Members

enjoying Maryvale Pub on a Club Lunch Ride

By Life Member Tony Malone

In 2014 I purchased a R1200RT; the new liquid cooled ones with a wet clutch. She looked wonderful, Callista Grey metallic matte, and the features were simply out of this world. One of those was the Navigator V, and while (sometimes) I am very stuck in tradition one often needs to come to grips with technological advances; pushrod days are over. And so, when I was going somewhere that I was not familiar with I would enter the address into the Navigator, and it would tell me how to go. Amazing!

Now the RT might have felt a bit offended when I purchased one of those R1250RT Option 719 things (hand pinstripes etc.) and sitting under the house for around a year while I was out enjoying 100KW and semi-active suspension I think that she worked ways of getting back at me. I should have taken her out on the town from time to time, but never really got around to it. She sullenly plotted revenge.

Time moved on, and due to disappointments in some respects (no-one wanted to buy my 1200) I sold the R1250RT. One of the consolations behind this was that I had (I thought) a perfectly good RT, which would do the job while waiting for the new arrival. After apologising and asking for forgiveness I fired her up again. Sadly, we were not reconciled as I had hoped! The Navigator started to play up.

It started out with little irritations, not responding when I pushed the icons and keypad to enter destinations. It would then change the map view all by itself, and sometimes that was difficult to override as the screen would not respond to my pressing on the icons etc. Sometimes it worked fine, but then would fail completely. Simply turning it on an off (the rebooting trick) did not work.

She was cracking a fit !

Within the Club I sought some advice, and one thing suggested was to update the device. I had not done this as thought it would cost money. Exploring the Garmin site proved that it did not. I think it updated to version 3.5, and while this might have caused some small changes in behaviour the overall problem remained. I then started to think of other ways to try to sort it.

One of the experiences was that it seemed to work better in cooler weather. I left it in the freezer one night, and it seemed to work okay the next ride. Thinking that the problems had been solved, I soon realised that I was deceiving myself. The issues returned. The problem was within the device’s heart.

Taking more advice, Paul Hughes suggested that I needed to recalibrate the screen. (If you want to know what I mean here have a look at the web. There are a number of videos which will show you how to do it; remove the device, power off, power on, press into the top left corner of the screen and press the buttons that will appear on the screen after reboot). The problem was that as it was not responding to touch, and so pressing the top left corner did nothing other than to simply allow the device to restart.

Arriving home the other day and turning the machine off, the Navigator gave the usual advice that it was turning off in 30 seconds, and if I wanted to do that now to press the cancel button. This I did, and out of the ordinary it did. Then realising that it was in one of those rare moments of responding to touch I tried the recalibration process. It worked! While turning itself on there were 3 words which kept scrolling down the screen, and lo and behold, what I had tried so long to achieve happened, the button which I needed to press appeared. I pushed and held this, and nothing happened. I started the process again, and the button appeared. I quickly pressed (not held) the screen. Another appeared in a different quarter. This went on for 20 or 30 occasions, and I wondered if this was another fruitless exercise.

And then it happened! The device told me that the screen was recalibrated, we were friends again and everything seemed to work as it had. I could even input address destinations. Wondering if the forgiveness was complete I took her for the mid-week ride yesterday, and the Navigator V worked just fine. Problem solved.

What I intend to do now is use the 10K services as a reminder, and each time that comes around to recalibrate the device (the fact it had worked for about 6 years and 90,000 kilometres without fail before 2020 deceived me into thinking it would last forever). This should avoid the catch 22 situation of the touch screen failing, which can only be resolved with the touch screen accepting your request to recalibrate. As in life, pushing with greater pressure did not help.

Modern technology is a great thing. However, it seems that we need to develop ways to best deal with it so that it can continue to assist us. Because if your Navigator is not working, you will find yourself lost as I did on some occasions contemplating what it is like when

I amAlone

100 Year Dinner Celebration - Thurs 21st September

Display of Bikes - Sat 23rd September

Thebike display will be run by our club at the central location of Reddacliff Place in Brisbane. We are looking for suitable bikes from all years and all models to display at this special event to celebrate this enormous achievement of the BMW brand that we all love to ride.

Do you have a bike that is suitable? If it is an older BMW (60’s or earlier) and it is completely assembled, presentable, registered or not, we want to hear from you.

