In direct contrast, the Pulsar exhibits a lot less crank inertia and uses its twin plugs and resonance chamber to the hilt. The engine responds immediately and crisply to the wrist and likes to celebrate the sense of speed. The gain in torque is noticeable and the Pulsar is quicker everywhere. No changes in the gearing rob the Pulsar of the top speed crown, though. We do wish that the 150 gearbox wasn’t all-down
and this time we will take away points for this. The shifts themselves are quite slick, but are so light that eventually you end up causing a mis-shift. It isn’t the bike’s fault really, but it keeps happening. Where the Pulsar trails the Unicorn noticeably is on noise. The Bajaj is better damped vibe-wise than the Honda, but it makes a carnival-size racket. It doesn’t sound like an Armageddon announcement, but it isn’t the welcome sound of trumpets either. This needs to be sorted out.
Who wins the shoot-out? First, Bajaj and Honda loyalists, please buy the Pulsar and Unicorn respectively and put ‘the other bike sucks’ stickers on... you won’t regret your purchase. The rest, wake up and listen. The Unicorn engine is friendly and likes to cruise, the gearbox is slick and it has a Honda badge on the tank. If you’re not particularly sporty and need only a frugal all-rounder of a 150cc to get to office, which happens to be down a good road, get the Honda. We’d recommend the F2 here, but it is comprehensively overshadowed by both of these bikes.
The Pulsar is the machine for the sportily inclined. It rides and handles better, manages broken surfaces more calmly and actually enjoys and provokes a thrashing. The standard alloy wheels look infinitely smarter, and make the 18-inch spoked rims look like they belong on one of Pablo’s Long Time No Sees. And unlike the cheap Chinese wheels people casually shell out upwards of Rs 3,000 a set, for, these Enkei’s are really very good. The new 150 (electric start) goes for Rs 61,617 on-road Mumbai, about Rs 4000 more than the Unicorn electric start and almost exactly the price you’d pay for the alloys at a Bajaj spare parts counter.
To take a longer perspective, over a seven-year period, at 11,000 annual km, we expect both to have only minor problems. However, we’d expect the more stressed Pulsar to age a bit quicker. Just so you know, Honda has the advantage in service quality right now, with overworked, overbooked Bajaj service outlets currently notorious for poor service, and even poorer customer treatment.
I almost wish I could do a buy-the-one-you-like standard ending, knowing that in this case it would be as near as dammit to the truth. But one bike must win, it’s an unbroken Motoring rule. In this particular case, by the tiniest of margins I vote for the Pulsar.
You see, the one thing I haven’t pointed out yet is that the Unicorn, unfortunately, is about as exciting as Microsoft Excel, while the Pulsar is as much fun as Road Rash.
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