We’ve all heard legends of the classic K-series BMW’s reliability, but the tale of this BMW K100 street tracker takes the cake. After all, how many motorcycles do you know that can set themselves alight, but keep on ticking"
The bike’s current owner, Duncan Bonar, found the 1985 BMW K100 at a local shop with a clean title ?but there was a catch. ?The only caveat was that it had self-immolated via an electrical fire,? he explains. ?But hey, a bike’s a bike, and a clean title is a clean title.?

Based in Los Angeles, California, Duncan is an industrial designer who likes to tinker on bikes in his downtime. By day, he works as a designer at the popular dune buggy manufacturer, Meyers Manx. And before that, he was part of the team at the boutique motorcycle brand, Arch Motorcycle. Although Duncan has recently queued up several project bikes under the moniker Dunc Werks, he started the K100 build several years ago with less urgency, working on it as and when he found the time. The K owes its brutalist aesthetic to Duncan’s industrial design background and his propensity for figuring things out as he goes. ?This was an exercise in doing it yourself with the resources at hand; an ‘often wrong but never in doubt’ kinda mentality,? he says.

Duncan’s first job was to get the K100 running after its little mishap. ?The wiring harness, electric fan, and airbox assembly were all toasted. The motor and bike were quite caked with fi...