I’ve featured a few high dollar BMW’s lately so I thought it might be time to feature a bike that I still think is dollar for dollar the best bargain on a BMW out there. If you think you know another, put it in the comments section. I’d love to hear your opinion. Another runner-up was the ugly duckling R1200ST.
Maybe the best iteration of the flying brick was the 1200cc motor. It made 130 horsepower, was incredibly smooth, and reliable as the sun. However, the K1200RS never really got the recognition it deserved thanks to BMW trying to convince the world it was a sport bike with silly graphics of checkered flags. The common complaint was that the bike was just too heavy to be taken seriously as a sport bike. I can only assume the poor sales of this bike contributed to the demise of the K engine, and the introduction of a Japanese style four. The brick is dead, long live the brick. However, in retrospect the K1200RS was always designed to be a sport-tourer, playing on BMW’s strengths in that part of the market. It was made to carry bags and spend long days in the saddle. Maybe it’s not shocking that BMW decided to make a few changes to the RS and call it the GT and sell them side by side. To the eye, the only real difference between the first generation K1200GT and the K1200RS is that the GT has more wind protection. There’s an extra lip on the fairing and a taller windscreen. Most of the other characteristics carry over. The only other difference I can think of is that I believe the GT had painted cases. For a sport tourer, the extra weight plays in its favor at high speeds.
I really believe this was BMW’s best tourer of the period, even better than the 1150 RT. What’s shocking to me is low prices have gotten. While this is an exceptional bike with only 17,000 miles and beautiful navy blue paint, it’s not unusual to see these bikes priced in the $3-4,000 neighborhood. Like a lot of K Bikes, sometimes the mileage in the ads is in scientific notation, but fear not, that bike still has plenty of life left in it. See Abhi’s story about his iron butt K75 with 88,000 miles. For the right person that who wants to tour at a fast clip, wants to carry a passenger and lots of luggage but doesn’t want to spend a lot I think this represents a relative bargain. Cycle World agreed back in 2012, even before the prices dipped farther.
This bike is available in Auburn, California for $5,200 here on Panjo. Long live the brick.