BMW R75

The BMW R75 was a World War II-era motorcycle and sidecar combination produced by the German company BMW, notable for its integral two-wheel drive, with drive shafts to both the rear wheel and the sidecar wheel from a locking differential and a transfer case giving road and off-road ratios. Development began in 1938 at the request of the German Army, first with a 750 cc side valve engine based on the R71 and then with an all-new overhead valve 750 cc unit that became the basis of the postwar R51/3, R67 and R68. The Zündapp KS 750 competed with it, and standardisation of parts between the two reached 70 percent commonality. Production ceased in 1944 when the Eisenach factory was badly damaged by Allied bombing, and the Soviets assembled a further 98 in 1946 as reparations. Its layout inspired the Soviet M-72, the Chinese Yangtze River 750 and the Harley-Davidson XA.