Track Your Daily Expenses with mychipper.com

Well, me and my colleague Suku end of the month always wondered were is our money going! Being in the internet industry we looked around for a lot of tools to track your expenses. But found most were either too complex, or lacked functionality and some nice ones were charging money for it.

So we decided what the hell lets build one ourselves. And then http://mychipper.com was born. It was done for fun. But our main aim was to build a Daily Expense Tracker that was extremely simple to use. In a short span of time we had 100 users, most of whom were coming back regularly. And we realized the simplicity of the application was very appealing to people. Lot of positive feedback came. And we started taking chipper more seriously. Over a period of 2 months we added lots of features. Some of them are summarized below -

• Set reminders – Chipper drops you a reminder mail. Use it to remember your due dates, bill payment dates or just about anything!
  
• Transactions – See you complete history by date, by week or by month
• Lending / Borrowing – Always forget to remember that 100 Rs you lent to your friend? You can now use chipper to track this. You can use chipper even if you are the one that borrowed that 100 Rs.
• Chipper on mobile – You can access chipper through mobile if you have a GPRS enabled phone.
• Chipper on Orkut – You can use chipper on Orkut too. Just click here to install chipper as an application.
• Talk to buddy – Buddy is a bot whom you can add on gtalk (buddy@mychipper.com). Just add him as a friend, send him the expenses and he’ll take care of the rest. Buddy has lots of easter eggs too, just try chatting with him sometime

Also read this excellent article on online expense trackers.

Advise on Buying Royal Enfield

Royal Enfield has enough variants to confuse a new Buyer. I have been through he dilemma in the past. This post of mine talks about Royal Enfield ThunderBird. All said and done I was not happy with Thunderbird, it lacked the thump which gives the Bullet its real character. So I sold it and Bought a Electra 5s and fit it with a standard silencer. According to me its the most ideal Bullet you can own. Thump is PERFECT. So my advise, If you are a true Bullet fan buy a standard 350. If you need a more reliable bike with the classic feel, Buy a electra 5s. If you just Don't care about the thump buy a any AVL. No comments on the twin spark.

Choosing a Royal Enfield

Royal Enfield - Built like a Gun goes like a Bullet

So you have decided to buy a Royal Enfield and dont know which one to choose? I have gone to through the same dilemma. Here is a Guide to Buying a Royal Enfield.

Royal Enfield has three variants.
1. Iron Cast.
2. AVL.
3. UCE.

If following are your reasons for buying a Enfield read on.
1. You love that dug dug sound old bullets make.
2. You want to just own a Royal Enfield and are not particular about the sound.

If you fell in love with the bullet for that old beat. Dont even think about a AVL or a UCE engine. You need a Iron Cast. No matter what you do to a AVL or UCE. It will never give you the best a Iron Cast can give. People try things like Short silencer and Gold star. Please don't waste your time on any of these. AVL and UCE are very high revving engines. To get that old dug dug beat you need a low revving engine like Iron Cast. Now even in Iron casts you have couple of choices.

Standard 350 / Electra 4s / Electra 5s - If bike is post 2001 it will most probably have a catalytic converter and/or a long silencer. If you neutralize the converter and change the silencer to a old one, It will give you the good old beat.

500 - I have used this bike twice for Test Ride. Personally I was not impressed. But people say it is your ne

Trip to Chikmagalur

Bangalore to Chikmagalur
Total Distance – 600 km’s
Duration - 2 days

About 9 of us had planned this trip forever. Most of us just wanted to ride our bikes not caring where we should go. Just one empty highway and our bikes zooming!! Others, however, were particular about where to go and what places to visit. All in all, we decided to leave early Saturday morning. I was so excited I couldn’t sleep. I was up at 4 since we all planned to meet up at 5. As always, few of us managed to meet up at 6 and everyone else slowly (but thankfully) turned up finally by 6.30.
Mode of transportation –
1 Comet, 1 Apache, 1 Pulsar 150, 1 Pulsar 180, 1 Thunderbird, 1 Indica. (Sum these up = funnn :) )