If your BMW bike is from the ‘70’s up to latest models and is in good visual condition, special or a rare model, we want to hear from you as well.

We have a target of one hundred bikes, to display an example of as many different models as possible. A selection process will be undertaken from the applications and consideration will given to bikes that fit the above criteria as well as bikes with high kilometres or extraordinary travel achievements.

To nominate your bike please register at: Display Registration

• What Model it is.

• Year of Manufacture.

• Total Km’s Travelled.

• Longest Journey Travelled.

• A Photo.

We want one of every BMW! But do we want this R100R Bobber? Could cook a nice lunch under the tank though...

BMW started production of the BMW R 32 in Munich in 1923. That is definitely worth celebrating!

To see the Promotional Video for the the events celebrating click on the Link below: https://vimeo.com/796122577

To celebrate the 100th anniversary of BMW Motorcycles the BMWMCQ are hosting a dinner event on Thursday 21st September This will be the warm-up to the Display of Bikes on Saturday 23rd September!

Date: Thursday 21st September 2023

Time: 6:30pm – although there is a lovely bar area if you arrive earlier for a drink

Cost: $60 per person for a sit down dinner with share table style dining

Venue: Royal QLD Yacht Squadron, 578 Royal Esplanade Manly QLD 4179

Nearby accommodation:

Manly Hotel (pub style) 54 Cambridge St, Manly (07) 3249 5999

Manly Marina Cove Motel (next to Yacht Club) 578a Royal Esplanade Manly (07) 3348 1000 Or check out AirBnB listings in the area.

BOOKINGS LINK: LINK TO DINNER RESERVATION

Concours – Saturday 23rd September 2023

This event will be run by the BMWMCQ at the central location of Reddacliff Place in Brisbane, in the CBD.

We are looking for suitable bikes from all years and all models to display at this special event to celebrate this enormous achievement of the BMW brand that we all love to ride.

Do you have a bike that is suitable? If it is an older BMW (60’s or earlier) and it is completely assembled, presentable, registered or not, we want to hear from you.

If your BMW bike is from the ‘70’s up to latest models and is in good visual condition, special or a rare model, we want to hear from you as well.

We have a target of one hundred bikes, to display an example of as many different models as possible. A selection process will be undertaken from the applications and consideration will be given to bikes that fit the above criteria as well as bikes with high kilometres or extraordinary travel achievements.

If your interested in applying to show your bike please use this link to the application form: Link: CLICK HERE

See the Video for the full celebration plans https://vimeo.com/796122577

NEW ZEALAND - THE FINAL CHAPTER

BY TONY GRAY MEMBER # 3905

Whenwe last left you we had ridden approx 4,000km around NZ’s beautiful South island and were contemplating jumping on a ferry to cross to the North Island. There was the small matter of a Tropical Cyclone bearing down on the North Island to consider but what is a bike holiday without a bit of adventure. To put this story into context it needs an understanding of how the Inter Island Ferry Services function on the Cook Strait.

There is the Nationally owned Interislander Service operated by NZRail and the privately owned and operated Bluebridge Service. Each operator has three vehicle/passenger ferries that regularly perform the 3.5 hour crossing between the Ports of Wellington and Picton. These services carry freight, livestock, buses, trucks, cars and motorcycles as well as walk up passengers. The country cannot operate without these services. We had bookings on Interislander heading North on 11 Feb and returning South on 28 Feb in order to have our bike back to Christchurch on 3 March for its return passage home. Our first passage gave an insight of what lay ahead - late notice that our ferry was delayed so rather than having an afternoon to look around Wellington we arrived late at night.

We were keeping a close watch on the cyclone’s path and had decided to avoid the east coast and keep to the centre or west coast but hey this was NZ with Auckland at 36 degrees South so not Tropical North Qld. Hardly severe cyclone territory. We ventured north on Hwy 1 across the infamous Desert Road (always wet & cold for us) then took shelter in a cabin at a fairly remote park on the southern edge of Lake Taupo as Cyclone Gabrielle started to vent its fury on NZ.

