Looks like the tourers of xBhp have not yet taken notice of this very insightful interesting article which will yet again be noticed and used by the auto manufacturers of this country (hopefully I add) to further their biking industry with more useful stuff than just graphics and stickering.
I remember our discussion MG and I will bring out the points now, the ones that I had mentioned when I talked to you...
1/ A 300CC single mill cannot effectively and efficiently produce 35 Ps.
2/ If point number 1 cannot happen, it cannot have a true speed of 150Ks.
3/ A bike with a true 150Ks top whack, will not be able to cruise at 120 all day long without stressing the engine. It would feel stressed, vibes coming in after 3 long tours, 15000 kms. This WILL happen.
4/ I personally will be happy if such a bike comes. But such a bike will still have one big drawback. On highway riding, there are umpteen occasions when a rider on a slightly different "looking" bike is often challenged to by wanna be Rossis or other cagers or often even by our dear old Volvos B7R. A 35 ps will NOT have, I repeat, it will NOT have enough power or acceleration left at 100 to make even a Scorpio eat dust, Old Fox, you can recount them your incident and thus you will be left gasping for breath. I am not saying that I need 150 Arab horses under my belt. Read my article on Hard Torque and you will know my clear stand on this issue. I personally feel that if you have 60-65 Bhp available under the hood, you got it going man. But 35 will just leave us in the lurch.
5/ You talked about a console giving, I quote "time, temperature, altitude, distance to empty and average fuel consumption", you forgot to mention GPS, strategically placed cameras, cable TV, onboard talking computer, highest speed, avg speed recordings of the last 10 outings.
Just joking, but with these, the price of the bike will invariably go up. You really need stuff like that, carry a basic GPS. I would rather they spent the money under the hood and not much over it. A basic console, giving me what we have on a 220 with coolant temperature and time added will be fine. I am not interested in altitude or my horoscope!
My call would be this. 300CC would be too little. A single mill will NOT do what we are asking for. If there is ANY indigenous development, I would like something that gives me 60Bhp, let it take any number of CCs that it requires to give me those horses. For touring I do NOT want Clip-ons. I want adjustable rearsets. I am all for Top Cases and company fitted side Panniers as well. Bikini fairing. Less than 170 kilos. A decent ground clearance, I do not recall MG talking about this. A good traveling front fork that does NOT dive like the Indian bikes. Pricing ranging between 1.8L to 2.8L depending upon the variant that the customer wants.
Interesting article MG. I am glad that you brought this up. I have tried to be as objective as I could keep myself without going overboard. I hope this constructive criticism takes us somewhere...
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