Have a good weekend on your BMWs. Yup, right down to the bore X stroke of the Bandit. Look it up. To the very mm.
Actually I'm taking the Strom on Sat and the FJR on Sun. But thanks for the thought.
I guess if my lawnmower and motorcycle have the same bore and stroke, then their engines are "virtually identical". (Actually the reason the Bandit 1200 and K1200 engines have similar bore/stroke is because they're both 1200 inilne-fours and these days bore/stroke ratios of all motorcycle engines have converged to similar values.) And little details like the fact the Bandit is air-cooled and the K1200 is water-cooled are inconsequential? That one is a lay-down four and the other is an upright four? That one is carb'd and the other is FI'ed? That one has a five-speed box and the other six? That one is a chain-drive output and the other has a shaft? Yep, none of this stuff matters - they have the same bore/stroke and that's the only differences between engines.
And FWIIW, here's Motorcycle Online's write up of comparative maintenance costs of the FJR vs. the K1200GT.
From:
https://www.motorcycle.com/shoot-outs/sport...-2006-3965.html
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Living with the Beasts
So you're leveraged to the hilt to buy your fancy new sport-tour rig, but don't put that wallet away yet, bucky: the money-draining fun has only just begun. Sport touring means racking up big miles, so maybe we should examine the cost of ownership of these bikes over the long term, huh?
An email to MO subscriber Jim Thurber (jthurber80) -- who teaches middle-school science but moonlights at Cal BMW/Triumph in Mountain View, CA -- garnered the following information about the BMW and Triumph. This is what one shop said, and we haven't double-checked with the service manuals, so take this info with a grain o' salt. Call your local dealer -- that's who is going to charge you.
Both of the European bikes have a basic 6,000-mile service schedule. We know, we know, Grandpa changed his oil every 1,800 miles and his '56 Buick lasted for 30 years (why doesn't anybody ask why you would want to drive a '56 Buick for 30 years?). But had Grandpa used modern synthetic oil and only changed it every 10,000 miles, it would have gone just as long. It's twice as expensive but resists breakdown for a far-longer time. Hey, if the engineers say 6,000 miles, who are we to argue? They're engineers, after all.
The BMW gets about two hours of therapy and about $50 worth of parts from a technician every 6,000 miles, until the 24,000-mile service, when it gets four hours, new plugs ($10 each) and an air filter.
At each service, the electronic diagnostic equipment they use can determine if a valve inspection is needed, in which case CalBMW will hit you up for $250, and an extra $150 if it needs an adjustment.
K-bikes are known for often not needing valve adjustments, ever; the service manager wasn't sure if he'd heard of any dealer ever doing a valve adjustment on the new K motor.
The Triumph has similar intervals, with the factory politely asking you to use its Mobil1 Racing synthetic oil at $12 a quart. The service takes about two hours of a technician's time. The big whammy is the 12,000 mile service, where the shop service manager takes you out back and beats you with a rubber truncheon. Or it will feel that way when you see the bottom line on the work order, which could run up to 8.5 hours, as a valve check is required, along with coolant, suspension oil and brake fluid. With a $360 parts bill, you could be looking at close to $1,000 for the pleasure of riding that initial 12,000 miles. Ouch. Gabe has experienced similar service sticker shock with his 2003 Triumph Speed 4, but he has found that you can save a lot of money doing simple tasks yourself or buying non-Triumph parts like brake pads and high-quality, but cheaper, synthetic oil. It seems bad, until you realize that the long service intervals mean you actually save money in the long run.
A call to Hattar Motorsports, where Editor Gabe once slaved away under the ruthless fist of MO reader and sales manager Bill Dansky ("Call me itchface") got us a quick idea of what the FJR would cost to service. The first service is at 600 miles, and should run under $200. Subsequent services are at 4,000 mile intervals, and are all under $200 until the big service at 16,000 miles, which will run you about $750, with six hours of service and about $140 in parts. The valves don't need an inspection until 26,600 miles; expect about four hours to get that done. Mike McDonald at Hattar says that "many folks choose to have this service performed at the same time as a 24,000 or 28,000-mile "minor" service in order to avoid the extra time and inconvenience of multiple trips within a relatively short time period."
The bottom line is that after 30,000 miles, the Triumph will run you $2,750, the FJR costs you $2,550 (subtract about $400 if it doesn't need a valve adjust, which it very well might, considering Yamaha's bullet-proof valve trains) and the BMW will soak up $1,900 of your hard-earned, figuring for one valve check and adjustment in that time.
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But just ignore all this - someone on this forum has weighed in that a K1200GT costs 5x to 10x as much to maintain as a FJR, and who are we to argue with their logic? After all, a Bandit 1200 and K1200GT have "virtually identical" engines.
- Mark
