For this trip we decided to have the couples riding together and the single riders also riding together so Howard, Adan and Roland left earlier at about 8:30am and Rick and Linda, Doug and Tammie, Bob and Caron and Paula and I left at around 9:15am. We then would all meet in Taos, NM for the evening.
After seeing the Cadillac farm just outside Amarillo we made our way West on the I40 towards Tucumcari, NM. We had been on the road for about 45 minutes and done about 50 miles when I had to change gears and my clutch lever felt very funny. It felt as it had no pressure on it at all and changing gears was becoming difficult. As you do not need a clutch one the right gear is in place and the rest of the way to Tucumcari was highway there would be no issue until we had to stop or ride through town so I calmed down and just enjoyed the way. It was quite windy and we were riding on a highway in the NW part of Texas (which is quite flat) so I focused on the music and let my mind wander.
As we pulled in Tucumcari we had a stop street with quite a lot of traffic coming through so I had to stop the bike but the clutch just did not engage so had to let the bike stall. Paula got off the bike and then I had to turn it on Neutral and put in gear without a clutch and hold the horses so she would not jerk too much. After some tries I was able to time it just right with no traffic coming through and roll the bike to the closest gas station where I stopped it and put it on the center stand.
It turned out that my clutch fluid was totally shot and with lack of viscosity there was just nothing to create an hydraulic effect so we knew we had to bleed the clutch hydraulic system but the question is substitute the liquid with what. After all we were in the middle of nowhere by BMW Motorrad dealer standards as the closest dealer in Albuquerque was 200 miles away. After a read on the Owners Manual that told us NOT to put brake fluid but did not tell us what to put, a call to Joel Watson which told us the system uses a special BMW Mineral Oil we decided the best option was to see if we could find Mineral Oil. Rick and Doug went to look for it in auto stores, pharmacies and finally found it at the Dollar store. The rest of us found places to eat and had our lunch.
They finally came back and here is a picture of what we put in the BMW hydraulic clutch system.
Lubricant Laxative can now have a new use to add to "relief of occasional constipation" !
Here is some pics of the Laxative doctors and I can add that the stuff is odorless, colorless and very slippery. About tasteless no one wanted to try.
We left the bike with the clutch pulled in (our master surgeon Rick believed this would get rid of all the air in the hydraulic system) while we finished our lunch.
When I got back to the bike, the clutch did indeed feel much better and pressure had returned back to the hydraulics. We started up and changing gears was possible and although did not feel perfect it was rideable.
We made our way to Las Vegas, no not the one that is well known but the one in New Mexico which by the way is very different. All was well for about 40 minutes or so and then the mineral oil started to fail under heat and clutch was useless again. The good thing though is after stopping at Las Vegas, the bike cooled down and the clutch was back and it was very much like this all the way to Taos, NM.
So the good news is that we made it all the way to Taos, NM. The not so good news is we have not been able to find any liquid that is better than what is in there now.
During the evening I put a post in Adventure Riders about our experience and got an interesting post back which said to go to a bicycle shop and get Magura Blood Mineral Oil from Shimano. It seems this is used for bicycles disc brakes. So this morning (Monday) we will go to a shop in town and get this and see if it fixes the problem.
Unfortunately another post said (and so did Joel) that problem may be more serious and I have a faulty slave cylinder which would mean BMW dealership again which by the way are closed on Mondays in this part of the world.
Oh well, lets see how it goes. So far we continue the trip.
We did ride through some amazing terrain specially as we approached Taos on the 518. I specially enjoyed the twisties as we passed Sipapu Ski Resort.
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