This never even happened on my Pulsar, And it has endured much worse rain in its life than what the quoted owner of the Duke can even imagine. But since the bike was tested in India, I guess they might just have overdone the cooling w.r.t. whats required in EU climate. Anyways, all that is minor teething troubles, nothing too terrible as yet .

Yeah understood. I've had my KB100, Wind125, Boxer 100 etc endure horrible rains too without any issues But how can mechanics (A.S.S guys) say "do not ride in rain"? And how can a bike of that calliber have such fragile electricals.

overdone the cooling - can u please help me understand this better? There have been issues reported of coolant leaking after a ride in the rain - and the garages have replaced a O ring to fix this.

Teething problems, I hope they have been taken care of on the 125's and do not surface on the 200's!

Some more:

Misfire/stutter at 7.500-8.000RPM. sometimes also at 9-10.000RPM - Fuel quality? I am sure UK fuel quality is much better than desi one's or has it been tuned to the desi quality? or spark plug?

Erratic speedo?

Dysfunctional front brake light switch.

uneven brake disc? Front brake recall.

Erratic Engine fault lamp.

Erratic Warning for low oil pressure

False neutrals

Loose paintwork on the wheels

Frequent engine remapping.

- Some other brand too underwent a series of teething problems - Do all bikes undergo that?

The quoted text says
This clearly means that the engine is running colder than it should and isn't even able to get up to proper operating temperature. Thats the reason he had to do mods on the radiator since it was cooling the engine down too much. This would have been desirable in an Indian summer. Certainly Not desirable in the EU winters.

Comments in bold.

Teething issues however can be easily avoided if you only bring tried and tested age-old products whose teething issues were faced and ironed out by a different company who did the entire R&D. This, apparently, is done with extreme success by a company in India. But that way, you can never offer the customer cutting edge technology.

Do the CBU's face the same issue? (ex: Ninja's)

Fuelling issues on the newly developed FI system - Why can't they be thoroughly tested before putting it out on sale?

False Neutrals - I wish someone who rode the bike for the review comments as well. Secondly aren't the gear shifts, short clicks on this one unlike most other bikes (Indian)?

Erratic speedo? - could be a new issue

So the prospective 200 owners - brace for this.

Teething problems in BSNL - Well that is not new and should we compare BSNL with a near cutting edge technology that Bajaj/KTM are dealing with?

Most Ninja 250R's I have been around have the issue of a tankslapper if you let go of the throttle hand when doing 60kmph in 2nd gear and have a loose grip on the left hand. Effect is more pronounced on some bikes than others, but its present on most bikes. BTW, Ninja is a CKD. And not, by any stretch of the imagination, a newly developed product.

Because people like TrustVishwas and BlackRival want to click pictures of the bikes under testing!! Because people like RishabhShukla want to stop test riders on their way and ask for test rides!! Let those people 'Test in Peace' !!

MG/Sunny please comment

I was just giving a non automotive example. And it wasn't only with BSNL. Airtel still has issues with its billing system. . But looking at the specs, I feel most owners will learn to ignore the minor flaws and accept it as its character (As long as the brakes are alright and the brake-light doesn't go kaput every now and then).

Minor flaws - Definitely acceptable.

But something like - false neutrals (Imagine a false neutral when you are revving hard and changing from gear 2 to gear 3 - vroommmmmmmm -rev limiter. and all eyeballs popping out at you.

and the other way too - you trying to rev hard and the engine does cough cough sputter sputter!

You standing at a traffic light - and the speedo thinks of Rihanna and goes 0 - 188 zip!

A casual glance at the console and you see the "Engine failure" warning lamp? (people who know about it may not jump out of their skin - but think of those who aren't aware of this flaw (if any that is)).

Anyway hoping for the best! For now bracing for the 24th and not for the issues (unknown/unseen) and Auto Service Banashankari zindabad, they are two lanes behind where I live.

