2011 R1200GSA with Ural tub build - The (sorta) end

Part 1: More dog sh*t than I’ve ever seen.

My old rig a 1984 BMW R100RT with Ural Sidecar

As you may have read in my racing rig build thread, the race rig got put on a back burner because I did this on my birthday ride with friends in June.

My street monkey is the racing monkey ( https://www.hellbendersracing.com ).  She’s an active monkey on the street too and that, friends, was my undoing (and a skill/experience deficit).

See, I’ve gotten used to her leaning on the street and we’ve been pushing our speeds accordingly.  She was working that day (thank Lemmy) but that meant I didn’t have an active counter weight. 

I went into a corner too hot for the “no passenger” configuration, but typical for how I usually do it and the sidecar wheel lifted.

I can’t say exactly what happened because I only had time for four thoughts before my flight.

- Oh, the wheel came up

- Telephone pole

- Try to go through the yard

- This is going to hurt

Best guess, I cut the throttle back and hit the brakes sending me left towards the pole. I’ve ridden two wheelers since the late 80s but only have about a year on three.

I tried furiously to miss the double telephone pole and cut through some guys dog sh*t covered front yard. (Couldn’t see the dog poo from the road but wouldn’t have had time to weigh the pros and cons anyway.)

I did not succeed in my attempt to offroad. 

Instead, I clipped the pole with the jerry can.  That spun me sideways and the rear of the bike smashed , not kissed, not banged, smashed like the anvil dropping on Wiley Coyote, into the tree. (Note the scratch in the pole)

By dumb luck I got far enough forward in my sidelong turn that the rear of the bike hit the tree and my leg didn’t get trapped or this tale would have been written from a hospital or scratched onto the top of a pine box.

But my gremlin bell worked and I managed to fly through a Drew-sized hole between the tree and a massive bush, landing about 30 feet from the bike with my brain bell good and rung.

I tried to get up and then decided, maybe I should give it a minute.  My two friends pulled over and ran towards me fairly panicked (and slightly impressed with the distance I flew).

I got away with a stiff neck, a pulled hamstring, and a bruise from my bum to my knee.  And – I know your dying to know – I somehow managed not to step in any dog poo.  That was as big a miracle as flying through the hole.  I kid you not, I have never seen more dog poo per inch of grass… ever.

Here’s the really weird part.  My torn meniscus instantly felt better.  Yes, really.  The Dr. said sometimes the corner of a meniscus tear will fold up (excruciating) and they thought I had unfolded mine in the crash which gave me pretty significant relief.  They did clearly state this was not a recommended course of treatment.

The gremlin bell didn’t save the bike I’m afraid.  Engine and front end/leading link were fine.  Tank, seat, rear subframe, and shocks were bent.  The tub was ripped off the frame (although the sidecar frame was fine).  The mounting frame Claude built was significantly damaged.

But...But...But....the point is....that Chloe, your Sidecar Racing Monkey is okay.

Whew, that was all we really cared about, was Chloe...the Sidecar Racing Monkey

All kidding aside, she was really traumatized.  For whatever reason, she likes me and this could have very easily been a really, really bad one.

I'm exceedingly thankful she wasn't there because that tub was ripped off the frame and ended up sideways against the bike.  She would have been seriously hurt.

If Boss Monkey had been there, the wheel wouldn't have lifted, and you'd never have noticed the dog poop. 😉

Looking forward to pictures of the "new" rig. 🙂   And yes,  I'm glad you are both okay. 🙂

Part 2: Decorative pockets and a plan

Skip this if you don’t feel like reading background blather.

As much as I liked my Airhead, I never really bonded with it.  I’m a modern BMW guy (except for my vintage racing sidecar, natch).

I dig MGV8’s rig and the builds from LBS but don’t have deep pockets.  My pockets are so shallow they are basically decorative.

MGV8's rig and photo

LBS build and photo.

Insurance side note.  I had $13k into that rig – amazing how it balloons from a $3500 bike and a $1500 sidecar when you attach one to the other.  Insurance only gave me $3900 and I’ve no one to blame but myself.  I forgot to add the sidecar onto my insurance when I attached it to the RT.

Pro Tip: You need to add the value of your sidecar as an accessory for it to be covered in most cases. 

