Cheap, shoddily built tat!

markjackson

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After a pitiful 34 years and barely much more than 74,000 miles my (clearly shoddily built) ‘Ultimate Riding Machine’ broke, and had to be fixed with tape; Tape! :D

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Is it too late to consider a warranty claim?

I did consider using valuable tywraps to fix things, but I only had a few, whereas I had two full rolls of black tape, like a good ex-linesman!:thumb


Thankfully, half of the crap overloading the pannier seemed to be spare straps, so I was able to turn it into a nice fetching top-box. :p

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To be fair, it looks like the Panyan frames were modified by the factory not long after mine was built; putting a brace between them, when it became clear that some utterly foolish people would overload their boxes with tools and mothers' day crap then take it bouncing over rocky lanes, in search of snow and big puddles...

:blast :D

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Terrible quality. You must be well pissed off. Dam thing is barely run in.

Unbelievably my G/S (which is also 34 years old) blew its original headlamp bulb late last year. Utter junk.
 
With all these basic defects appearing so soon after leaving the factory should we be considering a class action lawsuit? :D


Although they maybe aren't that bad... of the 3 bikes I saw ridden all day one of them was pretending to be an Airhead (a new R9t thing) and the other was an actual Airhead GS, being so noisily and speedily ridden northbound on the A64 mid afternoon I can only assume it was Florence of this parish! :D:beerjug:
 
BMW wont pay up... you’ve fitted non standard parts (the number plate cannot be original as its got the dealers name etc)

As its obviously a knackered old wreck and not fit for purpose, if you tell me where and when I can come and take it off your hands and I will only charge you a cup of tea and a biscuit...... cant say fairer than that !

Ride safe
Bubb
 
Is the mud under the front mudguard also 34 years old?

Could carbon date to check before returning to 'ze fatherland'.
 
My G/S PD has done 448,000 km including one and a half RTW's and tip to tip of the Americas and Africa.
Carrier broke within weeks , was welded, braced and gusseted about half a dozen times before it would stand up to even a modest load with as much weight as possible on the single seat carrier, and soft bags as close in as possible. Giant loop get it right!
Never had knobby tires on it - I tried some on my Funduro and the rear D603 lasted 900km which would just about get me to the coffee shop for a week.
And wouldn't last as long as a tankful with the huge tanks some w------ fit.
Barum/Mitas E07s are just about universal with your actual long distance riders as 15/20,000- km is easily achievable - never seen anyone posting pictures on this site with a set!
 
Is the mud under the front mudguard also 34 years old?

Could carbon date to check before returning to 'ze fatherland'.


Sadly the 'Mud' under the front mudguard is actually the black plastic, as the paint has flaked off! :blast
 
Sadly the 'Mud' under the front mudguard is actually the black plastic, as the paint has flaked off! :blast

Okay, so when do you want me to come and drag this pile of shite away for you???
 
I haven't had a chance to clean her since getting home on Sunday, so there's probably only a pile of furry aluminium and some plastic bits in a pile in the garage now. :D
 
Barum/Mitas E07s are just about universal with your actual long distance riders as 15/20,000- km is easily achievable - never seen anyone posting pictures on this site with a set!

That's because the really groovy people run Mitas E-08 :green gri

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E08s are my tire of choice on my R100GS, but my GS is my road touring bike.
Suit me and my bike well but the only tire ever where I wear out two fronts to one rear! Rears last me around 7/8000 km, compared to the 15/18,000 km the E07s last on the R80G/S.
The E08 is a modern road tire carcass with the usual triangular fillet at the bead, extra layer under the tread and flexible sidewalls, etc, etc, coupled with a tread pattern on the rear which looks like a cut slick. Most off road tires are built on something a lot cruder. And stronger.
Work OK on hard pack gravel , but then most road tires do , but not as good as the E07 or Sahara 3 on anything more challenging.
So a good choice if you ride mainly bitumen with only the odd foray onto unsealed Macadam roads, but not tough enough to be a real ADV tire.
And mine wont hold air on the GS rims and need to be run with a tube, which you will probably discover if you ever go far enough to wear the nibs off the tires!
 
I'm no off-road rider really so the E08's just see the standard routes really.....then again here in Ireland, every road is like off-road !!
Those pics were a year ago so the nobs are well gone and no problems holding air. So far anyway !!! I had Sahara 3's on before these.
Would I use them again ? No way. I did like them except for the fact that you only have to look at them for the thread to start wearing.
And bloody expensive in this neck of the woods ! The Mitas, I find, are a good balance of price and longevity. I was really tempted by
the E07's but I wasn't sure about their wet weather grip. What's the verdict on the E07's regarding wet surfaces ? Do you even get rain
over there in Adelaide ?!?!?! ;)
 
Haven't had much so far this year, but we do have a wet season, usually from the end of April to Sept/ Oct.
The climate figures are not a lot different to my home town, Edinburgh. 28" of rain, January 38 average, July 58 average.
Main difference is our January temp is centigrade, not Fahrenheit and July is midwinter, not midsummer.
When I started using the E08s it was because Mitas did not have a 17" rear in the E07s. They now do, in Oz .
They didn't have a state distributor either, but didn't charge much more than wholesale so it was cheap enough to have a couple freighted in and fit them myself or Pay someone $50 to do it for me.
Now they have a distributor, but he has nil stock, charges twice as much as Mitas did, plus special shipping , and is an obnoxious prat!
And Mitas no longer supply direct, so I have to pay retail interstate, shipping and fit them myself!
So I have tried a few options, but for some reason my experiences here are sometimes a lot different to elsewhere in the world.
I just killed a rear on the Funduro in 900 km, some guys claim 10,000 miles out of the same tire. And yes , I had air in it!
The E08s dont last me as long as the Sahara 3s , and although I used to get great mileage out of the E07s they have softened them and the last set were worn out around 5000 km sooner than usual.
And they had squared off quicker too.
I have also read that there are now three grades of E07s in some parts of the world, and it might be that the latest version has a more modern tread compound and profile and is softer , grippier and with maybe even a bit better in the wet,.
But I never had any problems in the wet with the original super hard ones , much the same grip as the Sahara 3s.
 


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