Biker explains why he sold his 1100cc Africa Twin and bought a KTM Adventure 390 [Video]
Owning and driving a massive adventure or sports bike is a dream of a ton of people in the country. Although not everyone is lucky enough to actually buy and own one of these bikes and experience themselves first hand. From a distance it may seem like having these bikes is just too simple and easy but as revealed by Bulu Pattnaik – an avid adventure biker and vlogger it’s the total opposite of what it seems from the surface. Recently the vlogger switched from the Honda Africa Twin to a KTM Adventure 390 and to justify his purchase the YouTuber shared a video explaining all the reasons why he concluded this move.
Weight and Handling
The first reason that the YouTuber stated to justify his switch from the Africa Twin to KTM Adventure 390 was the weight of the bike. He stated that these bigger bikes are extremely heavy in weight and this makes them a little cumbersome to handle on off-road terrains. He added that if you want to do highway cruising then bigger bikes are better but once you want to leave the highway and tackle the treacherous terrains they become difficult to handle and control. If you get stuck they are hard to retrieve and take a lot of energy to ride optimally.
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Pricing
The second biggest reason he stated was the cost of buying, riding, and maintaining the big Africa Twin. The vlogger revealed that despite being one of the more affordable bigger adventure bikes the Africa Twin is still an expensive bike and its maintenance and upkeep is also much expensive. He added that the cost insurance, tyres and accessories gets absurdly high and if someone who likes adventure riding more frequently the costs add up pretty quickly.
Lack of service centers
He started this point by stating that this is one of the biggest points everyone should consider before buying a big bike in India. He revealed that these bikes are not something that every normal service centers can fix if something goes wrong. They need special service centers. He added that the Africa Twin from Honda are one of the better ones in terms of getting serviced easily because Honda is slowly expanding its Big Wing dealerships but apart from it bikes from BMW, Triumph, Ducati, Kawasaki and others have even fewer outlets. He said it becomes fairly difficult to get them serviced. He also stated the costs of servicing are also a lot more expensive than normal 400-500cc adventure bikes.
Fuel Efficiency
The YouTuber revealed that the fourth point is the fuel efficiency. He stated that the bigger bikes consume a lot of fuel and generally give around 18-19 kmpl mileage. He added that despite the stereotype that the owners of these bikes don’t calculate fuel expenses he said that anyone who rides frequently does calculate the fuel costs and they add up quickly. Also he stated that the cheaper bikes can even take lesser quality fuel and ride normally but these bigger bikes will show error codes and not drive optimally if lesser quality fuel is used.
Logistics and Spare parts sourcing
The last two points the YouTuber touched on were the logistical nightmares and spare parts sourcing. He started off by saying that if you do not want to waste 2-3 days of driving in the highways then you have to ship the bikes via logistics companies and he stated that more often than not they will damage the bikes. And he then came to his last point that sourcing these damaged parts is a challenge in itself. He added that these parts are not mass manufactured so getting ahold of them is another issue and finally he stated that the culmination of all these points led him to get the KTM 390 Adventure.
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