BMW K SERIES: THE COMPLETE STORY

While BMW motorcycles are rightly synonymous with the 'R series' boxer twins that are at the core of its history and heritage, it's the German firm's alternative K series, its high-tech, multi-cylinder motorcycles, that are just as significant in its recent history. 

First launched in 1983 with the ultra-modern K100, a liquid-cooled and fuel-injected 4-cylinder that was radically laid 'flat', BMW's new direction quickly spawned a whole family of hi-tech K series machines that remain, in the form of the current 6-cylinder, luxurious, grand touring K1600GTL, its flagship machines. Over that time over thirty different models, ranging from the K75 triple through the revolutionary K1, multiple K1100, 1200 and 1300 4-cylinder roadsters, sports-tourers and tourers, in two completely different engine layouts right up to the world-leading K1600 six, have all been technical trend-setters, featured class-leading performance and been lavished with luxury few manufacturers can match. 

This book is the first to round up all of those machines, from the K series' radical beginnings and the men behind them in the 1980s to today's ultra high-tech and luxurious 'full-dressers'. BMW expert Phil West, author of BMW Airhead Twins and BMW GS, has again painstakingly researched their complete history, found pictures never published before, and recounts the whole K series story in a comprehensive and engaging tale.