^^^ my thought explained in better way. Also high Excise, ride safety + pollution issues etc would come into play for the manufacturer, including R&D.

hmmmm.... just wanted to point out 1 lttle problem with your arguement. India's population is 1 billion+. So 10% of that would be 100 million.

As per wikipedia, ever since it's launch in 1984, a total of 2.5 million maruti 800s have been sold till now.

Now you talk about 100 million people out about 500 million (since about 50% are below poverty line) buying a bike that seats 2 people (as against 4 in 800) and yet costs more.

Now if 100 million people do buy this bike, assuming a price of 3 lakh that would mean earnings of 3 lakh *100 million = Rs. 30*10^12 or Rs 30 trillion. If we convert it into dollar terms @ Rs 50/USD, it works out as 0.6 Trillion USD.
In 2008, the GDP of India was about USD 1.2 Trillion.
So what you are saying is that if a company launches such a bike, it can reach a turnover that is almost half of India's GDP.

Let's take a product that just costs about Rs. 3, that is a newspaper called dainik jagaran which, again according to wikipedia is the largest selling newspaper in India with 55.7 million readers. So a product that costs 0.001 % of what the bike is gonna costs is only bought by 50% of the people that you say are gonna buy the bike.

With this example I think I can safely say that were such a bike to be launched, less than 10% of India's population will buy it. In fact I would stick out my head and say that it will not even sell 10% of the sales achieved by maruti 800, ie 0.25 million.

Anyway, I did not mean to rain on your parade, just wanted to temper your hopes with a pinch of reality.

You can totally disagree. That is what makes us so interesting. And I do not see what is so crazy about it. You have the 1350CC 4 cylinder 197 Bhp, DOHC, 16V machine, twin spar frame, available brand new for less than 6L abroad, why can't you have a 3L 400CC locally manufactured twin?

How short will you make your stroke for a single mill 400CC? Your initial Torque curve will be very flat for the first 4K rpm! Correct me if I am wrong, you are the Technician.

Right said sir, lets take out of total indias population, if a mere 10% people also go for this 400 cc bikes still it taps a huge market for any person who can manufacture 400+ cc bikes, as we know today a 225 cc karizma costs today 1 lakh than i feel for a 400cc or more 2 lakhs to 3 lakhs is a decent cost and more and more people will go for those bikes, if not for daily commuting, still for weekend drives and it will be a new chapter for generations to come after us, where they stand and say xbhp changed the biking future of india, where it will be wrote in history from 1977 to 2009 -upgraded from 100 cc to 225 cc while 2009 to 2019 it would be like 225 to 450 cc upgrades ( big revolution year of 2 wheeler industry in india) and if our indian industry can really do it the entire two wheeler industry will look us with respect, if we can bring out a 600 cc nano car for a price tag half of maruti 800 then i think this 400+ cc concept is also possible.

....++1.

Also, there is accute need of increase in outright cubic capacity, rather than the increase in number of cylinders, multi valves, high compressions, technologically advanced gadgets, etc.

A 9.5:1 compression single cylinder, moderately short-stroke, 300-450 cc aircooled six-speed engine would be the most suitable and would satisfy divergent needs (sports, sports-tourer, tourer, city commuter, weekend fun bike) of our society.

Though more is never enough.

I totally disagree with you ken on the pricing.
An indian company, completely manufacturing a 400cc multicylinder(consider twin, may be v twin or parellel twin) at 2.5 to 3l ??

Thats crazy.

I totally agree that there is a substantial market for Indian Company manufactured 400CC multicylinder two wheelers priced between 2.5L - 3L. It is a bold and difficult step, financially speaking. But one needs the vision to overcome this and take the step since this WILL pay off in the long run. Which is why I am talking about vision. In the future, there will be spin offs.

we all xbhpians should really go and bang up this HH, Bajaj and yamaha heads and tell

Hey ken sir nice write up,

i feel at times we should go and meet this people research, marketing team and tell them what we want, shake their brains up and then they can really understand it, everyone of us cant afford 400+cc bikes today as our govt rules dont allow anything below 800cc and for other big bikes we have to pay a heavy cost, so if they understand and manufacture what we are looking in india, there can be a huge and potential market in india as those import taxes and all can be cut off.

