Royal Enfield has recently discontinued its café racer
offering, the Continental GT. In November last year, the bike’s sales figure
reportedly went down to just three units. It is likely that the low sales was
one of the reasons for the bike getting pulled off the market. Another reason
is the fact that a café racer with a bigger engine (GT 650) will enter our
shores in the summer of this year. Apart from the bigger engine in the Royal
Enfield Continental GT 650, the company has also tuned the bike to make it more
usable.
One thing we have done is taken ergonomics to the
next level. A lot of our customers tend to ride a Continental GT and actually,
there are lots of young riders. But there are some older riders and for them
crouching down too much for a long time gets a bit tricky. We’ve made the
ergonomics slightly easier and comfortable so it’s not like extremely
committed. And of course, the chassis concept is the same because we started
with the twin-downtube frame taken from the Continental GT 535. But we again
refined and improved that so obviously everything is hopefully one level up.
The new twin cylinder engine has an engine capacity
of 648 cc. The SOHC, 4-valve unit’s compression ratio is 9.5:1. It features an
oil-cooler, apart from the fins for air cooling. The engine comes with a
270-degree crank with a balancer shaft to smoothen out vibrations. The
powerplant mates with a new 6-speed transmission with a slip-assist clutch.
Royal Enfield says that the motor is capable of allowing the motorcycle to
cruise at 120-135 kmph without breaking a sweat.
It is safe to say that the Continental GT 650 will
not only be faster but will also be more refined and practical than the GT 535.
Expect an ex-showroom price tag of around INR 3.5 lakhs for the upcoming
motorcycle. The bike will be one of the most affordable cafe racers in the
country.