Shubz - We do not know the authenticity of such claims from the international forums; neither we know their age, riding experience & their standard of riding.

There's no 100% flawless ride; even Ducati's are known for teething issues, forget alone the matured N250R. Part of motorcycling is about learning the weakness of the ride & to live with it. The issues that were reported on KTM may be one of the kind, circumstantial or worst case attributed to the rider (assuming).

If you're skeptical about these issues, then, wait for sometime until all/major issues are addressed and/or make up your mind whether these issues can be lived with.

RG - I wasn't skeptical. Just thought of putting it out here. There are many experienced bikers out here. Just wanted their inputs on this. I was not expecting a 100% bike. This is for my awareness as well. I do not want to be among the "also boughts"

As mentioned above, the Probiking outlet behind my house (that do not deal with sales though). I have a wonderful rapport with them. So service is not an issue at all. I still want to take my chance with KTM wholeheartedly! Never sceptically!

Edit: I look up towards people like you who have been there/done that and gives me great confidence that I am in a forum where I can get valuable inputs/guidance and never ridicule for anything that is posed out here (as long it is sensible)

Shubz - Tks for those kind words; my purpose of the previous post was to stress on the authenticity of such claims from FB. I neither accept them nor reject them outright unless I personally know about the person who make such claims.

Let me put down something beyond riding; most people associate their rides (or even drives) to their better half (not to mention some crazy fanatics like me care for the ride more than Wife );I sometimes think its utter nonsense to call a ride as "SHE". This was until...

Buying a ride, (that I realized), is like an arranged marriage or love marriage; you buy a ride, understand the flaws & know how to overcome it & live with it happily (or fight) OR you keep waiting & look for that "perfect" ride, fall in love & cherish the ownership.

Quite a bunch of people love RD, they know the spares are difficult to obtain, lacks practicality in the current era, but still they're willing to live with it (these are much more than the speedo & false gear issues), its like having a celebrity as your Wife Your time with it makes you pride with jealousy onlookers, but, behind the scenes, only the owner knows the pain. Its all for that one moment ; Whatever!!!

Like I said before, nothing is perfect be it CBR, Ninja or even the BMW or Triumph. If you love Katoom, just go for it, you've to look beyond issues & look in terms of what you need rather than what things are. But if you're practical, then you're looking at what things are rather than what you need, then, you'll have to wait for that perfect match. Probably that's why they say...Love is Blind

Ahh well, the mud splattering starts on FB

@Shub: FB is a place for crying sore about anything and everything. Unfortunately, as Argee puts it, you cannot be sure about these claims. Further, it might be just a one off bike that has issues. Not trying to defend/score down any manufacturer, but issues were present on the mighty CBR250R as well;

If the users are Brits, forgive and forget them...they haven't been able to get rid of the oil leaks on their Triumphs.

Nice lines/Quote there, simply loved it..............

@aargee: Loved your last 2 posts man.. you just said the same thing in my mind.

I see a lot of comparisons with the CBR 250, Yamaha R15 etc, etc. Now if an average Joe who wanted an upgrade from an old Unicorn to something that had a bit more power and didn’t want to compromise on safety; the obvious choice would been an RTR 180 ABS. This was exactly my choice until I heard/read about the KTM.

I skipped the Yamaha purely because of its track pedigree nature. I know people buy it for that reason alone but I wasn’t looking for a track bike. I was looking for a proper, respectfully powerful, safe ride while I commute to and fro the office. The CBR 250 ABS is just too big as an upgrade from a Unicorn I thought, and therefore I was really looking at something around the 180-200 cc range. Now it was easy then because my choice would have obviously been the RTR 180 ABS.

But with KTM’s release this month, I’m back to square one wondering, should I get this one instead of the RTR and expect its larger discs and tyres to help me and skip on ABS? I know larger disc and wider tyres couldn’t outperform the function of ABS but the bike is so cool that my heart says to go for it and my head says stick with the RTR. What do I do, I'm ?

Nice post... Loved every sentence.