[sasmit]

Party piece of the trio is the engine and the sharp handling.
The engine is a gem be it low end torque, mid range punch or the free revving nature.
Excellent heat management without any of the liquid cooled hassles.
One annoying thing I find with all YouTube reviewers is they tend to mention liquid cooling as a must have feature , fail to understand if a manufacturer is able to make the same or more power without the liquid cooling how can it be bad.
Dimwit reviewers just read through the specs list , just like kids used to compare trump cards 😀.

[tarmacnaut]

Originally Posted by PreethamNag

I ride a adventure 390 and have tried vstrom on multiple occasions feel the rear suspension setup very comfortable though the suspension travel is less it has never bottomed out even while offroading. It is setup soft for intial travel and then it gets harder unlike the very hard KTM setup.

Spot on, I too felt the rear better/softer than the RE Himalayan I have ridden many times.

Originally Posted by PreethamNag

longer swing arm (chain length with 114 links vs 108 of gixxer).

Good point, was looking for this data, I think the engine mapping is also different, that coupled with a long chain the VStrom rides completely different than the Gixxer 250, which always pounces while VStrom is relaxed.

[TorqueyTechie]

Spotted a newly delivered V strom today morning in Jayanagar (Bengaluru). It was being ridden by a guy wearing a helmet that had a team bhp sticker on it. Thought to give a wave/thumbs up but missed in traffic. Any one from here?

[girimajiananth]

Originally Posted by TorqueyTechie

Spotted a newly delivered V strom today morning in Jayanagar (Bengaluru). It was being ridden by a guy wearing a helmet that had a team bhp sticker on it. Thought to give a wave/thumbs up but missed in traffic. Any one from here?

Was it a yellow vstrom with no number plate yet ? White and blue Vega helmet ? At around 11 am? If yes, then it was me. I took the bike out for a quick errand. Got the bike delivered on Saturday.

[TorqueyTechie]

Originally Posted by girimajiananth

Was it a yellow vstrom with no number plate yet ? White and blue Vega helmet ? At around 11 am? If yes, then it was me. I took the bike out for a quick errand. Got the bike delivered on Saturday.

Yes exactly. 👍 congrats on the bike. 😊

[anandtheleo]

Originally Posted by girimajiananth

Was it a yellow vstrom with no number plate yet ? White and blue Vega helmet ? At around 11 am? If yes, then it was me. I took the bike out for a quick errand. Got the bike delivered on Saturday.

Congratulations on the new bike!

I am also looking to buy one, may i please know which showroom you got it from? Was there any wait time? What was the final on road price?

[girimajiananth]

Originally Posted by anandtheleo

Congratulations on the new bike!

I am also looking to buy one, may i please know which showroom you got it from? Was there any wait time? What was the final on road price?

I bought this from apple suzuki , kanakpura road in Bangalore. Wait time depends on the colour that you need and the availability with the dealer. It cost me 2.58L otr. I got free insurance as a part of offer from suzuki and a free riders jacket worth 7k ( yet to receive) , the dealer gave me a free wheel sticker ( the one which you can put on the alloy rim ) .

I noticed that you are from Chennai, visit a few dealers and get quotes, they often give you competitive quotes if you are a serious buyer. Certain dealers will be willing to give you more discounts if you are not too particular about colour as they want to clear all the stock. Also if you have an old bike you can ask for exchange bonus worth 7k.

[anandtheleo]

Originally Posted by girimajiananth

I bought this from apple suzuki , kanakpura road in Bangalore. Wait time depends on the colour that you need and the availability with the dealer. It cost me 2.58L otr. I got free insurance as a part of offer from suzuki and a free riders jacket worth 7k ( yet to receive) , the dealer gave me a free wheel sticker ( the one which you can put on the alloy rim ) .

I noticed that you are from Chennai, visit a few dealers and get quotes, they often give you competitive quotes if you are a serious buyer. Certain dealers will be willing to give you more discounts if you are not too particular about colour as they want to clear all the stock. Also if you have an old bike you can ask for exchange bonus worth 7k.

Thanks for the update. I am currently based in Bangalore that's why checked with you on the offer you got with the dealers.

I checked with Aryan yesterday and they have black color for ready delivery but other colors were with 1 month wait time. I am keen on yellow.
Aryan also had similar offers that you mentioned sans the jacket.

[girimajiananth]

Originally Posted by anandtheleo

I checked with Aryan yesterday and they have black color for ready delivery but other colors were with 1 month wait time. I am keen on yellow.
Aryan also had similar offers that you mentioned sans the jacket.

Had a similar experience with orion suzuki in JP Nagar. Salesman said no one had yellow in stock ( this was a month back) and tried to push other colors. I have asked my point of contact at Apple suzuki if he has yellow in stock. I will let you know if he replies positively.

