The Ditch Pump Taken To New Levels

wouldn't want to be filtering on that .....

 

‘Ugly’ is the new beautiful. That’s why I’ve two ugly sisters

 

I quite like it as it harps back to the old R5/6 look as said a sod to filter on and i hope the cylinders are titanium as its going to get expensive if you drop it.

 

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I owned and appreciated a 1982 R100RS but that is just U G L Y. Huge seamed silencers and California chromed in a way unsuited to Northern Europe. I doubt they’ll sell many beyond Kings Road Chelsea or Rodeo Drive....... so not really for motorcyclists.

 

Gigantic foot warmers that double up as leg protectors. Whatever next??

 

I’m Feckin chemist and I think it’s Feckin lovely


Gotta itch and I’m gonna scratch it

I hate getting an itch
It always ends in tears

 

It's definitely true, I have, sadly, friends similarly afflicted.

Like Land Rovers, I like to borrow friends BMWs to remind me never to buy one

 

I suggest tincture of mercury for that....

 

I gotta say that I think that thing is grotesque. Bikes are supposed to be sleek and sexy not fat and ugly, that's what cars are for. Triumph managed to put that monster engine in their machine and make it looked like it belongs but that thing looks like the bike got wet and shrunk around it's engine or it's engine has caught something nasty and become rather swollen.

 

Why thank you sir! I do like to 'go my own way' I must admit. The current fashion in bikes and customising seems somewhat screwy to me. They are kind of 'Banksy' style caricatures with loads of pretension without good form and poor in function rather than masterpieces oozing class but doing exactly what they should do at the same time.

 

Exactly that. I love old simple bikes and 'Form follows function' is a tenet I like to adhere to. So many items, not just bikes, are a poor pastiche.

 

It feels like they have run out of ideas and simply don't know what to do and the results are truly ugly but at the same time, terribly dull and un-imaginative and that doesn't just apply to BMW. It seems to be a feature of the modern world in design, art and motorcycles that it's all very shallow with no depth or real thought being put into it. The BMW in question looks like they based the design on a caricature of an old BMW as drawn by someone who wanted to take the piss out of them when they could have taken their own blueprints of an early BMW and made it a sleek and refined 'new and improved' version. Rather like John Bloor intended when he re-invented the Bonneville. It's far wiser to simply improve and refine the wheel rather than trying to re-invent it and doing it very badly.

There's a very good reason why Fender and Gibson still make guitars to designs that are now over sixty years old and that is that the design simply doesn't need to be fiddled with. Streamline and refine the function but keep the design classic and elegant.

 

This is a personal view, I can take on board references, nods to times gone by but I've a problem with blind nostalgia.
I sold my Z thou when I realised that it was uneconomic to keep it in it's 70's hooligan style and it needed to be original. The buyer made it showroom and wrecked it imho. KISS, aka, keep it simple, stupid. Add lightness and simplicate. And always, Form Follows Function.
Fwiw, I play a Tele

 

I'm no slave to the past but I do think that sometimes a machine or device has achieved the shape and form that is ideal and it is futile and even counter productive to try and re-design it rather than simply refine it. On the other hand I am willing to grab any true and worthwhile innovations and design with both hands. I play a number of guitars but two of my favourites are a Schecter Hellraiser with purple/blue chameleon paint, Carbon Fibre binding, Floyd Rose tremolo and Sustainiac active sustainer pickup at the neck oh and glow in the dark position markers on the side of the neck and a Jackson Pro Soloist in stunning 'Northern lights' lacquer with Floyd Rose trem. I also have a modern Far Eastern built 'classic' Gretsch in Orange, a couple of Strats and a tele. I love classic style but I'm not a slave to it and, if I can buy classic style with modern build quality and intelligent improvements and additions I am all over it. My 2001 Triumph Bonnie's are classic style but they don't leak oil all over the place like an original and have, hopefully, better and more precise modern engineering and manufacture. If I wanted a Fender Strat or a Gibson Les Paul I would buy a new one made to modern standards rather than an old one even if it only cost a fraction of the price and doesn't have the 'bragging rights' of a '59 or a '56 etc. and, when it came to buying a Bonnie I decided that the early Hinckley ones were the way to go with their clean looks, air cooled, carburettor'ed simplicity and none of the over complicated ABS, ride modes, electronic clocks, Fuel injection and liquid cooling. To me the later versions (I do have a later EFi model, a 2014, that I would happily swap for an earlier caburettor'ed model in comparable condition as I just don't really like it as much) are just not quite as nice to ride as my 2001 790's. The 2014 lacks a certain something, seems just too civilised and, of course, as far as I am concerned it's not really a 'Brit bike' as it was put together in Thailand.

 

I dont like BMWs bikes or cars in general but i do like the old R5/6 and all BMW have done is what most other manufactures have done create a custom that harps back to an era just like Triumph, Harley etc as it sells bikes they dont care if your an ageing biker or a trendy young thing.

 

I don't mind the old BMW's, my R100RT & K100LT did galactic mileages and where reliable and comfortable, not too keen on some off the modern ones but that is also true of many other makes.

 

My opinion is that if they wanted to make a serious cruiser that isn't just a gimmick for hipsters, they’d have been better off using a K Series lump that would allow controls with a more forward set.

The R18 looks more like a vanity project that cost so much that they had to go into production to try to claw back whatever the project cost.