They also only paid me $500 for my riding gear and I was wearing a $750 helmet because my head’s a weird shape.

A costly lesson all around.

I already sold off my 2015 BMW R1200R, a completely restored tandem bike that I never (NEVER) got to ride, and a whitewater canoe to fund the Racing Rig. So I didn’t have anything else to sell except a smelly old dog that I’ve gotten rather attached to.

I decided the answer was to go celibate - sell a bit here, sell a bit there.

I tore apart the RT and joined Facebook (I resisted the borg for as long as I could. But it’s the place to sell stuff these days.) I must have under priced stuff because it sold out within days.

The leading links took a lot longer to sell and a lot more leg work.  I packaged them with a lot of extra BMW parts so they were literally bolt on ready and eventually they legged it to Kansas.

All in all I recouped a decent amount of funds to start the project - not enough but that’s why the wife works.

BTDT twice selling all (most) of the bits of a bike and/or sidecar.  Get pretty good at packaging after a while.  However, when a complete bike's value is low, but all the parts value is high, you get good at dismantling.

Got my popcorn ready!

Looking forward to the results and recovery from a nasty situation. Pretty sure yours will be every bit as good as the LBS rigs Mike puts together. Well, maybe not the wiring, Mike is hard to top on that front. 

Quote from MGV8 on January 20, 2024, 8:29 pm

Pretty sure yours will be every bit as good as the LBS rigs Mike puts together. Well, maybe not the wiring, Mike is hard to top on that front. 

 

Top his wiring? Nope. Those external junction boxes and whatnot are something else. 

BUT, I read his threads and took a couple of his ideas (Spoiler alert) like a EzCan for lights.

I also repurposed my Fuze Block from the RT build for heated gear too. But I'm getting ahead of the build thread.

Part 3. The bike.  Dwayne.  Rain. And a big honking ramp.

I wanted to build a GS/Ural rig if I could swing it.  I found a really nice 04 with 30k miles four hours from me and an 08 with 70k miles local.  I wasn’t happy with either choice.  The 08 guy was a pain and wanted $7200.  The 04 was older than I really wanted – I’m planning on keeping this a long time (that rumble you hear is the gods laughing).

I found another ad on F@*#book.  The price was way too high (both for my budget and reality) but the ad was up 13 weeks so I enquired and told him – right up front – that I didn’t have asking price.  He said call. I called. He proceeded to talk over me like I was an idiot and then refused to budge on the price.  Why have me call? Did he think he was such an amazing salesman he could talk me around? The joys of Facebook.

I was so annoyed that I started a new search of my for sale bookmarks (here, IBMWR, BMWMOA, Flakebook) and found an ad for a 2011 GSA with 40k miles for $7100 on BMWMOA.  More than I had but not by much.  It was 8 hours away BUT he said in the ad he would deliver it up to 200 miles.

I called and said, “I want to buy your bike if you’ve a mind to sell it.” He did. We talked through a price which actually fit my budget AND he said he could bring it north when he came up to visit his daughter  who lived four hours from me.  Victory!

Two weeks later he and I were making plans to meet when he casually mentioned the bike bit him when he was loading it into the back of his pickup.

Wait…what?  Noooo. I don’t do pickup trucks, thank you very much.  And for all you, I-do-it-all-the-time, jokers watch the youtube bike loading fail video below.  I starred in one once and never again.  When it comes to bikes and pickups, I won’t help load them, I won’t help unload them.  The only thing I’ll do is film.

A furious round of emails followed and he said he thought there was a ramp at one of the dealerships in Harrisonburg so I looked up all the dealerships one by one then plugged their addresses into google maps street view until I found the one with a big honking ramp out back.

Next morning the monkey and I hitched up the trailer and boogied on down to Virginia.  It poured most of the trip, only clearing up when we were 20 minutes outside of Harrisonburg.

We found the dealership and the ramp easily.  They built the ramp to load ATVs into pickup trucks and were cool enough to let up use it which made unloading the bike a breeze (I still didn’t help - rules are rules.)

The second that the GSA was on the back of the trailer, the skies opened up again. I got soaked strapping the sucker down in my useless rain jacket.  Job done and the PO wanted to talk about the bike but I was soggy and grumpy.  Felt bad because he was a nice guy but wet and cold do not a chatty Drew make.