We sat out a day as the wind bent and broke trees around us, power & internet services were down but we were safe and had enough food to keep us sustained. The park operators generously put on a sausage sizzle for their clientele on their gas BBQ. Reports we were getting were sketchy but the coast east & south of Auckland around the beautiful Coromandel Peninsula, Bay of Plenty & Hawke Bay had taken a severe battering over several days. Access to the impacted areas was almost impossible and recovery efforts slow to be implemented. A National State of Emergency was declared on 14 February. We got the distinct impression that the country was in a state of shock and that they had been ill prepared for such an event. This was somewhat surprising given they have had to deal with major earthquakes on a regular basis. The final tally accounted for the loss of eleven lives and a damages bill estimated at $13.5 Billion NZD making it the costliest tropical cyclone in the Southern Hemisphere (source:wikipedia).

The winds where we stayed were gusting to 125kph which was too much for many of the pine forests. We were unable to leave until the afternoon of the 13th after a path out had been cleared. We crossed many areas with trees and power lines down as we tracked west to Hamilton.

The transformation was stunning - apart from some fallen trees it was business as usual. A mere 2 hours away there was total devastation. It reminded us of Brisbane in the floods - if you chose not to venture into an impacted area then you could stay in your own little protected bubble impervious to what had happened to your neighbour. This was our first visit to Hamilton and it is quite an impressive City sited on the Waikato River with Hamilton Lake and the very beautiful Hamilton Gardens with themed Gardens - our favorite was the Surrealist Garden.

We had intended heading north to the Bay of Islands and on to the most northerly road accessible point of NZ at Cape Reinga. Unfortunately land slips and fallen trees had the roads north of Auckland closed. Our plans became very much a work in progress being dictated by road closures. We turned south to New Plymouth where Mother Nature had something else in store for us.

We had walked across to the main street from our Motel for a relaxed Thai dinner on a balmy evening with a late twilight. We were seated beside a timber framed plate glass window when the frame & glass started to groan and creak under the weight of some invisible force. Next moment our chairs started to shake and we came to realize that we were experiencing our first earthquake. The whole thing settled within about 30 seconds and then quick as a flash our host came bounding out of the kitchen clutching his smart phone to announce to the patrons that we had just sat through a 6.1 (later ungraded to 6.3) magnitude earthquake. It appears that a lot of New Zealanders have the GeoNet app on their phone. The quake was off shore and quite deep so didn’t cause any notifiable damage. Just to put this into perspective, in preparing this story I looked up the NZ GeoNet site and it shows the last 100 earthquakes to be recorded - those 100 quakes had taken place over the previous 4 weeks - average 25/week. We now hoped that with a trifecta complete - Heatwave, Cyclone, Earthquake - Mother nature would allow us to peacefully continue on our travels.

New Plymouth is another of NZs comfortably sized towns around 50,000 population, big enough to have good amenities but small enough to be relaxed and within an easy walk to explore. It also boasts some impressive Architecture and street art.

It’s main feature however is its proximity to Mt Taranaki. We were yet to see the summit of this impressive mountain as it is often shrouded in cloud. Although we did grab glimpses the clear summit image still managed to elude us. We had ridden around the back of the mountain and up to Dawson Falls Lookout at just over 900 metres and as far as you can ride. Back down to Stratford and the start of the Forgotten World Highway or otherwise known as State Hwy 43. This had been closed for a couple of days and just reopened.

State Hwy 43 is touted as ‘New Zealand’s oldest heritage trail, the Forgotten World Highway is remote, mysterious and scenic’. From a motorcyclists perspective it is a great ride with a good mix of tight & twisting tar and some good gravel with a highlight being the Republic of Whangamomona. Yes, this area declared itself a Republic in 1989 and has boasted among its Presidents a goat, a sheep and a dog.

It has an impressive old pub and when we arrived it was lunchtime and there just happened to be a pair of airheads parked out front - an R90 & R65. Opportune time to stop for a pie and a chat. Graham & John aka GG & The Killa, were members of the Velocette Owners Club and the BMWs both bore NZ plates but the boys had distinctly Aussie accents. In another case of ‘it’s a small world’ it turned out they were good friends of one of my Melbourne based riding buddies (also a Velo & BMW man) and were in NZ for a Velo gathering. They had borrowed the Beemers from a local for the ride up to the Whanga Pub. Unfortunately the R90 had a few electrical problems and wouldn’t restart so some roadside head scratching required.

We stopped the night in Taumarunui after a thoroughly enjoyable day. On the ride out along State Hwy 41 we rode up to the Waihuti Lookout and were greeted with stunning views across the Tongariro National Park with the peaks of Mounts Tongariro & Ruapehu out-