Got my ZMA about 2 months ago. This was my first bike ever. Heard people say its powerful, its big bike. What I felt was its small and undepowered. This coming from a person who doesn't like speeding. I was wondering how people could classify ZMA as big. It then struck me that most of those people probably have been using 100, 150 cc class.

Since this was my first, I never felt it was big or powerful. I personally have been driving cars all my life and still do. I got the ZMA specially to commute to office that carries me over a long stretch of highway. Good handling, though I found the engine quiet unrefined (this could be because I was only used to multi cylinder cars) and underpowered although very ecomomical (blame it on my car). You see, I don't directly relate power to speed as some seems to do so. And I have not even crossed 100kmph. My usual speed is about 65 KMPH in the highway. Can I push more. Of course, but 60-65 is the speed at which I found the sweetest spot in the engine, just buzzing easily. I wish the engine was more powerful so I could do at least 80 with the same ease. This is how I relate to power.

I've heard mentioned 200-220 cc class as a beast, a killer machine etc. Apart from some brilliant argument provided in this post by some, I think Its the attitute in us that will also define "What next?"

It is coming.

Fortunately, the two places you named are familiar to me. Correct me if I am wrong but I think the Khurja that you speak of is close to meerut right? If so, then I guess you can reach the delhi meerut highway within an hour which I think is pretty ok ( have they completed that flyover just before meerut there? while I was there about 4 years back it was still being built for about 5 years!). Anyway, I don't know exactly where Navada is in Noida but I guess if it is in Noida then you can get to the toll road pretty quick. Plus there's also the Noida-Greater Noida stretch and the expressway to Mathura. Well I had promised to name one road since you had said that none existed. If you now say that 1 is not enough then I guess I would'nt be able to satisfy you.

There's just one observation I want to make here, even in countries where you have the kind of infrastructure that you describe here, there are severe speed restrictions in place and even there I guess there are very few roads where you could drive an sbk to your heart's content. I would request ken to give his thoughts on this since he would know much more about this. About understanding customer mindsets and the markets for big bikes, why aquila was unsuccessful and about being practical, I would suggest you read my first post on this thread where I have talked about exactly these issues.


Anyway, I think our exchanges should stop now as we are increasingly just addressing each other and trying to prove that our opinions are right which I think is defeating the purpose of this thread. everyone's got a right to hold his own opinion. Let's just agree to disagree. I see that you agree with some parts of what I wrote while I agree with a part of what you have written and if we continue just countering each other, pretty soon we would end up being repetitive and driving others from this thread. I suggest we should take this over pm if you want to discuss this further. What we need is a fresh perspective from a new person rather than the same old people saying the same old things. I liked the jousts we had but for the sake of other xbhpians, I propose that we stop. Let's not take ourselves too seriously.

@ ken: Thanks a lot. hey how about a new article on Hard Torque by you? it sure has been some time when i last saw something by you here. Let's hear your thoughts on some other new contentious issue.

@ hash

I am not saying all roads are bad, or being in Delhi i haven't visited other states! you talk abt cities and towns go to NAVADA in Noida or Khurja in Western UP, and try proving your point, if you read my first point i said in india biking is more for commuting and not for fun, fun biking is still niche, if you talk abt electronic media and then yes i have made differences at my place and i am even trying that now! i am just another IT guy but yes i have written things to govt, to newspapers etc and things have changed, honestly speaking i haven't even met 10% ppl in bangalore on road and connect them as xbhpians, may be i know them through board thats different.

@Ken
if you mean to say 700 kms in 7 hrs through 3 cities its different than through 3 highways, also you maintained a speed of 100km/hr on an average! with a variance off course. if you talk abt indian bikes! ppl do tour on enfields and other bikes and yes they an maintain a speed of 100km/hr, but if only this could be realistic!