Boss Monkey and I went inside, bought some “thank you” t-shirts (pretty nice too - hides my belly), and met the shop’s Great Dane.

On the (thankfully uneventful) trip back, Boss Monkey decided to name the bike Dwayne because the asymmetrical headlights reminded her of Dwayne the Rock Johnson’s signature eyebrow raise.

I agreed to it because A. She’s right, B. It’s funny, and C. Always go with A.

AWESOME!!!!!!!

What an epic story.    Dwayne will make an excellent tug. 

I like vans.  Low to the ground, and easy to load.

Part 4.  The tub.  Frankensteining the sumgum.

The original tub was ripped off the frame from the force of the rear of the bike smashing into the tree.   Ural tubs are bolted onto the frame with U-clamps at the front (4 bolts each) and single bolts through the (2) snowmen at the rear.  The bolts tore through the bottom sheet metal at the front but the snowmen pulled out of the retaining frames at the back.

The tub was turned onto its side in the accident (we turned it upright before I got it together to take a picture).   The force dented the rear behind the passenger seat.  It also buckled that supporting wall which was a bigger concern structurally.

I got lucky first time round.  I bought the Ural tub with bike for $2200 and sold the bike part for $500.  When I went searching for a tub this time they were few and far between and going for $2500 ragged out or $3000 in better shape.

Remember the bit about budget constraints and decorative pockets? (Part 2).  $3000 wasn’t an option.  And not in the way that failure is not an option because failure is always an option just not one you want.  This was not an option in the sense, I didn’t have the d@mn money, whether I wanted to or not.

I contacted my bike hoarding buddy and he said he had a tub he’d let go for $300.  He said the nose was dented but that it could be banged out.  I had the R75 frame from the race rig’s donor bike. It was in decent condition and low miles (1500) and he agreed to a trade.  I asked for pictures of the dent. He had the tub in one of his storage units and promised to go out there in the next day or two.  The pics never came but I didn’t think much of it.  His stuff is usually dirty but usable.

Hmpf.

I almost didn’t take it but it was basically free (I had no use for the R75 frame) and I wasn’t finding another tub.  I did try pounding the nose out but that was a failure. 

Partly because I had no experience metal shaping with a hammer and dolly (that would come later), partly because it was hard to reach, but mostly because it was seriously frogged.

I called my buddy, Chuck, who built the Leading Links for the RT, and he said I should weld the old front onto the new body. 

Just cut it off, he said.  Just build a jig, he said.  Just tack it in the corners and weld it up, he said.  This didn’t take into account that:

1. I didn’t know how to weld (at the time)
2. I didn’t have a welder (at the time)
3. I didn’t even have decent cut off tools (at the time)

Importantly, I still didn't have $3000 for a new tub.

But hey, I was eager to learn.  Ok, maybe not eager but willing. Thankfully I have skilled friends who are willing to teach.

A 5 inch angle grinder is one of my most used pieces of equipment.  

A good quality 1mm thick cutting disk used adroitly... is an efficient parter of metal.

And fingers for the careless. You must be able to count to 10 before AND after. 

MIG welders well set up are easy to use. 

With thin metal it's about not getting it to hot to prevent distortion.

Buckling and bulging. 

So lots of small tacks spread around. 

Practise on the old pieces.

Mind there was a guy locally that had a Ural for sale with a similarly stoved in front.

He had beaten it back out again.

The cut and shut will be easier.

Metalwork is a good hobby not career. 

In my experience anyway, others may differ. 

Now where's the pop corn button.

There was someone on the Hoosegow forum who made the whole front of his Ural tub hinge open.  If I remember right, he basically welded in a frame structure for both parts.  All done, it sure made for an easy way to enter and exit. 

Since you are making one tub from two, this might be an opportunity to get creative. 🙂 

side note:  something is wrong with my browser and I can't get the Thumbs Up icon to light.  So, until I figure that out.  We are writing "two paws up" to all the above posts.  🙂

I believe......I  say, I do believe.....that  the  sidecar  that  Sheath is talking about is  down under,  in the  land of OZ.

ask Bruce Carson.....brstar......which one of  his mates down  under  did the hinged nose on his Ural style tub.