KTM Duke 200 Vs 390 ownership downsides



After the launch of KTM Duke 200 in 2012, it completely changed the biking scenario in the Indian motorcycling history. Our first ride on the Duke 200 was awesome and quite unbelievable as it was churning 25 horses. But in June 2013 the Austrian manufacturer again rewrote history, with the launch of the Duke 390. Both bikes have pretty similar appearance except the paint schemes, but when it comes to long term ownership there are huge differences.


The Duke 390 is equipped with some higher performance parts like the soft compound Metzeler tires, dual channel ABS, company fitted knuckle protectors and of course a bigger clutch.

If you want a daily commuter bike you can opt for the Duke 200, but if you are power thirsty then 390 is the bike you should be buying. Owning the 390 over a 200 in the first place will make you spend about a 60K more. Once you have your hands on the bike, you need to be ready to spend 8-10k on the tires in the coming 10-12k km. Duke 390 also has some idiosyncratic problems like cracking of air-box near the throttle body. Some issues are small like the chain cover bolt falling off due to vibrations, on the other side there are some common problems on both the Dukes like engine idle unstable at cold conditions, clutch cable getting hard. On both the bikes the rear view mirror are partially of no use.

With the relaunch of the new 200 & 390 in 2015, most of the issues on the bikes have been solved to a great extent. Lately in 2016 there have been updates that both bike will be again relaunched with more changes for the delight of the customers.

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