Bajaj Dominar 400

The Bajaj Dominar 400 is a sporty touring motorcycle and the manufacturer’s flagship offering. The bike was designed to take on motorcycles from brands such as Royal Enfield that dominate the 300-400cc segment. Let’s take a look at the Dominar today.

Bajaj Auto has inaugurated their first overseas manufacturing facility in Manaus, Brazil, which will manufacture the Dominar 400 and other bikes for the Latin American markets.

Design

The Dominar has a design language that is on the lines of a power cruiser, similar to what we have seen on the Ducati Diavel which is surprising given the Dominar is supposed to be more of a sporty touring motorcycle. The bike gets a bulky design, large headlight and an overall beefy body which makes it stand out from the other naked bikes in the market. 

Bajaj brought some changes to the bike and added in additional features that makes it more of a tourer, things such as a tall smoked visor, handguards, engine bash plate, engine guard, pillion backrest, rear luggage rack along with a navigation mount and USB charging port. For a small premium, customers also have the option to buy a saddle stay that allows them to mount saddlebags. 

Engine, Performance & Mileage:

The Dominar 400’s engine is a 373.3cc DOHC liquid-cooled single-cylinder motor originating from the older-gen KTM 390 Duke’s power plant. But Bajaj has brought some mechanical and tuning changes that have made the engine more suited to cruising at long speeds on the Highways. The engine is mated to a 6-speed gearbox and comes with slip-and-assist clutch. It produces 40PS at 8800rpm and 35Nm at 6500rpm. The only issue with the engine is that vibrations that start to creep in when riding at high speeds, other than that there aren’t many issues and the bike is able to offer good performance.

Handling and ride quality

The Dominar is heavy when it comes to handling and this comes down to its kerb weight of 193kg. The rider will have to put in a bit of effort to control the bike. In city traffic the bike feels lacking in terms of agility required to navigate through traffic jams and narrow roads. But on the highway, the bike provides a wonderful experience and the kerb weight keeps it planted when cruising on high speeds. 

The lack of agility and heavy nature of the bike makes twisties a not so fun experience and tipping it from corner to corner take a lot of effort.. Braking duties are handled by 320mm and 270mm discs at the front and rear respectively. The brakes are quite responsive and they don’t need too much rider inputto get the bike to stop. The MRF radial tyres used provide adequate grip.

When it comes to ride quality, the Dominar 400 does feel a little stiff on bad roads, and the heavy weight of the bike doesn’t help either. But on smooth highways, this weight of the bike keeps it very stable. 

The suspension setup is good but it's clear that the bike doesn’t like being ridden on rough roads. There’s a bit of stiffness that can be experienced when going over rough patches but this isn’t a major issue as the rear suspension comes with preload adjustability. The Dominar is able to provide a comfortable riding experience and stays true to its sports tourer character overall. It is a bike that can crunch long miles on the highway with ease.

Comfort

When it comes to comfort, the Dominar is able to offer a really good experience both when going for short rides and long tours. The seat used is well cushioned and also doesn’t feel too soft. Riders can easily ride for long distances without having to worry about discomfort. The overall riding posture is quiet neutral, with very slightly rear set footpegs and the one piece handlebar is tall and wide, giving the rider a commanding position on the bike. The overall upright riding position and the comfortable seat ensure that the rider will have no aches and pains when touring over longer distances.

Features

The Dominar 400 comes with 2 information displays, the bike’s main instrument cluster and a secondary panel mounted on the fuel tank. The instrument cluster displays information such as speed, rpm, fuel level along with real time and average fuel consumption and the secondary instrument console houses the odometer, tripmeters, clock and gear position indicator. The big issue for the secondary display is that riders need to tilt their head down quite a bit to see the screen, taking their eyes off the road, which could be potentially dangerous.

The motorcycle overall feels a bit lacking in terms of features, its competitors have left it far behind with colour TFT screens with Bluetooth connectivity and turn by turn navigation, electronic safety aids such as traction control, and even adjustable suspension. But Bajaj does offer a smartphone/GPS mount which does bring navigation capabilities to the bike. 

Should you buy the Dominar 400?

The Dominar 400 is a bike that will only appeal to a certain set of riders, ones who are more interested in touring and don’t really care too much about commuting much in the city. For them it is a perfect motorcycle but for the others the Dominar doesn't make much sense now.

The market now is much different than what it was when the Dominar once came out, there's a lot more options to choose from like the Triumph Speed 400 that is offered in the same price range. There’s also other options like the Royal Enfield Meteor 350, Royal Enfield Classic 350, Honda CB350RS, TVS Apache RTR 310 and the QJ Motor SRK400.