So we begin - destination Chikmagalur. Off we go and we are yet not even past Yeshwantpur, and our fastest bike break down. Well it’s a bike trip! The clutch wire snaps. Seven in morning we are looking for a place to fix it up. Thankfully we find an auto mechanic. We had this easy clutch installed that is connected to the clutch lever with a wire of about 5 inches length. We have a cable too. All we need is to cut the cable exact length and fix it on. Dear mechanic cuts the cable but refuses to touch the bike. Big deal, it’s not that big! We fix it up in about 20 min’s. Probably he would have done it in 2 min’s. But anyways, while we were fixing up the cable some curious onlookers enquired about the bike. Asked for the mileage we told it might return a 25 per litre. And his response “what’s the point?” His question was enough for us to not even make an effort to reply. Guess the guy has not sense of bhp.



Already few hours behind schedule we hurry. In the excitement most bikes just zipped. And the car followed. Roads were very bad on this Yeshwantpur stretch. Sadly only people in the car knew the route :) . You should be able to guess what happened. Few kilometers ahead we were suppose to take a left. We missed it. Next we found a road going to Belgaum, it was a toll road, and it was a beautiful to ride bikes. We went 25 km’s before realizing the blunder. And the car went about 20kms in the perpendicular direction. So we all had to turn back and catch up with the car.

Next stop CR Patna. Our pulsar 180 refused to above 40kmph! We knew something was wrong. One mechanic we found. After few minutes of him inspecting the bike, he took the whole engine apart with absolutely no results. A day before the bike was given for servicing. We also figured out that the bajaj guys had removed the old engine oil but they had filled it half!! Blunder of the century. Obviously engine had seized. We spend some 4 hours in CR Patna, to our entertainment we had a local volleyball match girls vs. boys. Finally the mechanic gave up on the bike. We had some contact in the local police station. We put the bike there and off we go. Next stop Hassan.

On the way we stopped for lunch at Kamat. The food was good. After some 2-3 hours of continuous riding we reached Chikmagalur. It was too late for us to visit any of the main attractions. Right before we entered the main city there was a dam. It’s a nice place, really breezy and calm. The water levels were quite high since it was October. After spending about half and hour we came into the city. It was a really small and sleepy city (probably how Bangalore was few decades ago). Found a decent lodge to stay. Cost was about 800 for a big bedroom, were 5 people could stay. It was just perfect for us. We didn’t want luxurious place anyway.



After dinner we decided we would leave the place at 4.30 am and watch the sun rise from the Mulayangiri hills. Being really energetic about the whole trip we woke up at 4 and were ready by 4.40. And next surprise, our car has 4 cars parked in front of it which made it impossible to steer our car out. With 9 people and 4 bikes. :( . we decided to let go of the sunrise. By 7 we wake up the other cars’ owners to take out the cars. And we were off that place in like 10 min’s!!

We start the climb of the hill. I have to say the best part of the trip was this. The silver oaks, the plantations, the really scenic locations all were just breathtaking! It was a beautiful morning. Mulayangiri is about 15 km’s from Chikmagalur. There were three other spots. But we had a time crunch. We had to keep in mind the fact that on a Sunday we had to figure out a way to send the pulsar that was lying in CR Patna to Bangalore.



The view from the top of the Mulayangiri was out of the world! What was difficult for me to believe was that it was in this very world-a beautiful other side of the planet. There was a short trek too. Most of us managed to do half of it. And then we decided to leave. On the way back I got to ride the hyosung comet. It is just such an amazing bike. 250 cc 26 bhp. I guess that’s as good as it can get as of now. I rode it for about 25 km’s. The bike is so stable at high speeds and in mid range in the 3rd and the 4th gears the bike has so much acceleration. Rest of my trip was spent on the thunderbird. It’s a perfect touring bike. We rode back 300 km’s on the second day with out lot of breaks. But I was not tired. All through the trip I would got excited with the fact that we had so much more to ride, just wished it would not end.

