BMW R100 Tracker by Garage Sheriff

BMW R100 Tracker

We are thrilled to bring you guys this handsome-as-heck BMW R100RT tracker, which was largely a father/son project between Charles-Élie Dumontier of Montreal’s Garage Sheriff and his dad.

As you may know, the R100RT was the touring version of the venerable R100 series, introduced in 1976. It followed in the wake of the R100RS–BMW’s first faired sport bike–and the R100RT was meant to compete against Harley’s big touring bikes.  It offered a 980cc, 70-hp airhead motor paired with a full cocoon of fairing, adjustable windshield, and options like heated grips.

BMW R100RT Tracker

Charles-Élie bought the bike as a literal basket-case, then set to work turning this once-whale of a touring machine into the hard-nosed, black-and-gold beauty you see here. We love a machine that is as practical as it is appetizing, and this bike stands its ground as a daily rider with double-disc front brakes, functional rubber, uprated suspension, upright riding position, and stubby (but intact) fenders. All of this orbits that blacked-out boxer engine, one of the most bulletproof and versatile designs of all time.

BMW R100RT Custom

Below, Charles-Élie of Garage Sheriff gives us the full story on the build.

BMW R100RT Tracker:  In the Builder’s Words

BMW R100 Street Tracker

(Words by Charles-Élie of Garage Sheriff. Highlights by us.)

I bought this bike in pieces. Every single part of the motorcycle was mixed up in a box. That made the build even more challenging.

I was lucky enough to have my dad’s help during this project.

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So we started out with the front fork conversion. I wanted to keep the original front wheel while upgrading the front suspension and the braking system. To do that, I made some spacers and bushings to fit the Suzuki Katana front disc on the BMW original wheel.

For the subframe, we wanted to do something different so we used a metal triangle instead of tubes to support it. The problem with that idea was that we needed some really long rear shocks. After a week of searching for shocks of the right length, I finally found some XR500 1980 that were long enough.

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We really tried to keep this bike as clean and simple as possible. The engine was fully rebuilt and painted. Both fenders come from a CB900 front fender that I chopped.

The speedo was custom-made by Speedhut.

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The seat has a small but great special feature, the sensor from the M-lock made by Motogadget is hidden under the fabrics in the back. So to turn the bike on, all you need to do is to tap the chip on the back of the seat and VOILA!

The lower and upper triple trees were custom made by Cognito Moto. For the electricity part of the build, we used Motogadget’s stuff pretty much everywhere. The battery box is hidden under the transmission.

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