring bike with an air cooled engine. How long would one last with Puc running across the desert at 100 mph? He would need new engines about as often as new tires.

Stratoliner engine instead of a VMax engine:95:

It's a beautiful bike I admit. But I'd never buy an air cooled touring bike. I don't think the Honda Goldwing or the BMW 1600 have any competition from this one.

Air cooled! Just what Puc needs to tour the southwest desert! NOT!!!!

I hate screw extractors. I think every time I've used one it broke off and as I remember I ended up replacing the part the bolt was stuck in. I hope you can grind the bolt head off!

Most of us have subjective opinions about everything including oil. The only reason I posted about the FJR1300 owner is that he gets his oil lab tested and his opinion is not subjective, but based on the lab report. Like I said, for what it's worth.

Nice to see those First Gens!

Compression will not be affected by the carbs not seated properly. To get a good compression reading, the throttle has to be open when checked. If the carbs are off the bike, the compression can be tested accurately. http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-8Pc-Spark-Plug-Cylinder-Compression-Tester-Test-Kit-Professional-Gas-Engine-/332155770002?_trksid=p2385738.m2548.l4275

For what it's worth, there is a member of the Kawasaki forum who rides a Yamaha FJR1300 bought new and the last I heard it had over 90k miles on it. Anyway, he's anal about maintenance and gets the oil lab tested to make sure how long it can be used. He said the Rotella oil didn't last very long in his bike. He uses Valvoline synthetic.

Remove the plug. Put it back into the spark plug cap and ground the body of the plug against the engine with the engine running. You should see a spark at the spark plug gap. If you have spark, it might be worthwhile to do a compression test on the engine. To do so, remove all plugs and hold the throttle open when checking the compression. A good compression test number will assure you that there is no mechanical problem.

Glad she is okay! And thanks for posting this. It's a good reminder for all of us to be careful out there. Trajedy can occur at any moment.

Looks like you are okay with that tire according to the sidewall. Just made me wonder after looking up the Challenger. Surely wouldn't want anything bad happen to our National Treasures, Puc, Tippy, and Tweeksis!

That Kenda surely does look like a beefy tire. Report back on how it performs and wears.

Is windows 10 worse than Google for mining data?

[quote=BTW I've been told that once you use a synthetic don't go back to a dino oil. Not sure why exactly but thought I'd mention it. Lots of old mechanics tales about "synthetic" oil vs dino. You can mix and match whatever meets the spec and be okay. Switch back and forth if you want and it's okay.