1971 BMW R-Series

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1971 BMW R75/5 Original condition, cosmetic project. The story.... I am the third owner of this fantastic bike. I bought the bike a few years ago expecting to do a full restoration. The gall I bought the bike from owned it for 20 years, she affectionately named her Helga. The bike was bought new and lived in Santa Barbara until I brought it down to Long Beach. When I bought the bike, the previous owner had stopped riding it because she heard a strange noise coming from the left cylinder on the way to work and just turned around and went home. Around six months from that day I showed up and put the bike in a pickup and drove it home. Turned out one of the pushrods had warped and was banging around on the tube. I changed the pushrod and adjusted the valves and the bike ran great. Nothing ever went wrong for me after that, other than that pushrod tube leaking some oil at the seal. The bike had always been garaged, but sat outside during the day in Santa Barbara on a regular basis for over 15 years. It was a commuter, 10 miles each way. My plans to restore the bike never really got started, I bought a few parts here and there but just rode the bike and fell in love with the original condition. The bike always starts, always. Rides great in town and has no problem on the freeway. I just took the bike to a very well known mechanic here in southern california (http://valdis-motozone.com/) which I learned about on various airhead forums, and had the leaky pushrod tube seal replaced, along with a carb sync, valve adjustment, new swing arm boot, and a general tune up done. The bike is mechanically very solid, but is far from restored. The speedo and tach stopped working about a year ago, the actual arms on both of the dials had broke a bit before - but the odometer stopped about a year ago. The mileage is with 200 miles of actual mileage at the most. This is a cosmetic project for somebody that wants to be able to ride while doing a restoration, or just keep in original condition and put some miles on a classic. All the lights work, the bikes shifts well through all gears, all fluids are fresh and clean. The front brake is a bit grabby at slow speeds but is normal once above about 10 or 15 mph. Cosmetically the bike is not in great shape, I don't want that to be confused. I have all the service history from new, every receipt is in a 3 ring binder, its like reading a journal. I have some extra parts that will be included, hard bags that are functional but worn, a higher handlebar, double seat and single seat, original owners manual, and some various other nuts and bolts. Also the tires have about 150 miles on them, brand new Dunlops K70's. I did get a quote for painting the tank and fenders with hand pinstripe back to factory, which was $900. On May-16-11 at 00:01:21 PDT, seller added the following information: The registration is current, I just paid everything up to date this week. Title in hand. The pipes had surface rust so I bought a rust removal brush for my drill, removed the pipes and blasted all the rust off. I then cleaned the pipes and covered them with 3 in 1 oil.