This standard /7 era tank has been customized with some nicely done recesses in the kneepad area, which change the looks a great deal. It's somewhat reminiscent of the custom tanks often found on British cafe racers of the 1960's.

I spotted this tank for sale at a swap meet, and took a photo to share with all of you. This one is a fiberglass tank of unknown pedigree. The tool box lid looks like a stock BMW item - perhaps from an R25 or plunger twin. There were dozens of small nicks in the black paint, which you can see in the photo as white marks. These extend down to the plastic. I don't know if this was for a /2 era bike or for a newer machine.

A German made Habermann tank, this one photographed in the Spring of 2001 at one of the few shows I was able to sneak away to attend. It was just out of reach in the center of this full sized pickup, so I couldn't give it a light tap to verify that it was fiberglass - but that's my guess. It looks very much like a 10 gallon Heinrich except for the racy lower back end treatment around the bike sidecovers.

This isn't the best angle to see this tank, but it's a nice shot of what looks like a sporting tank on this pre-war R51 racer.

A year or so back a friend of mine asked me to find him a /5 large police tank, and this was the tank I got for him from Germany. The cover still had an elaborate switch mechanism for controlling the police radio, which weighed a lot! This cover was quickly replaced with a standard toolbox cover, and the tank makes a nice accessory on a stock /5.

...what I would bet is a copy of a small Heinrich (done in fiberglass) on this clean looking R69S.

Here we have a standard /6 small tank which has been notched out for clearance for the riders knees.

BMW police tanks are not that common here in the States - but a lot of people (myself included) like how they look on a bike. They are pretty easy to find in Germany though, and not all that expensive either in used condition. I brought this tank back for a friend of mine to use on his R65LS (see next photo). This tank would also work on an R45 or R65.

Here is the same green tank (above) a few months later. A new tool box cover was ordered from Germany to replace the missing part. The tank is finished in red with a flat black lower treatment as used on the LS models, and it's now mounted up on the bike. 

A very nice looking Heinrich 8.2 gallon Fuhrmann II tank that recently changed hands, and is now headed for a /6 era machine. For those of you out there like this fellow that need to replace your incorrect or missing Heinrich kneepads, I now have a template to make your own in the "Service Bulletin" section of my web page.