[prince_pervez]

Dunno about others but My 180 is 6 years old and clocked 50000 + kilometers.
Its still running fine and still beats the crap out of most bikes on the road. It has been severely misused by me. The point is if it can take a beating and still perform then I think it is pretty much reliable. About the resale, yes it fetches much less than the average Zma. An year back I asked Bajaj how much do I get for this bike in exchange for a P200, the guy said 27.5K. Which is not bad at all for a battered bike like mine. So how much would a Zma 6 years old, 50K + kms, fetch in the market ?
It would be a nice comparo. Thanks.

[apachelongbow]

Originally Posted by joslicx

Man its the reputation!!!
Just like fiat... And for a reason too. bajaj are known to use cheap parts that fail often. Hero Honda are known to use quality parts. Key word is 'known' - reputation. At the end of the day its not about my or your bike only. Reputations are built over time and over millions of sales!

Theres the reason why Hero Honda commands better resale. I sold my 5 year old Karizma for more than 50% of purchase price (bought for 71k, sold for 40k). My friend had bought his Pulsar 180 at the same time and is still struggling to sell it for even 20k!

Probably analogous to Fiats position in India. Got bad reputation and now resale value of Fiat vehicles suffer (even though they might be good). I am not saying Bajaj is still using bad quality spares but they did at one time and have this bad reputation in the market!

Hero Honda is a big assembler of Honda parts. After Honda disassociated themselves with HH, which 'new' bike has HH launched? Lets not call cd100/dawn splendour/passion/glamour cbz/watevar as new bikes. All HH does is merely repackages older offerings and uses bollywood to sell them.

Karizma was supposed to have a softly tuned honda cb230 engine. The least HH could do is to tune up the engine and release a Karizma plus with 21/22 bhp!!! What they did is added a 'new' belly fairing, red alloys and hey this is a whole new bike!!! The Karizma is a good machine and I lament that HH didnt think of improving it over time

What I love about BAL is that they dont sit on their asses like HH but every 6 months come out with some improvement on their product offerings. Every iteration of the pulsar the bike has gotten better. BAL has listened to the bikers, we wanted a bike with more performance and reasonable cost.. and now we have whats arguably India's fastest bike.

Apart from BAL TVS is the only other manufacturer which has its own R&D and strives for regular product improvement.

I am eagerly waiting for the on road review of the new 220, glad to see that atleast one or two manufacturers are actually 'listening' to their customers.
Ive owned the original 180 a while back. Used it to the hilt for all of 50000kms and it was as good as new when I sold it. Only replacement were fuses!!!. I had great satisfaction thrashing all kinds of yamahas and hero hondas on the road Not to mention countless Mumbai Pune trips taking not more than 2 hours. As an owner I stand by BAL and their products. If I were to buy a new bike today I would def buy a BAL product.

[chevelle]

Originally Posted by joslicx

Man its the reputation!!!
Just like fiat... And for a reason too. bajaj are known to use cheap parts that fail often. Hero Honda are known to use quality parts. Key word is 'known' - reputation. At the end of the day its not about my or your bike only. Reputations are built over time and over millions of sales!

Theres the reason why Hero Honda commands better resale. I sold my 5 year old Karizma for more than 50% of purchase price (bought for 71k, sold for 40k). My friend had bought his Pulsar 180 at the same time and is still struggling to sell it for even 20k!

Probably analogous to Fiats position in India. Got bad reputation and now resale value of Fiat vehicles suffer (even though they might be good). I am not saying Bajaj is still using bad quality spares but they did at one time and have this bad reputation in the market!

so what kinda parts did hero honda use on my bro's splendor that he has to replace the whole engine? where they of high quality? if yes, why engine going kaput in middle of a ride? thank god he wasn't doing high speed, else it would have been disastrous.

as for resale, i think it depends on the vehicle's condition too. no doubt hh has more resale than bajaj. but bajaj's is not bad too. for the record, i am getting 27.5k for a 6 and half year old 150 dtsi, which i bought for 60k in 2003 oct. this is from second hand bike dealer. may get a little bit more from direct buyer. is that gud or bad?

i am planning to sell this for new 220 and hopefully shall get the same quote after 2 months. lets see how it goes

[ananthkamath]

Originally Posted by fieroid

They claim racing DNA and crap and none are still capable of a power wheelie or a serious rush. All they know is sell a moped on the lines of an SBK.

