Saturday, September 1, 2007
It's About Time!
It's been almost 3 months since Peter's motorcycle met the acquaintance of the front side of a 17-year old girl's Saturn. And in the course of eight days, in an unprecedented act of God, the two of us managed to become involved in independent motorcycle accidents that would total two pristine, not-so-cheap BMW motorcycles. Well, that's what we thought until we heard the insurance company had other plans...
The estimate to repair Peter's bike was just shy of labeling her a total loss, so she was to be rebuilt from the ground up instead, replacing almost every major component you could think of including the frame, the entire front end, new plastics, and exhaust.
Once completely disassembled, she didn't resemble a motorcycle at all but rather a heap of parts. And it was only then, after the work had already commenced, that it was discovered many other parts were needed, likely qualifying the bike as a total loss after all. But with labor hours already accruing, the decision had already been set. With many of the parts not available anywhere in the U.S., "Chance" spent weeks strapped to a lift until one day UPS arrived with a slough of big boxes full of GT parts. It was like Christmas in July, only I certainly didn't envy the technician who had all that work before him.
The painstaking task of rebuilding her piece by piece fell upon BMW of Denver technician, James Lenard. After nearly 40 hours dedicated to making her good as new, James was finally ready to test ride his handiwork, but only after suiting up from top to bottom.
The estimate to repair Peter's bike was just shy of labeling her a total loss, so she was to be rebuilt from the ground up instead, replacing almost every major component you could think of including the frame, the entire front end, new plastics, and exhaust.
Once completely disassembled, she didn't resemble a motorcycle at all but rather a heap of parts. And it was only then, after the work had already commenced, that it was discovered many other parts were needed, likely qualifying the bike as a total loss after all. But with labor hours already accruing, the decision had already been set. With many of the parts not available anywhere in the U.S., "Chance" spent weeks strapped to a lift until one day UPS arrived with a slough of big boxes full of GT parts. It was like Christmas in July, only I certainly didn't envy the technician who had all that work before him.
Pictures: Peter and I discussed possibly making a time lapse video of the repair process, but the logistics proved to be too complicated. I did, however, manage to capture photos of some key moments.
The painstaking task of rebuilding her piece by piece fell upon BMW of Denver technician, James Lenard. After nearly 40 hours dedicated to making her good as new, James was finally ready to test ride his handiwork, but only after suiting up from top to bottom.
Videos: Tuesday, August 28th, 2007. BMW of Denver technician, James Lenard in full gear cautiously test rides the newly rebuilt "Chance" sans side panels.
Returning to the dealership.
With my pending trip to Seattle just weeks away I became increasingly nervous as they hit more snags in the rebuild. After over a week of missed promise dates, I was also getting pretty irritated. BMW of Denver wasn't willing to release the bike until it spent a full day being test ridden by a few of the technicians as well as Bob Creger, the General Manager. But I guess I'd rather be safe than sorry. Over $14,000 later, she is finally complete! On Friday, August 31st, "Chance" was deemed ride-ready and was released to my care. There is still some baked-on bug splatter on the remaining original panels that I'll try to scrub off, but she looks pretty and she rides like a champ. I wonder if I was to slap a GT decal on "Beasty" (my Yamaha 650) if Peter would notice. It has been 3 months, afterall.
Labels: rebuild, repair, test ride
Comments:
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sounds pretty good to me. you sure you're up for such a long trip?! nah, I'm excited you're back on a decent bike.
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