Total Motorcycle Community Forums

I have a 1995 BMW R1100RS with 37K miles. It recently started to run very poorly, hard to start and would stumble and fall on its face with moderate to full throttle acceleration. I took it to a BMW dealer for a quote on what the problem might be, and they came back with "its in the wiring harness" they want too replace the entire wiring harness, and quoted me a fee that is more than 1/2 what the bike might sell for. $1800. I don't know whether to try and find the fault myself or really how to go about it. Or should I sell "as is", or part the bike out?
Any suggestions out there?
Dave

The Service Dept. wrote: "its in the wiring harness"

That's not far off of "There seems to be a problem sir". Are they planning to replace the harness and all the electrical components?

If they mean the problem is in the harness itself then the question is can you figure out where the problem is, and take the harness apart enough to fix it. Or buy a harness and install it yourself and save on the labor.

Throughtout the Southeast at least this approach of "you need a new motorcycle" seems to be the rule at BMW dealerships.

That's a ridiculous idea, telling you to buy a new harness. They are taking advantage of you. Report them to whomever will let you.

Your hard start and bad acceleration problems could be anything from clogged FI system to a bad Hall Sensor. I had a '02 R1150 with some troubles, the Hall Sensor went bad very early.

The bike has a cult following; I'd search through the BMW forums and totalmotorcycle to find if someone's had the same problem already.

$1800 is mostly the labor required to UN-zip tie the harness from the frame and then re-run the wire and attach it. Replacing the whole thing is actually faster than trouble shooting for bad sections and replacing them individually.

Check and see if there is/a service bulletin for the bike. Unfortunately you have probably exceeded the deadline on that.

P