sport touring h2 dual direction quickshift

For those who have one, ownership should bring only rich contentment. As desirable and pointless as a carbon-fibre Spitfire. Here then is the ultimate air-cooled boxer. It was also unique in the way each camshaft actuated one inlet and one outlet valve, a necessity if the new camshafts were to be chain driven from the crank.īeautiful skew-ground cam lobes acting on drag levers allowed BMW’s engineers to position the valves radially for a more compact combustion chamber.ĭespite making the most power it was the smoothest, most liquid of boxers at high rpm, soaking up abuse as it revved fluently to a lofty 9000rpm.ĩ8 RON petrol was required for optimal performance, though, while, most exotically of all, new con rods were specified at the 30,000-mile service. Its dohc engine, a first for a BMW boxer, would soon be transplanted onto the new R1200GS, but for a year it was boxer exotica - and the best of them all.

Even its carbon cam covers came with nylon sliders. Virtually every conceivable performance enhancing modification had been installed at the factory. Nonetheless, a quick-shifter one-piece Brembo front brake calipers Öhlins shocks carbon bodywork throughout a new, high revving, double-overhead cam iteration of the opposed twin ultra adjustability and a data-recording 2D Systems dash made it the most pre-modified sports bike ever seen. The HP2 Sport was conceived as a £20,000 rival to the Ducati 1098R rather than the £15,200 competitor to the base Ducati it ended up as.įactory insiders say BMW lost their nerve slightly and down-spec’d at the last minute. Its 189 kilos was a seriously competitive weight its 120-ish horsepower just enough… The riding position was quickly and minutely adjustable. There was no conventional rear frame either: the carbon seat unit was the sub-frame and once the exhaust it supported was detached could be removed by undoing just four bolts. The front and back ends of the HP2 could be quickly unbolted – it was pure endurance.

The limited edition road going HP2 Sport that followed in 2008 was no watered down look-a-like but an authentic stab at transferring the magic of racer to the road. How could anyone with a heart not support a bike that had more in common with the machinery in the Le Mans campsites than the World Superbike spec bikes it was competing with on the Bugatti circuit? Here was BMW’s most belligerent and maverick statement yet the ultimate reason not to do the easy thing and buy a four-cylinder liquid-cooled motorcycle. On paper it was hopeless and exactly how boxer addicts like it. Touring-style Telelever front suspension and clunky, power-sapping shaft drive were just the start of its quirks.īMW’s flat twins, so brilliantly configured for air-cooling, also have inherent ground clearance issues that quickly become a limiting factor on track.Īnd while the 140bhp HP2 had by far the most powerful boxer engine yet seen, it was still 60bhp down on the factory Kawasaki ZX-10s and Suzuki GSX-R1000s - and surely on the giddy limit of reliability. It was radical, yes, beautiful too, and dripping in carbon and Öhlins, but still only a pair of heated grips short of an R1200RT. The HP2 elevated the old twins to a new level of willful contrariness. So when in 2007 BMW wheeled out its most daring boxer ever to compete against the 190bhp Japanese superbikes in the World Endurance Championship, it was almost too much for followers of air-cooled BMWs. In the case of the BMW boxer that speed must come from this 90-year-old design, which, compared to the near-weightless internals of modern superbike engine, reciprocates with the urgency of Stephenson’s Rocket.īeing a BMW that engine must also be mounted in a rolling chassis that is fundamentally designed for touring. If you do you kiss goodbye to normality and sign up to the fringes of mainstream motorcycling, driven by an irrational need to ride a bike that makes its speed the hard way. If you don’t, life is simple: you buy a Fireblade or an R1 and go zooming about. You either love the idea of trying to make a twin-cylinder air-cooled engine that’s based on an old 1923 knocker go like the clappers, or you don’t.

Sport touring h2 dual direction quickshift