Oil Change, Filter, and Pan

Today I wanted to finish off the fluids in the 10K service, I waited to do the oil filter, and engine oil until I could order a new oil pan gasket. Went to Hucky's and got me a oil pan gasket. I proceeded to drain oil, change filter, dropped oil pan, much black sludge but no real metal in the screen or pan, just thick older oil. I cleaned thoroughly. The older oil pan gasket came right off without any fuss.

The oil filter cover had at least two old paper gasket cover which I managed to clean off the cover and engine case 99% without any damage to each. I changed the filter, screwed in the main bolt and cover, and put a fresh gasket on. The oil filter bolts were replaced at one point with good hex bolts and washers.

The oil pan and screen were cleaned, and reinstalled with new oil pan filter, hand tighten the bolts down lightly, and put a fresh crush washer on the oil drain pan bolt, 30NM torque.

Filled with 2 liters of Castrol Act-Evo 4T, and topped off with my left over Spectro Golden 4, both 20W-50 weight.

I did reuse the oil pan bolts and washers, will watch for leaks, and possibly order new washers for the 14 bolts.

Pictures

Progress

At this point I wanted to re-assemble the bike to working order in order to get the Texas State Inspection completed, so I can register and tag the bike for riding.

I had removed the rear fender, taillight assembly to get to the battery tray easier.

• I started to clean the swing arm on the left side
• Misc sections of the frame were sanded
• Cleaned out the oil in the points area
• Started 10K fluid changes
• Put Points cover, start cover, and air box back together
• Put Rear fender and tail light back on
• Battery re-connected with battery tender plug back on
• Greased Swing arm

To Do

• Change Oil/Oil pan gasket
• Finish 10K service, Valves, Timing, Cable Lube, Sync Carbs
• Centerstand needs to be restored
  

Finishing up Battery Tray

The battery tray was re-installed today, and following the Airheads.org club canon #2, "Airheads believe that the simplest engineering solutions are the best." With this in mind I looked for the rubber vibration bobbins that connect the battery tray to the frame. These little dampeners cost $13-18 dollars a piece x 5 from BMW, so to spend $65 seemed a bit high, so I went forward with my solution.



Went to Ace Hardware and bought 5 rubber stoppers @ 43 cents a piece, cut them down to the dampener length, drilled a 1/4 hole through the center and proceeded to bolt them to the tray and frame using M6 metric bolts, washers and nuts. Overall the cost was less than $5 dollars, looks good, and holds the tray solid.



The original dampeners are rated to hold 25lbs a piece, and the rubber stoppers are rated around 22 lbs so this seems sound, proof is a year from now.

A Stiff Drink

Today after discovering that no fluids had been done by the former mechanic other than fork oil, I decided to start into the 10K service for the bike.

NOTE - BIKE IS APART DOING BATTERY TRAY SO FLUID CHANGE DONE COLD ENGINE, NOT THE BEST BUT STILL BETTER THAN NOT DOING.

I have Golden Spectro Gear Oil which is what is bottled for BMW.

Amounts

• Transmission - 800cc
• Final Drive 250cc
• Drive Shaft 100cc

Inspection

• The Transmission oil was water contaminated, brown, stunk and had traces of milky white fluid.
• The Final Drive oil was also water contaminated, but not as bad
• The Drive Shaft oil actually looked fairly new

I went ahead and bleed the brake fluid which looked a bit dark, and replaced with DOT3 brake fluid, worked out the big bubbles, and will let sit over night and check again.

Some cleanup

Here are some pictures of the electronics, there is a gummy oil leak on the left hand side of the alternator wiring, might be a cam oil seal leak, goign to dig in

Battery Tray

Decided to start on one of the simple items, the battery tray. Like other older airheads this tray is usually rusted at the bottom, acid damage, and the rubber mounts are broken, rusted, or damaged. Mine was all of the above. These trays are over $150 to replace, so care and feeding is necessary. A can of black gloss rustoleum does wonders, after a good sanding.

Once I removed the battery, big heavy Panasonic, does it really need to be this big?

I discovered that to really get the tray out, I need to remove the rear fender, so I started to unbolt the rear fender, well that leads to removing the rear taillight section which is all in all very time consuming. It did allow me to inspect the inside of the rear fender, and clean out underneath. Close examination, I think this fender has been repainted at least once. There are tape lines around the tire information sticker on the top of the fender.

I worked on removing the rusty nuts and rubber vibration dampening mounts, some might be ok, but at least three were damaged beyond use.

Looking online at the BMW parts fiche, they want over $15 a pop, and you need five of them with washers and nuts on both ends.


Hucky's has them for $12.00, but that still seems high.


I searched the Airheads.org archive email list and found a post, Tom Cutter responded two with two sources for replacement parts.

McMaster Carr has these for $6.00 a pop, need to check size, but will save some money.

http://www.mcmaster.com/#4403k722/=28tuoa

From 1976 BMW R75/6

Seafoam Treatment

The first thing I did is to run about 4 oz of seafoam through each carb to blow out the crud. The bike idles pretty good, vibraton felt at the top end on the rpm's, will have to sync at some point.

Another Horse in the stable

Today I bought a 1976 BMW R75/6 from Boxer's by Bruce, a local Beemer mechanic in Arlington, Texas. Bruce had this bike on Craiglist as a consignment. She is not the prettiest, but seems to run good, and no oil leaks, YET.

The compression test show around 125 PSI on both cylinders, not great, but better than 123.

VIN 4945953
Mileage 65,894 (odometer migh tbe broken)

BMW 1976 R75/6 Airhead

From 1976 BMW R75/6