I don't know how bad the situation is in other cities but it's really getting on my nerves here in Bangalore. On my way to work every day, I see scores of vehicles (small and big - even trucks!) on the wrong side of the road and sometimes exceeding the speed limit. For some reason, they're too important to wait in traffic on their side of the road like the rest of us do. </vent>

Anyway, after many delays, finally got my Rolon chain today for INR 2950. I suggested to the Rolon rep that a number of Ninja riders should be nearing EOL on their chains and it might be a good idea to keep some stock handy. How many of you guys are interested? Also, any feedback from the guys that already have the Rolon installed?

While I was at Motorcycle Components (JC road), the Rolon rep was talking to me about Top1 oil that Rolon is importing and beginning to promote here in India. They have multiple grades. They have a semi-synth Top1 Action Plus JASO/MA2 spec'd (official looking label) 10W40 that might be suitable. Relatively cheap at around INR 320 a litre (IIRC). Looks like Top1 is a large US company that's pretty big in SE Asia. Now who here is man enough to try it and tell us how it is?

The engine oil topic is very very much like break-ins in that everyone's got an strong opinion but no one's got any test results. I went trawling across the interwebs and here are some-
- Oils Well That Ends Well, Part 1 - Sport Rider Magazine (all oils appear reasonably close except that mineral degrade faster)
- Oils Against Oils - Major Oil Brands go head-to-head on the dyno. (cars tested, no longevity test)
- Testing Motorcycle Oil (old article, study by a PhD)
- www.amsoil.com/lit/g2156.pdf (300V not looking good but not great; interesting article but wonder if biased)
- http://motorcycleinfo.calsci.com/Oils1.html (no tests, just information gathered and understood by someone who loves his bike)
- Google "motorcycle oil shear test" etc. for more

Look for 10W-50 grade if possible, since the weather in India is warmer. A 10W-50 oil will be more resistant to thinning at higher temperatures than a 10W-40.

Proud owner of a Black Ninja!!!

Right... So I've been the proud owner of a Black ninja for a little more than two weeks now... I was planning on getting a brand new ninja, but decided against it when I worked out the finances and checked out the available used bikes on the market... What I landed up getting was an April 2011 black ninja, with about 2900kms on the clock... Bike was absolutely stock and pristine... The benefits of getting this bike were that I didn't have to go through the rigorous break-in period which, as many of you know, can be such a pain... lol... On the flip side, I really wanted to use the motoman break in on my bike... This, apart from the 1.00-1.20 lacs I saved(if i include interest costs), made the deal totally worth it...

Thankfully for me, I did get a test drive of the bike(once I get quiet vocal about it over the phone) from the vashi showroom, so I knew what to expect... This bike is a world away from my dad's RE classic 500 I'd been riding before... The first time I got on it, I couldn't control the handle, it was so light... I was considering the CBR 250R for a while too, but didn't go in for it, due to the single cylinder and lower hp rating. My logic was that it'd probably take me a lot longer to grow out of this bike, than it would the cbr... From the 100-150kms I managed to cover over the past 2 weeks, I've been finding the bike to be slightly sluggish... It doesn't have that oomph factor... I showed it to Peter from 7th gear customs, but he said it was running perfectly... I also showed it to a friend who is an avid sports biker with both a Hayabusa and an R1 in his garage, even he said it was not as peppy as it should be...

The lack of peppiness didn't stop me from crashing my bike exactly on the week from taking delivery though... Luckily, the damage to the bike was minimal and no damage happened to the idiot who was riding it(me)... I was riding in a straight line at about 40-50km/h when a fabia took a right turn out of nowhere at the cut in the road, causing me to panic and slam the brakes right in the middle of a huge wet patch in the road... The bike slipped and skidded a few mtrs before stopping. I have no idea how, but I didn't get anything bigger than a light scratch... God was definitely watching over me that day... lol Anyhow, the Damage to the bike was a broken left side indicator, lots of scratches and a small crack(right in front of the indicator). On the same day after the accident, I had another near mishap, when at an intersection a bike guy decided he didn't need to look left or right(or pay attention to my horn) before cutting across me causing me, to once again panic and slam the brakes... This time though, the bike lost traction for only a second before coming back under control... Not before my ba**s were in my mouth though... lol... After the trauma of the first accident and then this in the same day, I refused to take the bike over 40km/h for the next few days...

