Malaysia’s quarter-litre class motorcycle market today leaves the buyer spoilt for choice. With practically every motorcycle manufacturer having at least one 250 or 300 cc entry-level or higher bike in the local range, there is a quarter-litre bike to fit every need and budget.
\nAustrian outfit KTM, which is currently 47% owned by Bajaj Auto Limited of India, has leveraged heavily on its partnership, and produced a series of small-displacement bikes that has seen it garner a large market share in the Indian sub-continent, as well as in South-East Asian countries and a large customer base in Europe.
\nLaunched mid-last year in Malaysia, KTM’s pair of 250 cc twins, the Duke 250 and RC 250, have gained a following amongst local riders. For those wanting a brand outside the mainstream of the Japanese ‘Big Four’ (or more accurately, ‘Big Three’ locally since Suzuki doesn’t officially offer a 250 cc motorcycle), KTM offers an alternate image, with a performance oriented focus.
\nWe were given the opportunity to test the 250s back-to-back, and this provided for a good comparison as to how two identical engines and almost identical chassis can behave in very different ways. <\/p>\n
Designed for two very different riding styles and images, the Duke 250 and RC 250 take opposite ends of the riding spectrum. The Duke comes as a motard-styled naked, with an up-right riding position and wide, Moto-X style handlebars, while there is no mistaking the RC’s racebike looks, with its full-fairing, and head-down riding position.
\nTaking the 390 cc single as used in the Duke 390 and RC 390, KTM sleeved down the engine bore, to create a 249 cc single fed by EFI. This was in response to both licensing requirements in many markets, where 250 cc bikes are the most license-friendly, as well as consumer feedback that the 200 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Malaysia’s quarter-litre class motorcycle market today leaves the buyer spoilt for choice. With practically every motorcycle manufacturer having at least one 250 or 300 cc entry-level or higher bike in the local range, there is a quarter-litre bike to fit every need and budget. Austrian outfit KTM, which is currently 47% owned by Bajaj Auto […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5817,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137413","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5817"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137413"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137413\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}