I am no expert. But i just did this and maybe my experience can help others. This 91 K100LT was in good but very neglected mechanical condition. It starts, runs and rides fine. But it had been laid down 3 times. the fairing and bags were a mess. The fairing was unsalvagable at all. I just pulled all that crap off of the bike. The thing was way too top heavy anyway in my book. I figuired I didnt need any 4-way flashers or ABS on/off switch or whatever the hell else that all was and I removed the ingition switch and dumped the rubber switch thing. I left the ABS on the bike. It works. No reason to fix something that ain't broke. I pulled the tank and pulled the wires out for all the switches and radio and etc. I cut off one horn--one is enough. My general theory of horns is that by the time you push the horn button, you are dead. But a horm is required in PA--one is enough. That leaves you with mounts needed for the ignition switch, one horn, headlighht and turn signals--plus that pesky hydraulic brake hose. Mirrors are no issue--I bought a pair of used Harley Sportster mirros at a swap for $15 and just put the left one on--all that is required in PA.

I'll cover more in my next post. If you have any specific questions let me know. I might not have answers but i can make something up...

Hi Donsmerz
interested to see a photo as I have a bit of a wrecker that might be ok as a naked bike. Did you use the standard headlight/assembly as to me that would look a bit crude like one of those ugly triumph things
Regards RT

I don;t have pix yet. But I will get some.



Headlight and Horn



The head light is easy. Standard 7 inch round, Chinese-made brand new headlights are on aBay all the time for $50 or less. Once you take off the fairing, horns and all, you will see two forward-facing threaded holes in the bottom fork clamp of the triple tree. A standard Harley custom headlight bracket ALMOST fits. All you have to do is grind the bolt slots inward about 1/4 inch toward the center becasue the holes on the BMW fork clamp are too close together to fit the slots on the Harley bracket. Your 7 inch headlight mounts to youir modified headlight bracket with the bracket facing up or down. I chose to face mine up with the bend in the bracket going inward between the forks. My bracket cost $7 with $6 mailing--$13 total. I cut the BMW headlight wires and just ran them into the hole on the headlight bucket and re-soldered them to a new headlight bulb plug that came with the headlight. Done. Total elapsed time could not have been more than an hour.



The horn is easy to stash somewhere as long as you don't care about looks. When I removed the fairing, there was this plastic airway on the right side coming up from the airbox and I took that off. I just left the hole in the side of the airbox (where the plastic thing was attached) for the bike to suck air through. I'd love to remove the airbox entrirely and pitch it. But the way that the air is metered through that valve in the top of the airbox made me decide not to change that. So I just left the airbox in place.



Anyway, back to the horn. Each horn is on a straight metal bracket about 3 inches long. When I removed the air intake tube going to the airbox, this exposed a big area behind the radiator in front of the airbox. I just used the stock horn mounting bracket and mounted the horn to one of the fairing bolt holes on the frame downtube below the gas tank right side so that the horn occupies the space formerly occupied by the plastic airway. If you carefully re-route the horn wire back to this spot, the stock horn wire just barely reaches. Eventually I have to do a better horn mounting than this. But for this summer, there it stays.

if your ABS is working without a problem at the moment I would suggest putting the switch hidden out of the way under the seat or somewhere easily accessible you never know when you will need it!!!

There is nothing worse than riding for quite a few miles with both the ABS warning lights flashing at you late at night,

I am trying to work out if your going for the RAT look or more a street-fighter look?

I have seen a K100 with a Fireblade front end and some modified Ducati rear end bits.... now that did look good

Good point about the ABS. In the preparednes category, I have found that a piece of black electrical tape does wonders for annoying flashing lights! If the ABS starts fussing at me, I will just pull it off. Since I don't want to put any money into the bike, I guess the look will be RAT rather than street fighter. It certainly is RAT right now. The previous owner never cleaned a spot of dirt or oil off of it and I have continued his tradition! No wax means all of BMW's foreshoight about not ding any decent plating or using stainbless for nuts and bolts means that they are all riusty. So the cutrrent look is rust, dirt, oil and mixed paint!

I know the look you mean.... but is yours sprayed matt black?! the PPO of my bike did just that to everything! and the PO just rode the poor thing 2 miles to work and back! I have just (as in I am still covered in dust) sanded down all the panels apart from the main fairing and am preparing to start repainting them!

Naked BMW K100 : Pictures and some text are now on my blog here

I still need two things for this bike: 1) some way to protect the radiator--right now it is all exposed. And 2) This has the heated grips on it with the bar end weights and I want all that off of there with just regular grips. Can anyone give me buying tips on what kinds of grips would fit and what years the grips are interchangeable?

I have seen different patterns of perforated metal available in small panels from some general hardware stores and could be easily cut to shape.

You know, sort of thing 1200GS owners pay couple of hundred dollars to cover their oil coolers with when they go off road.
If you take the bar end weights off you may get a lot more vibration. Take them off and try it before you go too far.

Thanks for the tips. Can I keep the weights with regular grips? Or do the weights and heated grips go together?

You can keep the weights with any type of grip as long as there is a hole in the end.
If the heated grips are working bung them on ebay. You might be surprised what you get for them.