And, there the bike sits, for a while, during the construction of a home theatre in the basement. [Blog entry to come soon.]
Installation was not the 10 minutes advertised by Bob. He must be a mechanical genius, or perhaps the R1200R has more room under the luggage rack to reach the mounting straps and nuts. I had to fiddle and force my hand and wrench under the rack, but got it done.
Before
Givi Plate retaining strap
There are 4 of these.
After some time, I attached two of them at the front of the Givi plate, let them dangle, fed each through the holes in the BMW luggage rack, reached awkwardly under to fasten the nylok nuts, and just snugged them up. Since the nylock nuts resist tightening as much as loosening, this is not the easiest thing to do.
After - Givi plate attached
Not shown: there is a flat cover plate that conceals the grated area of the Givi mounting plate shown in the picture above.
Functional Storage
The box is suitably large:
Looks Great!
When I picked it up, the parts guy said this was his personal favourite Givi model. I too think some of the other designs are a bit too rounded, and kind of plain as a result.
Conclusion
Guess Bob is not really too much at fault for getting me to part with my money. He did all the leg work in finding such a bargain. I was able to get this box for $289.95, tax included! And, that was about $100 less than Bob paid. Some dealers seem to sell them for much more than the Givi recommended price.