Royal Enfield Himalayan

Just a few weeks stand between motorcycle enthusiasts and the launch of Royal Enfield’s highly anticipated Himalayan adventure motorcycle. The Himalayan is expected to go on sale in India in March. Not helpful to those of us here in the U.S., but it marks a new entrant into the small ADV market.

As we get ready to sample the production version of the adventure bike let’s take a quick look at the specifications as we know them.

• Royal Enfield Himalayan will be powered by a 411-cc oil-cooled single-cylinder engine tuned to dish out 24.5 bhp at 6,500 rpm and 32 Nm torque at 4,000 and 4,500 rpm, with five-speed transmission. Not extravagant numbers by any means, but it should be a very capable motor off road and get the job done on back roads easy enough.
• The Himalayan measures 2,190 mm in length, 840 mm in width, and 1,36 0mm in height (windscreen height). It has a wheelbase of 1,465 mm and offers a ground clearance of 220 mm.
• The new adventure tourer comes with 41-mm front forks and a mono shock in the rear, and rides on a 21-inch front and a 17-inch rear wheel.
• Price is slated to be below the Classic 500 and the Continental GT.
• Brakes are a 300 mm disc in the front and a 240 mm disc in the rear.
• The engine will have a 10,000-km oil-change interval and the spark plugs every 25,000 km. Take these with a grain of salt. The harder the use the shorter the maintenance interval.
• The Himalayan comes equipped with a semi-digital instrumentation cluster with an analogue speedo, tachometer and a digital tripmeter. The motorcycle’s instrument cluster also features an altimeter. Whether that will be a US option will remain to be seen.

After the hype of the Africa Twin and some of the other ADV bikes coming to market I am more excited by this bike. Small, capable, and reliable it fits for the traveler who just wants to ride and be connected to their motorcycle.

Would you buy a bike like this if Harley made a Sportster based dual purpose motorcycle? Comment below and let us know. Who knows maybe we can develop a whole new model.