@hash
if you talk about 1 motorable road in anyone city, its like a needle in hay stack, you cannot satisfy hunger of CC with one motorable road! most ppl buy bigger bikes for style or get there own bikes modded, i bought and FZ against pulsar 150 to break away from the habit, and shift to a leaner and a machine with better refinement!

its easy to come up on a forum write an article and giving high hopes without looking at real scenario or understanding basic customer mindset! one of the things i pointed out bajaj moving to 100cc discover DTSi any idea why! cuz bigger bikes have less market, do not count FZ success as big, its still not close to what pulsar 150 made as a success simply on price point ratio! as far as hyperbolic rhetorics are considered i am not taking it personally, but yes we are the ppl who commute daily inside the city and face all the odds. riding on high speeds is more of a skill game. All i meant was being practical, it was not totally an argument i agreed with some of your point, but yes when i am consumer i have the right to make a decision and believe me if you were right Aquila won't have suffered the result it did, neither did BMW bike launched in India. Bigger bikes are going to come but with time, we need to be patient and wait for the business ppl to make right decision good for them in first place, its too far from what we dream to be soon.

You write very well indeed. And to top it, you got pretty good humour as well, both caustic and "real"!

I agree with you wholeheartedly. The fact that the Mercedes and the BMWs of the world can easily handle the so called "bad roads" should be proof enough!

while putting up an arguement, i have found that it is extremely easy to employ smoke screens in the form of general statements. I mean no offence, but general rhetorical statements like "where are the roads?" would have no effect on me.

anyone who says so has not seen India or is simply exagerating the facts just to put up an arguement. Let me put up a challenge. Name any Tier 1, Tier 2 or Tier 3 city and I would, sitting on my chair in the office,tell you a road within an hour or less of that city where you could drive a superbike.

Moreover, if there's one thing i dislike more than hyperbolic rhetorics, it is the attitude of some people who live in Delhi or Mumbai or other cities of similar scale. This is a recent phenomenon and I find this absolutely irritating. It is quite common to find people from US or other developed countries thinking that India is a land of snakecharmers and elephants with the Great Indian Rope Trick being the pinnacle of indian achievement. We talk about such people and ridicule them and their frailties like needing evian and air conditioning, etc. However, of late I have discovered an almost similar attitude among some people from the aforesaid cities. Let me clarify that "some" is the operative word here and I refer to a very small number of people and I am in no way saying that everyone is like this. These people seem to think that Delhi/Mumbai is the only place worth living as if the rest of India were a jungle crawling with robbers, devoid of basic aminities like roads, electricity and water.

Although the rest of India does lag behind, it really is not so bad. We do have roads on which we can drive. If you decide to move out of delhi someday and travel to Jaipur, Kanpur, Chandigarh,etc. I think you will be pleasantly surprised to find some black strips on the landscape, made of some kind of hard material stretching for miles. If your curiosities were aroused enough and you decide to disembark from your bike/car and investigate these strange things further, you will find that these are in fact roads of a nature similar to those in Delhi. It appears that people in those parts of India too surprisingly have access to the very same material that are used to make roads in Delhi.

And about "taking concrete steps with media to point out the faults", I mean am i not doing exactly that, even as I am typing this? This is also a form of media, albeit an elctronic one but nevertheless accessible to anyone who wants to read it. Granted that I am not airing it over the idiot box or publishing it in print for public consumption but if I were, I would not be alone. There are people out there who are airing these concerns and such articles are ubiquitous in each day's newspaper. News channels cover these infrastructural failings and it is due to this that we are getting progressively better roads.

Anyway, the point is, that if it became a law that you were only allowed to comment once you have proved yourself to be an expert on the subject, not only will it kill the favourite pass time of India but would also end free speech as we know it. Because what this would entail is that you would not be able to criticise our politicians, because as you said that you "would like articles posted when we make a difference and stop complaining."
I guess that this would mean that when Sachin bats, only perhaps Gavaskar, Lara (add your own favourites here) would be able to comment or criticise because everyone else just would not be qualified enough!

Anyway, I have found that such tones and attitudes are usually taken by defeatists and cynics who only persue one thing in life- a reason to be cynical.

PS @ Mindgrinder: although I have quoted your text, it was merely to build a reference for the counter-arguements and not addressed to you personally. In no way do I intend to say that you are one of the people that I have criticised here. I am sure you are a well read, well travelled person who loves all of India and not just any one city