I think Triumph were the only Co to use chrome - talk about vanity! I had two R100RSs, did 100k miles on them, great bikes!

 

Well, the Jap stuff all had shiny stainless steel discs that did not work that great in either dry or wet. But yes, what a crime to chrome luvley iron discs. I have an 81 RS. Has to be the best fairing ever in wet weather. I used to ride it to work in my office clothes in the monsoon season here and usually got there completely dry, if I could avoid stopping at a red light!

 

Goddit! Sort of.

Re-bled the system. Plenty of good flow even with maximum pedal pressure then crack the bleed nipple, so no sign of old hose blocking up, methinks.

Pumped the caliper piston almost right out, no sign of gunge or sticking, greased it up with rubber grease and ran it in and out a few times. All free there.

Checked the pads and rotor again. Aha! Yes as suggested by some of the expert panel on here, there was a few thou wear on the disc and a slight step at the inner diameter of the swept area. And the marks on the back of the pads from the piston indicate the pads were sitting high on that inner edge.
So a whopping great chamfer filed along that edge, particularly in the centre where it bears on the inner diameter. And a smaller chamfer along the outer edges just in case.

Locked up the back wheel at the first street corner, at about 15mph, so much improved already and presumeably will get better as the new(ish) pads bed in further to the worn disc. Went for a spin around town and woohoo the back brake is actually slowing me down now.

Still not what I call a brilliant back brake but on par with the fronts now.

But I bought some 10mm aluminium alloy plate in town today to make the adaptor plates for the GSXR-750 4-pot calipers to go on the front so will have to decide then whether to match the rear or if it will be ok as stock.

But for the time being it is plenty good now.
Thanks for all the help guys. One of those blindingly simple things I just did not see, I guess.

 

Good to here you have it working close to right

 

Just been busy out in the shed cutting up some 10mm aluminum alloy plate. Got one front caliper bracket done, one more to go.

 

Great to hear you've sorted your brake! Back to the interesting stuff, I bought an original RS in '77 and then one of the Motosport specials. As you say, best fairing ever! BMWs haven't been the same since. My only other one was a K1, as the spiritual successor of the RS. Four cylinders good, two cylinders better (with apologies to George Orwell)!

 

Yes, that is why I bought another Harley. Seen too many problems with the modern BMs blowing bevel drives, $5,000 ABS modules, gear boxes etc etc. Love the old Airhead though.
At least the old Evo is simple to keep running and repair on the odd occasion that it might need it.
Have you heard about the Aussie bloke Peter Forwood who rode his 94 Electra Glide to every country in the world, doing 670,000km in the process? Two top end rebuilds. Bottom end and gearbox untouched. Broke a few belts along the way - on dirt roads in Congo etc.
I cant see the new BMs keeping up with that. (His story is on the Horizons Unlimited website.)

 

Yes, I did read a few episodes - just isn't easy to take in what is involved, day after day! Ted Simon did a round the World trip on a Triumph 500 back in the 70s IIRC, also Charlie Boorman has done stacks of daft long trips on BMW twins. I think I prefer to stay at home and read about them!!!!

 

Ted Simon re-rode part of his old trip recently on a BMW GS, fell off and broke his leg in Africa. He wrote a book about the recent trip too, quite interesting.

 

You'd think he'd be old enough to know better these days! Mrs B and I took a trip through the Channel Tunnel with our bike a while ago, on a trip to Hungary and shared our space with a chap with a BMW Adventure. Darn seat is chest high to me FFS! I'd fall off it trying to get on.....