Hello Friends,
This is my first review hope you all will like it.
First impression
Nicely put together and well composed. Retro looks and new technology fused together. Very well executed design. Muted thump helps your ears at three figure speeds. Paint work does leaves a lot to be desired. After riding a CL500 you don’t want to ride any other Bullet, leave alone any other fuel starving bikes. Put the key in, you hear the fuel pump prime for 4 seconds. Red light goes off, you crank and the beast comes to life.
Engine/Performance
CL500 is a Indian version of a mid-range revving thumper. Always starts at first crank. Takes about a minute or two before the Decompression stops lifting the valve after 700RPM when the engine warms up and crosses the threshold. Idle is set to 1000-1050RPM. Idles beautifully with a bit of noise from tappets. This engine wants to be abused. I find it hard to ride under 60Km/hr. The torque is lovely jubly and very addictive. But don’t expect rocket like propulsion.
Please for love of God, do not expect UCE engine to perform in terms of quietness and the ability to lug at slow speeds. You need a helmet at all times to get away from the chitter chatter going on in the engine to enjoy the ride although with a upswept, things get better.
Handling
It holds quite well around the bends. Feels highly unstable above 90km/hr. It’s like a locomotive engine on track without suspension. Quite comfortable at slow speeds. Suspension absorbs most of the potholes but 19 inches could have helped at the cost of maneuverability as I feel with size 18 it’s quite agile. Front disc brake is very effective but comes with some dive characteristics as standard which is essential for safe braking or else increasing the chances of skidding. Rear does not sway out on hard rear braking as it would normally do on previous bulls.
In short the whole package inspires confidence in driving with the speeds it can achieve. You can ride the bike like any normal bike without worrying to plan every move for the traffic ahead.
Only thing this bike lags is the stability at high speeds. I wish it could gulp the rough roads the way RD350 does at 100.
The standard rear tyre 110/90/18(MRF Zapper Q) has poor grip on slushy roads. Even going straight at low speeds I was shocked by the sudden loss of grip and had my mouthful.
Front tyre(MRF Zapper FS 90/90/18) has quite good grip to my liking. I have done some emergency stops at three figure speeds and not once did it failed to stop or loose traction.
All though my latest experiment with tyre pressure has given fruitful results and to quite a extent solved the problem of unstable behavior at speeds above 80. I feel the recommended tyre pressure for CL5 is way to high. Now I am quite happy with front at 20 and rear at 22 PSI.(without pillion rider)