Bajaj RE Climbing Ability

Bajaj RE Climbing Ability Tested on Mount Samat

A comment that is often asked is how good is the Bajaj RE Climbing Ability. This is often asked by people who live in mountainous area such as Baguio.

When I tell them the Bajaj RE has no problem climbing it is often met with disbelieve, replies like “I am not sure that a little Tuk Tuk could get up such steep hills” are very common.

Well there is only one way to prove it and that is to take on a steep climb in a Tuk Tuk and video it to show how it performs on a climb and that is just what we did.

Bajaj RE Climbing Ability Up Mount Samat, Pilar, Bataan

The climb we tested it on was Mount Samat, Pilar, Bataan. The climb up to the top is not a long climb just 7.3km but it is very steep in places.

Google Maps claim it should take 13 minutes in a car, the Bajaj RE did the climb up Mount Samat in 13 minutes 30 seconds.

The route up Mount Samat
The route we took in the Bajaj RE up Mt Samat.

There was a lot of roadworks on the way up and at one point there was no concrete because of roadworks. I suspect if there was no roadworks the RE would have done it as fast as a car.

Badly adjusted clutch

It was the first time I had driven the Bajaj RE I used for the climb and had only got into the driver’s seat 1 minute when the video starts.

As soon as I got in it I noticed how badly the clutch was adjusted, the clutch on an RE is only meant to have 4mm of free play, this RE had about 30mm of free play. The result of too much free play means changing gear is not easy. Sadly we had no tools with us as I would have fixed it, it is a 2 minute job with a 12mm spanner and a pair of pliers.

You can see the correct way to adjust the clutch on a Bajaj RE here.

It is for certain the RE would have climbed up Mount Samat even quicker if I was not struggling to change gear because of the poorly adjusted clutch.

For the climb we loaded it with 4 people plus luggage a total weight of 260kg.

The difference in climbing time between a car and an RE was minimal and if it was not for road works and a poorly adjusted clutch the RE might have done it even quicker than the 13 minutes Google maps say it takes in a car.

On two of the hairpins I did have to drop it down too first gear. On the first hairpin I might have managed it in second gear , but I was slow going down from third to second gear because of the poorly adjusted clutch and lost my speed.

What the test showed is because of the Bajaj RE’s Climbing Ability it will get up even the steepest mountain roads without any problem.

Thanks to the Camera Woman

I would like to thank my wife for the excellent job she made of videoing the climb to the top of Mount Samat, if you have ever tried to video a climb like this in a vehicle you will know it is difficult to try to capture just how steep the hill really are on video, for some reason video always make climbs like this look flatter than they are in real life. She has managed to capture the steepness of the hills in many places, not an easy task when you are holding a phone in one hand to monitor the camera and hold the selfie stick in the other while fighting the wind resistance against it.

Camera Used to Video Bajaj RE’s Climbing Ability

The video was taken with a SJCam SJ8 Pro set to record at 1080 Ultra at 30fps, Gyro Stabilizer on, Distortion correction on.

Since we wrote this article we have tested the TVS King ability to climb and it is even better than the Bajaj RE .

2 thoughts on “Bajaj RE Climbing Ability Tested on Mount Samat”

  1. I use mine from Tuguegarao Cagayan to Baguio City via.Kayapa-Ambuklao.road. that’s approximately 60 kilometers uphill-winding road.
    Never had a problem going uphill
    Who’s in for some adventure?
    Did it thrice already.
    Will be on the.road again same route anyday before the end of November.
    Join me!

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