Techlusion, CO Pots etc.

["Tom Brown" <tbrown@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Pete:

Don't know your level of mechanical interest.  If you have an 1150 without
Twin-Spark, chances are that your bike surges quite a bit, especially if you
have under 20K or so on it.

The newer Techlusion box is reported to work pretty well.    It's not terribly
difficult to install.  You can have the dealer do it if you're not confident.
It costs some money, but saves you the hassle of doing all the other
procedures if your a guy who doesn't really work on his own bike.    Different
dealers have different attitudes towads these things.  If you want them to do
the work, better check it out with them first.

Now, if you're willing to get your hands dirty, there are several other
options...

1.  The older Techlusion box, with the three adjustment screws, also works to
reduce surging.   It can be adjusted to increase performance and waste gas as
well, but doesn't need to be set this way.   A lot of people set them very
wrong and then are not satisfied with the results.  This is one reason they
changed the box to a non-adjustable design.   If you're interested in one of
these, I still have one in my garage gathering dust.   I can sell at a good
price and give you really detailed instructions on hooking it up and setting
it up.

2. You can perform a "Zero equals Zero" adjustment on your throttle position
sensor.   This voids your warranty, technically, but I know of no one in the 5
years or so of being active on these mail lists who has had any sort of
problem relating to this procedure.    It's detailed pretty well by the late
and legendary Bob Lentini on the ibmwr website.

3. A really painstakingly nit-picky valve adjustment with an equally nit-picky
throttle synch does wonders for surging and overall smoothness..

4. A change of those black plastic intake tubes to the ones made for a GS
really smooths out 1100 RTs and RS's.  It also gives more torque at low and
mid revs at a slight cost to ultimate power at high revs.  I don't know how
you ride, but I've found that I run near redline very seldom and this is not
much of a concern for me.  I'm not sure how this mod works on 1150s.   Not
needed at all with twin spark.

The tubes are about $30 for a pair and are available from the BMW parts
department at any dealer.   They're a bit smaller diameter and quite a bit
longer, reaching further inside the air box.   I felt they were not great in
combination with the Techlusion.  I'd get some mild pinging in passing
situations at higer RPMs.   When I removed the Techlusion prior to trade-in of
my bike, the ping went completely away.  I left the GS tubes in.  The bike was
very smooth and good running.   Again, don't know exactly what will happen
with your bike.  Mine was a '99RT.   I do know all the procedures backwards
and forwards and can give detailed help for anything you want to try.

5. The very best solution is to remove the head and send to San Jose BMW for a
second plug in each head.    This will cost you around $450 and the time
and/or expense of removing the heads and sending them.   What you end up with
is actually better than a Twin-Spark bike because BMW didn't set up the single
spark ignitions for minimum emissions.  They're set more for performance.
When you add the second plug, you get the advantage of burning more of the
fuel that goes into the cylinder without the lean-burn power-robbing that BMW
dialed into the Twin Spark bikes.    The result is a HP increase over the
single spark and the Twin Spark stock bikes.   This comes with increased fuel
economy too.    So it's money well spent, in my opinion.   There may be others
doing the mod now....Bob's BMW???    Anyway, I checked it out before I managed
to get a really great deal from my local BMW dealer on a new RT.  They send
you a box to put your head in for mailing, a kit with all you need for hooking
up the second plugs and detailed instructions.   Again, a decent dealer will
do the work for you, especially if it's winter where you are...a lot of them
are hungry for mechanical work this time of year.


There are quite a few people on this list familiar with 0=0, perfect valve
adjustment and throttle synch.   Bob Hadden is certainly one of them and will
not steer you too far wrong.

I've always been the guy who likes to try things just to see what will happen.
I'm cautious, but I will try new things once I've researched the procedures
well enough.

- -TB

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