Now I'm in Uttarakhand for a month, and my poor bike is lying in Bombay... I really need to take some time out from my schedule to do some serious riding and diy work on the bike... The only two alterations I have made to date are to remove the saree guard and to pain the windscreen black... Will post another review once I get to spend some quality time with the bike... Till then I went and picked up an Fz16 hugger for my soon to come fender eliminator... Also getting a rear paddock stand made...

Hey bluevolt. I don't think I'll be switching down to semi-synth. What I've understood so far is that synth has two major advantages - better operating temperature range (doesn't matter here) and better shear stability (will maintain viscosity for more miles). I checked out Top1's specs for their Action Plus semi-synth and they don't mention shear stability so I am not keen on it. Looking at it another way, with 300V your engine might last 150kkm while Action Plus might gives you a life of 100kkm. You'd have spent about INR 46k vs. INR 5.3k on oil over the bike's lifetime. I wonder how many people here plan on using their bikes over 100kkm. If you don't, you just wasted 40K. Then again, even with 300V, you spend on oil a tenth of what you spend on petrol. You might justify 300V as a 10% premium you pay for peace of mind.

So 300V for the Kawasaki and maybe Action Plus for the Bajaj.

Congrats, psych0hans and welcome to the forums. What do you mean "sluggish"? Of course it's sluggish compared to an R1! That aside, you don't mean the initial pickup, do you? If you feel it's sluggish in general, you might want to try cleaning your air filter if you haven't already.

And I see you've learned the hard way to "expect the unexpected". Don't let your accident scare you out of having fun with your bike. Just pretend the road is an FPS CTF match and everyone's out to get you. That should keep you safe.

one argument on oil could be considering the indian weather conditions of rain shine heat cold and dust,dirt etc etc, it would be more prudent to put the reccomended oil or semi synth oil run it no more than 6000 kms and replace the oil and oil filter. this may be better than the long drain expensive fully synth oils considering the indian weather.

I don't think Indian weather is all that extreme. It can get a little hot so maybe as bluevolt suggested, use something heavier. And because mineral and semi-synth will shear much more than fully-synth, it will probably behave like a 10W40 after 1-2kkm. You'd probably be quite alright if you stick to a product matching manual recommendations (20W50, JASO MA/MA2) and change every 6kkm. A fully synthetic oil might actually last longer so you'd be wasting it by changing at 6kkm... I've read about people that change the filter but keep the oil for two filter changes.

Thanks Evershine!!! When I say sluggish, I'm not comparing it with any bike, I feel it isn't too rev happy and I can feel the bike struggling to reach high revs... But considering this is my first bike, the other being my fathers RE, I really don't know what to expect from it? I'm going to switch over to a free flow muffler and air filter soon, lets see if that helps...

The bike the gets insane after 7000 revs and the top top end is thrilling. Like evershine said try cleaning your air filter. That'll give a noticeable increase in pick up..

Saw a white ninja at pbk on Saturday. It was superb. Here are the pictures. Only had a phone camera.
Enjoy

WOW. The white ninja looks super clean and elegant. The green one next to it belongs to my friend Rajiv. He got the wheels painted on his bike, thats how i can say so confidently.

Some offence taken.

Black is classy, black it's elegant, black is luxury, moreover, black means courage, brave and no fear of anything..... :P Anyways, my bike isn't going to be black for too long, painting her in the 2011 white paint scheme(something that I always wanted).

Just looking for a good place to get it done. I'm from Pune, anyone knows good custom paint guys from pune? Help please.....

You can add another blacky to the list as well . Got her three days back. My Initial impressions: (Completed ~250 kms now.)

1. It is a pain to ride under 4k RPM all the time.
2. Ride is good - not as harsh as I had imagined. Bike is perfectly balanced - waay better that P220 and the brakes are just awesome.
3. Rear view mirrors could have been better..can't see much.
4. Idle RPM takes around a minute to settle to 1.4k RPM
5. Bike rocks sideways when still - guess this is due to uneven firing of the cylinders

Uploading a few pics as well

Clue: Have you fueled up recently?

yes I did - my first tankfull.
Edit: So the full fuel amplifies the cylinder vibes?

I take it that the bike rocks with full fuel