We got to CR Patna managed to find VRL office that was open on a Sunday! We booked the pulsar transfer and next surprise hit us. We didn’t have diesel in our Indica :) and the area petrol bunks seem to be short on diesel. Yes it was a trip with no plan. But we were lucky we found diesel very close by. Finally we start 145 km’s from Bangalore. And we are greeted by very heavy rainfall. 15 min’s it rains cats and dogs. And finally after that we ride back to Bangalore with out any more surprises.

“World needs more roads” - From the heart of a bullet lover

Not happy with your AVL?

For Buying a Gold Star Silencer contact - Akram, 9945400727

Please read this blog before continuing it will save you a lot of time.

So you have always wanted to buy that timeless Royal Enfield. For some reason you decided to go buy yourself a Machismo/Thunderbird (AVL engine). Now you really are jealous of all the old bullets that make that daba daba sound? Probably you have looked around internet what can you do about that thump that’s missing in your AVL? People on net would have talked about short bottle silencer, rocket silencer and the legendary GoldStar silencer.

So I am software professional from Bangalore. Few months ago I bought a Royal Enfield Thunderbird. So the bike is awesome. I love this ride. But, where is the thump? I mean it’s a Royal Enfield right? Ok so I knew thump will be less. But god sake I can’t have a 350cc engine that gives no thump!! So I start my research on net.

So Rocket silencer was first solution. It’s a complete free flow silence. It makes terribly loud sound. I didn’t want that. So this was no solution for me.

Next the 500 cc silencer, oh it fits out of the box on the thunderbird. It costs 600 bucks.

It gives a very nice beat. So I decide to try it on. I had it for 3 months. But I am still not happy.

The expensive solution, but the only real solution.

The GoldStar silencer – so what’s so special about it?

Well, anatomy of a GoldStar – It is a complete free flow silencer with glass wool in it. It’s got a very distinctive shape. Sound? Well I would say it is not exactly like a standard Bullet sound. It is ALOT better. The sound that comes out of a GoldStar has this deep bass to it. It’s like Thump + Deep Bass. It’s really addictive. Thrust me when you hear a AVL/bullet with a GoldStar. You are bound to go gaga over it.

Next when you open the throttle, you get this racing feel. GoldStar was a standard fitment on the Café Racer (a racing version of bullet). GoldStar has racing origins. It originally belongs to legendary BSA GoldStar motor cycle. Its production was stopped decades ago.

On a Machismo/ Thunderbird/ Electra it’s an easy fit (no modifications). If you want to put it on Standard, most mechanics would ask you to change your bend pipe. Well if you don’t want to cut your standard’s exhaust pipe. Yes put a new bend pipe. Else cut the pipe of the standard bike and make the collar of the GoldStar of smaller diameter.

After 50 – 100 km of installing the silencer you would notice a considerable improvement in sound. You would never hate your AVL.

I would not say go to extent of saying choose an AVL over standard. Standard Bullet is legendary. There is no denying that. But don’t forget AVL engines are also from same people. They found all the flaws of a standard and fixed them with AVL engines. In the whole process, thump was lost. Instead the AVL engines were blessed with lot of advantages.

Be careful! Some idiots make silencers which are nothing but pipes with shape of a GoldStar. And Try to sell them to for 2000 bucks! Surprisingly Teknik motors (authorized dealer for Royal Enfield) in Bangalore tried doing that to me! That is not even a real replica of GoldStar. It is a rocket silencer that looks like GoldStar. It cost 500 bucks in reality.

Real GoldStar silencers are hard to find and are way too expensive. Replicas are what you get in India. Just remember, GoldStar is free flow and has glass wool in it. The back portion of the silencer has a screw. When you open it we have a section of silencer coming off and you can adjust the glass wool for beat that you want out of your engine.

It will cost your around 2500 bucks. Personally I feel it’s worth the spending.

So if you have faced problem similar to mine. Just don’t waste time and money with other solutions. Just put on a GoldStar silencer and fall in love with your Royal Enfield all over again.