[anandtheleo]

Originally Posted by girimajiananth

Had a similar experience with orion suzuki in JP Nagar. Salesman said no one had yellow in stock ( this was a month back) and tried to push other colors. I have asked my point of contact at Apple suzuki if he has yellow in stock. I will let you know if he replies positively.

That's great, thanks mate

[girimajiananth]

Originally Posted by anandtheleo

That's great, thanks mate

Spoke to him a while back. Yellow is not in stock. They have black if you are interested. If you need yellow you will need to wait till next month.

[anandtheleo]

Originally Posted by girimajiananth

Spoke to him a while back. Yellow is not in stock. They have black if you are interested. If you need yellow you will need to wait till next month.

Thanks for checking, guess the same across dealers in Bangalore.

When you find the time do share your initial thoughts on your new bike.

If I buy it, I will be back on a saddle after 2017 (had a Bullet 500 till then). Started with a TVS Ind-Suzuki of my Dad, moved to Splendor and then Unicorn to Bullet. Thinking if not now, when again!

[girimajiananth]

Originally Posted by anandtheleo

Thanks for checking, guess the same across dealers in Bangalore.

When you find the time do share your initial thoughts on your new bike.

If I buy it, I will be back on a saddle after 2017 (had a Bullet 500 till then). Started with a TVS Ind-Suzuki of my Dad, moved to Splendor and then Unicorn to Bullet. Thinking if not now, when again!

When again ? Now is the time. If you want to get a bike, get it. That Ind Suzuki is a gem. My late father too had one of those in blue colour and I was a kid back then, I have very vague memories of it.

Below are my initial thoughts. I have done ~90 KMs on the bike so far. I am waiting for the number plate and knuckle guards from the dealer else I would have clocked in a few more KMs on it.

I am around 5 ft 7 in, I cannot flatfoot with both legs, but I can manage to tip toe with my regular shoes on, not a challenge there.

Riding in city is not difficult for a bike this big, you cannot weave through traffic easily like you can do on a smaller two wheeler, however its manageable.

Clutch is on the harder side, after a while you will start noticing it. Are other V strom owners facing this too ?

If you slot the bike in first gear and slowly declutch, the bike will roll forward without any throttle inputs, found this useful in city traffic.

Seats are comfortable for rider and pillion. No complaints there.

Parking in tight spaces is tough. I took the bike out for a small errand, found it difficult to park in small spaces.

Attracts attention. A lot of people come up to you and ask OTR, FE and what not. I had parked it at a hotel and I saw one guy pressing the clutch, trying to change gear and trying to get a feel of the seat. I wanted to whack him badly.


Objects in the mirror appear closer than they are, objects ahead of you come up faster than you can think. It is a fast bike, especially for someone like me. I have been riding Jupiter and Ntorq for a while now and I feel this is quite fast. Speedo meter reaches 100 kmph quickly and without a fuss. The engine pulls effortlessly and smoothly.

Did not notice any vibrations so far.

I had trouble engaging first gear in cold engine. I had to blip the throttle a little and then slot the bike in first gear.

Gear indicator sometimes did not show the gear. Not sure why. It seems to have resolved by itself now.

Headlight is good. However I feel it needs to be focused. Rather than illuminating the road, I see that it lights up the objects in front of me. It seems the light beam is parallel to the road. Also, when you have a pillion, the suspension goes down slightly and the headlight rises a little bit up.
Planning to get the headlight focused if possible during my next visit to showroom.

The ride poster is a little bit forward compared to KTM ADV, but this is nothing to complain about.

The bluetooth displays name of the caller if you have saved it as a contact, else just the number. I tried the navigation feature to a known location, it did not work as I expected. I showed some crazy options. I am not used to map my India app. The Suzuki ride connect app is not bad. It syncs the bike details like fuel level, odo reading , number of trips, last parked location etc.

I am yet to explore different options on the speedometer console. I am waiting for the user manual.

Overall a happy purchase.

Question to other V-Strom owners. Is there a run in period ?

[vvs29]

Originally Posted by girimajiananth

Clutch is on the harder side, after a while you will start noticing it. Are other V strom owners facing this too ?

It seems the light beam is parallel to the road.

Question to other V-Strom owners. Is there a run in period ?

Compared to 100cc commuters, yes, but I didn't feel it too hard for the class.

The headlight unit is adjustable for height. See if there's a gap just below the bottom of the headlight acrylic. If so, it's probably adjusted up. There's a bolt under the cowl on the left side, the user manual will show the image clearly. You can loosen it, push the headlight down and tighten it back up. Mine was also tilted way up and after pushing the headlight all the way down the illumination is good enough for the city.

The manual does mention a run in period. I kept the rpm below 5k for the first 500kms, and below 6k for the first 1000. Since there's a 6th gear, it wasn't really bothersome for the city.

[girimajiananth]

Humble request.

Does anyone have a soft copy of the user's manual. The showroom is yet to provide me with one. I need to go through this once at least, just for my satisfaction.

I tried searching it online, but could not find any. It would be a great help if someone can share links to the user manual.