That was built by Chris' folks at San Jose BMW. It was at the San Jose Motorcycle show. it is truly stunning looking. It has not been run yet. He just finished up the final intake work and had the body work completed.
Looks like they are using the same compressor as on the Kohler spercharged Guzzis. They don't spin at anything near turbo-like speed, so I wouldn't worry too much about it blowing off your private parts.
The supercharger initially will run a mild boost, appx 8 lbs at full throttle, at lower throttle settings the manifold pressure would be normal as the throttle body is upstream of the supercharger thus restricting the air available to the engine. The bike will be completely normal in all but the highest throttle settings. Chris and San Jose BMW has been building intresting BMW's since the mid 70's as evidenced by the AMA Superbike wins in the 70's thru the current win at the last Boxer Cup win at Daytona, comming in 2nd over all in the last Boxer Cup series, winning every time entered at the Airhead Invational at Talladega, set two records again this year at Bonneville, 162 on a 1978 R100RS the other on the K1200R Power Cup bike and literally dozens upon dozens of wins in between. With out a doubt, among less than a handfull of people on the planet with anywhere near the Beemer experience. In short, don't count on the Blower Bike fraging. The San Jose BMW Booth at the show was one of the most crowded.
Or for the price of the blower you could buy a nice used Japanese 600 that will out perform the oil head all day long! But it's a nice design and eng. exercise none the less.
It's nice to have someone working on the bikes we ride, there's plenty of aftermarket out there for the sportbike crowd. Kudos to the ingenuity of the boys and girls down @ San Jose. I'd like to see their critics do better. It's certainly more appealing than a 600 c.c. bike with a loud exhaust... you don't see those every day, do you? And as always it's the rider not the bike...
I never said it wasn't nice, in fact its quite nice and if you had taken the time to read my post all the way through you would have noticed that I complimented SJ & Chris and also I wouldn't mind having one, but having said that, one of those unappealing Japanese 600cc w/loud exhaust will out perform said boxer w/blower for the same money as the blower alone, hell the Motronic alone costs more than a used 600. P.S. I miss seeing Chris and his very cool bikes race each year at the AHRMA event in Steamboat.
I wonder if they will be developing this further for other GS models . I especially like the other aspects of the bike that haven't been mentioned. A real enthusiasts endeavour, expense and purpose be damned. Again, a job well done.
I spent a lot of time talk'n to Chris about it at the show. His love for that kinda stuff really shows; he will talk to anybody forever about his shop's projects. He is in a very difficult south bay area BMW market place with two big boys with in spit'n distance of him, Santa Cruz BMW and Call BMW. I think he keeps his market share by be'n the only high performance BMW shop around. I think it gives his shop, San Jose BMW, a lot of industry respect.
Rad, you are right on. Intrestingly enough, San Jose BMW is one of the highest volumn dealers in the greater San Francisco Bay area....if not the highest. Chris has been building world beater project Beemers since the 70's and he definitely gets a lot respect from his peers. As an example, Power Commander does all of their Beemer research with him at his facility, as do others.
Hey SQD8R, No regrets so far, but then again, I'm easy to please. The KS is crazy fast & comfy at the same time. If yer every down this way, come visit & while yer here, take it for a ride.
I plan on doing a big tour this summer, coast to coast, but even if I don't I'll always head down to North and South Carolina. Deal's Gap may get the spotlight but the areas all around those states are too enticing to pass up. So I'll take you up on that and I'll repay the favour by getting you back on old faithful, the 12GS, although somehow I don't think you'll be the one in lust @ the end of that ride.
Great looking machine. Id love to see the finished product & dyno numbers for it. Use to have a 88 Toyota MR2 that had a OEM blower. Made good HP for a 1.6 liter car with a larger pulley and better intake/exhaust. Throttle response with an SC is great, very fun to drive.
Hell yeah! that is really cool. Anybody that does perf. boxer stuff gets a dbl thumbs up from me. I would like to see a turbo set-up like the old luftmeister stuff. Also cool to se the the telelever front end switch, road style. Got any more pics?
