They tend to favour Honda engines for testing as they are so well built, but apparently that will be changing due to 'political' reasons. Bang for buck, the manager showing me round rated BMW engines. They're not the most reliable, but they are the best balancing reliability with the amount of power Bee-Emm squeeze out of them.
Occasionally one will blow up on the test bed, a K1200 put a rod through it's sump one time making hell of a bang as it split the case, and was then engulfed in a fireball as hot oil sprayed onto the glowing down pipes. The test rooms are all sealed though, with copious amounts of fire fighting devices and nozzles everywhere in them.
The bike below had been parked outside for two years before I got to it and was covered in dust, pollen and tree sap. Came up almost like new, shows what damage road salt does to a bike as this had seen none.