The RTR chassis truly had some input from TVS Racing. So its not a totally hollow claim, at least on the part of TVS, and at least on the chassis front if not engine.

I dont know what kind of racing Bajaj does or supports, though.

With the present margins in the Indian 2-wheeler industry I doubt if its cost-effective to develop a truly high-performance motorcycle from scratch. Indian emissions laws are crippling as well, so its tough to get a high power output from small displacement while still maintaining decent fuel economy.

Its easy to talk on a forum, but how many people besides the most hardcore here would actually pay for such a motorcycle and not crib about not having one?

[extreme_torque]

Originally Posted by fieroid

With acceleration figures of 3.8secs to 60 and 11.1secs to 100 while ridden by a 50kgs rider, its by no means scary. Its not even close to what a high performance bike should be. That way, all our Indian stock bikes are a joke. RTR, R15 and everything I mean.
They claim racing DNA and crap and none are still capable of a power wheelie or a serious rush. All they know is sell a moped on the lines of an SBK.

Bajaj isnt calling it a superbike... its just the fastest indian production bike. Yamaha took a step in the right direction with the R15 which is a full blown 150cc if you dont go by numbers alone. We are evolving albeit a little slow so manufacturers are not to be blamed. Ninja 250 is coming soon... lets see how many Bajaj sells before you accuse then of aping SBK's again.

[doctorque]

Racing DNA, fastest production Indian motor cycle are marketing strategies and they have a right to use as most of it is correct.

Now for the anti Bajaj people
@ Joslicx
@ Straight6
The new 220 is a seriously good effort. atleast its an effort to do somthing with very limited engineering expertise as compared to japenese.
Now what have the people with expertise done about it. Launched karizma, a great bike, what do they do years after launching it? give it a sticker job and give it an alphabet it will Never deserve, "R".
Bajaj quality is good if not great. And my fellow Karizma riders have got the Rs.8000 exhaust changed 2-3-4- or even 5 times. More than a few friends have done it so i know. After the warranty is finished, they couldnt do much but to live with the other world noises from the exhaust. So quality issues are not just with Bajaj. The exhaust was an example and there are more than a few issues with the Karizma which still stay.
I strongly believe its just the matter of getting some technical inputs from KTM. When that starts next year, the products which will be made available to us would be far more superior to others.
I reckon.

Great effort, The new 220.

[Technocrat]

Guys lets keeping the flaming & brand wars off this discussion.

What I really appreciate is that the P220 is the right step to give us enthusiasts a Performance machine at a much more affordable price than before.

Having FI or other fancy technology just for heck of having it is of no use IMHO. Also the FI bikes havent really picked up well in India.

[fieroid]

Originally Posted by Mpower

It does sound a little fishy.
3.8 is a whole 'second' faster to 60 than the 220 FI but with just 1 more bhp.
BTW, the rider is supposed to be Varad More, dunno if he is 50kg.

yes it does sound a little hard to believe. Not coz a pulsar can never do that, but coz the bike in itself weighs around 140+ kilos.
varad now weighs 53 kilos.

@ananthkamath - Ofcouse, I know what TVS did to develop the RTR man. But frankly all this is getting too boring. Its high time these makers really up the game.

[Technocrat]

Ofcourse any figures on Bajaj Products from Adil's venture will sound Fishy . I thought this was known.

[extreme_torque]

Originally Posted by fieroid

yes it does sound a little hard to believe. Not coz a pulsar can never do that, but coz the bike in itself weighs around 140+ kilos.
varad now weighs 53 kilos.

@ananthkamath - Ofcouse, I know what TVS did to develop the RTR man. But frankly all this is getting too boring. Its high time these makers really up the game.

but then these figures are not from Bajaj themselves or are they?

