I met the previous owner and took the bike for a ride long enough to run thru all the gears, weave thru some twisty roads and try the brakes, lights and horn. It seemed to accelerate and stop well and the first noticeable issue was that the clutch lever was hard to pull. I checked underneath the bike and didn't see any leaking and all the fluids seemed to be at the right levels. I realized this was a 26 year old bike, and frankly figured I needed to factor in 20% of the purchase price to fix all the unknown or hidden issues. When I worked out a price that allowed me the leeway I needed I pulled the trigger.
I was able to ride the bike home, park it in my garage and scheduled a visit to my local BMW dealer to have them do a detailed post-purchase inspection. As luck would have it, while I was driving it to the dealer, I pulled in the clutch cable and it snapped. Perhaps if I had looked closer I would have seen that the clutch cable was frayed under the rubber boot. Anyway, the previous owner had pointed out a worn spot in the cable sheath and had also included a spare cable. However, he had purchased a spare throttle cable -not a clutch cable. So instead of making a quick roadside repair of the included cable, I had to get a ride to the dealer, buy the new cable and install it myself. Lesson #1 learned.
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