As I mentioned earlier, I was tired before I arrived at the showroom. Seeing and hearing the bike got me recharged. Getting her on the road, I was still a little worried:
Will my back ache, will my wrists hurt?
Power comes from a 4 stroke 8-Valve Parallel Twin 649cc engine rated at 71 BHP (@ 8,500 rpm) and 66 Nm torque (@ 7,000 rpm). The power-to-weight ratio of this motorcycle is 348 BHP / ton.
I had decided even before starting the bike that I will stop in 15 minutes. Relax a little and call home. Pune city is slowly waking up, with traffic building up gradually. Lots of pedestrians as well. I starting riding & quickly realized that this is one motorcycle on which you feel at home instantly. The high seating position is completely spot on. The accelerator is easy to modulate, and the desired speed easy to control. She does not leap forward unpredictably, or has any such drama. The ride is mature too. There is a lot of power on tap, and I can feel it with every twist of my right wrist. Give the 650R some open space, and the rider can be at triple digit speeds within seconds. I tear my eyes from the road and check the clock. Some 30 minutes have elapsed since I started riding the Kawasaki. There is absolutely NO pain anywhere. This bike is perfect for riding in the city and as I would realize shortly, she loves the highways as well.
The monoshock rear gives a comfortable ride at higher speeds. It's stiff at slow speeds though; you can literally "feel" every bit of the road. The toolkit has a spanner that can be used to adjust the suspension:
The gears are very sticky. They are smooth enough when down shifting, but upshifts, especially at less that 4k rpm, are painful. In fact, at one time, I was not able to shift from 2nd to 3rd. In the resulting confusion, when I left the clutch, the rear wheel did a bit of spin and the bike fishtailed. Fortunately, the Ninja is easy to control & keep straight. The moment passed without my support team, driving right behind, even noticing.
The gear lever's position is easy to find. No shoe slipping on it. It would have been nice if there was a gear indicator on the bike, at least for the newbie riders who form a good part of the target market. There is so much torque, even in the higher gears, that I kept forgetting I am in the top gear. There is so much speed in the lower gears, I kept forgetting I was in 3rd:
There is excellent power on tap in all the 6 gears. The engine also generates superb torque at the low to mid rpm range. This gives it amazing city & highway riding characteristics:
In fact, if you are riding on regular roads under <120 kph, you can ride in any gear between 3rd to 6th as if the bike is an automatic. The 3rd has a riding range of 30 - 120 kph. If you are feeling lazy after being on the open road for a long while, stick to 5th gear. You can ride as low as 50 kph without any jerking or lugging from the engine.
The rear disc brake does its job well too. The international version of this bike has an ABS variant that, unfortunately, is not currently available in India. ABS is already offered in lower segment bikes like RTR/CBR250 which make far less power and its really a shame that a bike capable of 0-100 in 4s omits this. We strongly recommend that Bajaj offer it as an optio:
The rear view mirrors are a letdown. My armored jacket blocked out nearly 50% of the view. At speeds between 90 - 100 kph, resonance does set in. The mirrors shake and the image gets badly blurred. Since most touring happens between 80-120 kph, this is a problem (more so at night). You might want to experiment with rear view extenders:
After riding solo for about 100 odd kilometers, I met GTO and Stratos. All the pictures have been clicked by Stratos, and I had a lot of fun posing for them:
The fuel gauge display has 5 bars. By now, 2 bars have disappeared and the third is toggling between on and off. We decide to top up on fuel. The tank drank a little over 7 liters after having run of 120 kms, making for 17 kpl. On the highway, we filled up regular petrol and the bike didn't portray any hesitation at all:
While I am following Stratos' directions for the photo-shoot, my respect for the bikes slow speed riding capability increases.
Sure, taking turns at slow speeds is a problem, due to the large turning radius. You will fumble in a tight space, like a parking lot. But riding slow in a straight line is a lot of fun. The engine is butter smooth. Try the same in a slightly lower gear, generously dial the accelerator in, and the wild ride starts. You get pushed back as the bike leaps forward!
Having done my share of long distance touring, I am wary of Indian riding conditions. I never take a blind turn at high speeds. This causes a considerable loss in overall touring speeds. The rapid acceleration available on the Ninja helps reduce this problem to an extent. You can enter a turn slow, yet exit at almost double the speed. Just keep your eye on the perfect line. This makes touring safer while allowing the rider to save on valuable time.
We hit a long traffic pileup on a bridge. Since my navigators were in a car, I had no option but to ride behind them. I could not leverage a bike's inherent advantage of taking the sides of the road and leaving the traffic jam behind. The clutch is very light within the city. The brakes are perfect & easy to get a hang of. Despite being on a bridge with broken tarmac and lots of truck traffic, the bike was not uncomfortable. The radiator and cooling fan keep the 649cc engine cool. When switched on, the fan makes a mild humming sound:
The puny horn is no match for Indian roads:
GTO could not resist anymore. We traded places for a few kilometers. I had ridden close to 180 kms at this point. While the air-conditioned car was comfortable, I could not wait to reclaim the bike.
Obviously, the Civic is no match for the Ninja in terms of acceleration or mid-range punch. I doubt any, but for the fastest sports cars, would be able to keep up with the 650R in a 0-100 dash. I just hope that the riders who buy it are able to appreciate its power in a responsible manner.