[Spitfire]

Originally Posted by extreme_torque

but then these figures are not from Bajaj themselves or are they?

Your Answer:

Originally Posted by Technocrat

Ofcourse any figures on Bajaj Products from Adil's venture will sound Fishy . I thought this was known.

[kolimuttai]

Originally Posted by praful

- 145Kmph 'true' top speed.

Ditance - Is it from Chennai to Bangalore?

[pgsagar]

Fuel Injection replaced by carb? Isn't that a step backward? Or, does carb pack more punch that fuel injection????? Any answers please?????

[aaggoswami]

Looks like the bike has arrived, but I think we were expecting more than this. A completely new platform would be appreciated.

Source : The Hindu : Business : Bajaj Auto launches Pulsar 220 cc bike
Article :

NEW DELHI: Bajaj Auto on Tuesday launched the new Pulsar 220 cc bike, which gives 21.04 PS of power and is priced at Rs. 70,000. It has also developed a new series of fuel efficient engine and plans to introduce two new bikes this year. Addressing a press conference here, Bajaj Auto CEO (two-wheelers) S. Sridhar said: “We have been continuously evolving our Pulsar range to provide our customers state-of-the-art products with unmatched performance and technology.

The new 2009 edition Pulsar 220 cc has further raised the bar in the performance segment by becoming the India’s fastest bike”. Bajaj Auto also unveiled more fuel-efficient engine series equipped with new breakthrough technology called DTS-Si version 2.0 that incorporates five major innovations. “This makes it the most fuel-efficient engine not only in India but also in the world. The first product powered by this technology will be launched next month,” said Mr. Sridhar.

According to Bajaj Auto Managing Director Rajiv Bajaj, the company aims at selling 2.50-lakh units a month.

Source : The Statesman
Article :

Bajaj to launch 2 bikes soon

; Press Trust of India
NEW DELHI, 23 JUNE: The country's second largest two-wheeler maker Bajaj Auto today said it would launch two new motorcycles ~ one next month and the other by December ~ and hoped to sell up to 2.5 lakh units in a month riding on the planned models.
“We are looking at increasing our domestic motorcycle sales to 1.75 lakh to two lakh by the second half of this fiscal by virtue of a couple of launches over the next few months,” Bajaj Auto managing director, Mr Rajiv Bajaj told reporters here, adding that another 60,000 units will be exported.
It would launch a new motorcycle with the DTS-Si engine on 18 July from its Chakan plant near Pune, Mr Bajaj said, adding: “One more model is coming up by the end of this year.”
“All launches this year stem from where we went wrong and where we stand... We have changed our product plan accordingly after 2008,” he said, adding the current fiscal would be the best in BAL's history in terms of sales and profitability.
Mr Bajaj said the company did not perform well in 2008. Expectations were also high after sales increased in the previous year, he added.
The company also unveiled an 'affordable' version of its existing 220cc motorcycle Pulsar without fuel injection technology, priced at Rs 70,000 (ex-showroom). Pulsar with 220cc DTS-Fi engine comes for more than Rs 80,000.
The company sells about 2-2.25 lakh bikes in both domestic and overseas markets a month.
The company exports about 40,000 bikes a month, while sells about 1,000 units of scooters per month in the domestic market.
On the company's production capacity, Mr Bajaj said it has a total capacity of about 2.6 lakh motorcycles per month at its three plants in Chakan, Waluj and Pantnagar, of which 60 per cent has been utilised in the first quarter of this fiscal.

[devarshi84]

Originally Posted by fieroid

@ananthkamath - Ofcouse, I know what TVS did to develop the RTR man. But frankly all this is getting too boring. Its high time these makers really up the game.

First of all TVS is going through a rough patch. Their sales slid for months until the apache RTR and Flame came to the market. Tighter cash flow equals slow R&D.

Secondly how many people really care for a motorcycle that costs 80+ and has all the advanced technology?

Hero Honda learnt the lesson with Karizma. It clearly showed how they milked the customer when they lowered their prices to 70K range.