Yesterday I got to give the "new" BMW factory windscreen a real work-out, riding 580+ miles in a day on both interstates and in the twisties, so here's a short review...
For those of you unfamiliar with this "new" windscreen, it was shown at Intermot last year, and was posted about on the "old" http://www.r1150r.net board (ezboard). Here's a link to a picture:
http://www.bobsbmw.com/parts_accessorie ... ields.html
(scroll about 3/4's down the page, and look for "High Windshield 380mm for R1150R")
How's it work?
Well, as with most things, it has both it's good points and not-so-good points...
1.) Appearance - I think it actually looks great mounted. Evokes memories of 1950's road racers to me, and looks smaller on the bike than you think it will when you first take it out of the box. Very similar to the Bikescreens NZ screen that mounts on the BMW flyscreen mounts, but not raked quite so far back. You will have to decide for yourself if you like the looks of the bracing uprights or not. I do.
2.) Mounting - A royal pain. Makes mounting the flyscreen easy by comparison. You have to disasemble about half the front end of the motorcycle to mount it properly. However, the trade-off for this is the shield is wonderfully rigid in use, and does not move in any way no matter what the sidewind or speed. Bracket did line up perfectly, just like most BMW-made accessories. Took me about an hour to pull my flyscreen and mount this one, working carefully and methodically. One great thing is it does *NOT* use the usual BMW expanding rubber grommets to mount the shield. No sir... Hole in the shield take captured *BIG* rubber grommets, internally threaded posts welded to the bracketry come through these grommets, and large dished washers go over the grommets on the outside and big screws thread in on top holding it all together. No more windscreen popping out of the mounts!
3.) Shield quality - Typical BMW, only better. Optically perfect, with no distortion whatsoever, anywhere. The best way to describe the shape is as though they cut a section out of a sphere, No reverse flips, no contours, nothing... Just a smooth, rounded bubble. Shield is thicker than any BMW shield I have ever seen, and is stiff, stiff, stiff. Ultra-rigid. Looking through it is like looking through clear, mountain air...
4.) Performance - This will depend a lot on how tall you are, how high a seat you have, what bar arrangement, etc. I am 5'8" tall, but rather long torso'ed and short legged. I have a Sargent saddle, and I use "Ricky" bars. You most definitely look "over" this shield... Way over. It is actually raked back quite a bit when mounted - much more so than how it appears in pictures - though not as far back as the Bikescreens shield. For me it is about 10-15mm too short, or it is raked back just a bit too far. The windblast coming off the shield hits me right at about face shield level, and I really wanted to to try and get it to toss the bugs over my head instead of splatting right on my shield. At this it does a better job than any shield I have tried, but it's not quite "there' yet... However, the airflow off of it is wonderfully smooth and quiet... No excessive noise, no buffeting. Just smooth flowing air. Your helmet remains completely where you want it, with no bouncing or buffeting around, and however loud your helmet was before is how loud it will be with this shield. For this alone it is worth the price. I have never ridden behind a quieter or smoother shield on a "naked" type bike, period. I cannot stress this enough...
Now, what would I change? Like I said, I wish it was just 10 or 15 - maybe 20 - mm taller, but I think I can achieve the same thing by gently bending the support/mounting bracketry to make the shield just a bit more upright. I only hope this won't spoil the good looks of the shield, nor muck up the airflow... In order to avoid this kind of thing I am going to go very slowly with the "bending" adjustments.
All in all, I am very happy with it, and perhaps the best compliment I can give it is that all of my regular riding buddies who ride with me quite often didn't even notice I had swapped to it from the flyscreen... When I mentioned later in the day I was pleased with the my new windscreen they all then said things along the lines of "Wow, I hadn't even noticed you didn't have the little screen on..."
So, for the "new" BMW Roadster screen, I give a solid 9.0...
Of course, YMMV...
Cheers!
Dallara
