1988 BMW K1

When I hit my twenties, the BMW K1 was impossibly glamorous. It was the poster bike for motorcycling. As a casual observer, I didn’t realise it was BMW’s attempt to appeal to younger riders, seduced by Japanese sportsbikes such as the Suzuki GSX-R1100. And I didn’t know that BMW’s engineering and quality control—for once—was deeply flawed. To me, the K1 was the kind of motorcycle Luke Skywalker would ride if he existed in real life: a blend of warp speed power and futuristic styling. It was a machine straight from the pages of JG Ballard’s Vermillion Sands: glossy, lurid and...