I have a Karizma for the last five years. A decently powerful 17bhp bike that has served me well. But it’s human and natural to get bored of a handful of horses in five years. My colleagues pester me into buying something more powerful but with no affordable option available in India, I have no option but to squeeze each single horsepower of the 223cc engine each day to somewhat satisfy the enthusiast in me.
While searching some info on the Yamaha RD350 (yes the same mosquito-killing smoke fuming bike that can still lick every single bike being manufactured in India), I happened to come across this particular website. The next two hours were spent reading every single page followed by an hour trying to search for the author who it seems loved being anonymous. But whosoever he is, I salute you buddy!
His love (and hate) for not only two-wheels, but other things in life (including the mighty lord) has been expressed beautiful, with sarcasm as well as love. But what really caught my eye was the page on the RD. Not only has the gentleman enlighten me more on the bike, but is now a source of inspiration on how to ‘write’. No really!
Coming back to the point, way back in 1983 (incidentally the year when I was born), there was a tie-up between Yamaha and Rajdoot. The good thing was the bike that was born out of the marriage of two brands, a 39bhp two-stroke twin-cylinder 350cc bike. The bad thing was that the bike lived up to its advertisement – for a ‘few’ that like to live their dreams. It seems the ‘few’ were hardly a few hundred bikers. The bike was a failure. The ‘few’ ones who went ahead, making a laughing stock of themselves at that time are exactly the one who can kick the butt of each and every sorry arsed excuse for a bike launched since then in India.
The original 39bhp bike was dead for India. A few changes to the exhaust port and the HT (high torque) model was born. It lost 8.5bhp but was still faster than anything an Indian had felt between his groins. It sold a tad more bikes than the original model till its habit of guzzling petrol came out in the limelight. The HT too died. Yamaha engineers were back to work again. Work was done on the exhaust port and the ignition timing and hence the low torque (LT) was born. A full twelve brake-horsepower down than the original one, the LT was still good for around 140km/h or so.
The LT, as compared to the original bike, was a joy to ride at low revs. Power was available on tap for city riding, though you felt as if the bike hit a wall at around 6000rpm or so. But it sold well till the time it was taken off the market for being too expensive on the pocket. The bike still lives on in every hard-core nut’s heart. The lucky few who have managed to maintain the killer machine well or managed to add some dope in the form of modifications are laughing away to glory raping other so called performance machines in India.
An electric start, or discs, or half fairing doesn’t make a bike go fast. Goodies can never be compensated for performance. Bikes came and went, but nothing came close to the RD. True, most RD than run on the road are kept in a horrible state by the owners but if you know the ones who run and keep an RD the way it deserves to be, then you surely understand what I am talking about. If you are one of those who want to feel your hair stand every time the throttle is pinned or feel its time you tasted real blood, I will be frank – the probability of you finding a decently maintained RD is even less than finding one cop in Pune wearing a helmet on the bike.
This doesn’t mean the future for bike nuts in India is a doomed one. There was a bike being sold by Kawasaki abroad for the last 18 years – a 250cc parallel twin bike good enough to keep up with the likes of the RD. It got a much awaited makeover and is all set to hit our roads soon. Yep, the minuscule little baby Ninja 250. It may not send shivers down you spine like the RD, but for Rs 2lakh for a brand new legal small superbike managing 30odd horses will a full fairing is a good deal. The old 250 managed a 6odd second 0-100km/h sprint with a genuine 160km/h capability. I don’t see why the latest 250 (even with revised tuning for environment protecting norms) should still be at par with the best of restored RDs on the acceleration and top speed stakes. Add in better handling, comfort and reliability and your wait for a bike different from the usual tight-tummied screwed-up mopeds seems worth it.
May I add that after market performance add-ons like full exhaust system are already out for the Ninja and with a potential to add another half a dozen horses to the parallel twin engine, the Ninja 250 might well be the answer to the RD350 in India, after a full quarter of a sanctuary. The only way I can keep myself from laughing after writing the last line is by thinking, “better late than never”….
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