OD Garage: Kinetic Blaze

A long bad stretch of road, with bits of tarmac here and there could’ve been a delight for our ‘dirt-rider’ Karan, but not the rest of the pack. Their sheer discomfort was evident but things never got too annoying aboard the Blaze. Thanks to the softly tuned twin rear shocks, the ride is cushy no matter what surface you ride on. Then you have the huge seat with a backrest to complete the ‘heaven on earth’ cliché. All you feel are faint jitters from the stiff front end, but I guess it has to be that way to prevent it from bogging down at potholes and under hard braking. The front disc breaks the braking jinx the earlier Blazes suffered and has a sharp feel to it. The lesser said about the constantly fading rear drum brake the better.  After spending almost a month with it, my fright of towing this bulky baby in town has vanished and I’m working desperately on getting down my commute times to Apache levels. Yeah! She’s that nimble and capable too. My ‘valentine’ has also been consistent with fuel efficiency, delivering 31 kilometres to a litre. The best I could squeeze out was 36kmpl, being ultra gentle on the throttle. A busted front fork oil seal in less than a thousand kilometres of running raises a question on Kinetic’s quality control. But the biggest grouse still remains tripping to the fuel station every other day.

Vijayendra Vikram Singh