The Royal Enfield Classic 500 | The Final Bastian of the Old School
Yes Okay i need to calm down i don't want to get too carried away or excited before i actually get into this video properly so i will maintain my calmness for the introduction let me take you back first of all before i do anything to a summer two years ago when i had the royal enfield press bike the interceptor on test and while emperor gave me a call and it was the start of summer and they said freddie do you want to come for a barbecue in the kent countryside with a few other royal enfields so i headed out into the kent countryside i was on the royal enfield interceptor there was a himalayan a continental and this the classic 500. we rode out into the countryside we pulled up into a big field all of the bikes parked up with a barbecue spot and a land rover parked up the weather was stunning and we decided to go out and get all of the food for the barbecue and there parked up next to the interceptor was this the classic 500. i remember looking at it and i remember seeing the guy riding it and thinking this is one of the most incredible looking bikes and the guy timothy who was riding i remember thinking he looks so damn happy riding it so i asked him timothy do you mind if i borrow that do you mind if i take that out to the shops for the 10 minute ride so there we were on the country lanes interceptor himalayan continental ahead of me and me at the back with this the classic 500 and for those 10 minutes that i was whizzing around the kent country lanes i have never been so happy in my life and i've never had such a big smile on my face so i want to know was that 10 minutes of pure joy just a summer infatuation a summer fling or was it something deeper okay the walk around right they started so i almost just slipped then they started making these bikes the classic 500 in 2008 and production stopped in 2020. this bike right here made was made incredibly all the way up until 2020 so it's a 500cc it's a single cylinder bike it's 27 horsepower and it's 195 kilos with 90 percent of fuel in the tank it's the most glorious ergonomic position the most glorious riding position that i think i've ever experienced it's so perfectly comfy and situated just riding along the motorway in the country lanes it is absolutely perfect the bend in my arms the way my leg bends like this it's it for me it couldn't be more perfect just as a sit up and enjoy everything around you kind of motorbike styling well it's it's classically absolutely classically as true as you could ever possibly imagine to post war styling there is no other motorcycle on the market or has been no other motorcycle on the market within the past two decades that stayed as true to the original post-war era styling as this bike and not just styling this bike itself has stayed as true mechanically to the post-war era as any other motorbike built in the past 20 years right let's do it front to back headlamp circular headlamp but with this again i said again the classic kind of post-war styling big binacle that's attached to the headlamp metal it's a metal mudguard big chunky indicators spokes wheels looks brilliant with a single sided disc and again for a bike of this power you don't need any more i mean they are absolutely tiny aren't they probably as simple as you can get with the brakes there great looking tank there it's just you know my my granddad there's a picture of him and in fact i'll put it up here this is a picture right here of my grand add-on we think from the best of the family knowledge around about 1944 or something like that on his norton bike and this is the closest thing i will probably in reality ever get to riding one of those it's a bike that more than any other takes you back to if you're around my age probably the the bikes that your grandparents or your granddad was riding it really is incredibly similar with the type of shapes and the riding position of that bike so that is my granddad on his norton around about 1944. back to
this bike monica can i test you here i'll put you on the spot what the hell is that i have no idea that is a kickstart that's a kickstart so i was talking to billy the owner's son of easyrider tenerife and by the way if you want this bike or any other bike of this silk if we're looking at royal enfield interceptors bonneville's harley davidsons if you want the modern classic bikes and you're coming to tenerife with an easy rider tenerife and a link in the description is your place to go it is a playground for bikers they're selection bikes off the scale and this is one of them so this shall embarrass myself now okay monica step back a bit and i will try and do it i was talking to billy the owner's son like why is there a kickstand there hasn't been a kickstand on any on any new bike must be for about 30 years or so and and billy said the reason they've got these is in case if you're out in the middle of nowhere for example exploring the indian countryside and the battery dies well then this is a brilliant backup this basically means that you can start the bike if the battery dies so let me see if i can do it right ignition on i'll be completely honest billy was showing me how to do this and it took about 15 minutes of him showing me how to do it for me to actually be able to do it right the bike is in neutral no clutch nothing and it's just a very confident push very confident that's so simple that's why i love this old engineering because everything works how good is that it's brilliant okay so that's a kickstand uh let's carry on this you can put a passenger seat on but this only has a single one it's got these springs on this seat so if you see the camera going like this and that because there's a wasp attacking monica and she's definitely trying to stay stable it's got springs on the seat look at that this is incredibly comfortable this seat and then you've got the metal rear mud guard they've put these great looking panniers on either side real kind of army style panniers with just a very simple utilitarian rear instrument binacle twin shocks on either side and i'll show you this monica if you pan over to this this is all that you get as a rider you get the milometer number of miles you've actually done a light for fuel but no actual gauge to tell you how much is left and an engine warning lights and a few lights for neutral you get nothing else at all forget about any type of rider aids or anything else like that at all it does not get more basic than this bike completely forgot to mention also has a manual choke so you've got to navigate a manual choke a kick start absolutely no electronic or ride aids other than what is the bare minimum safety standards i think maybe it's got abs but even that i'm not sure about so this is as basic a bike as you can possibly get this is not a modern classic this is a proper old-school bike that royal enfield just forgot to stop selling foreign do i have never felt so alive on any bike as i do right now when riding this bike because every single second that i'm on this bike it's an intense experience that takes over everything when you're going over 60 miles an hour on the motorway the vibrations penetrating your whole body gets so intense that it's all you can think about the thud of that engine it's an addictive thing just listens listening to it throbbing away when you hit the sweet spot 50 miles an hour in the country lanes with that engine ticking over the handling absolutely perfect when you're on the back roads forget about the motorways with this because any more than 15 minutes and you feel bits of your body shaking off that you didn't know was possible but if you stick if you stick to the side roads you stick to 50 miles an hour just sitting up enjoying everything around you i promise you i honestly do not think it's possible to have more fun on a motorcycle and it must be the closest thing possible to experiencing a pre or a post-world war ii motorbike with just enough and i do mean just enough of the modern day reliability and refinement and i really do mean just enough with that you know bikes like these i love them so much because they force you to recalibrate in your mind what what fun means what the definition of fun actually is when biking is it the absolute most powerful motorcycle or the most refined motorcycle or is it traction control and lean assist abs when going around xry or is it actually absolute back to basics with a very simple low powered engine just something that makes you feel amazing it's a sensory overload this spike you really do have to in your mind and especially for me i've been through all of the stages with biking where i wanted the most powerful bike so it does take some recalibration if you consider a bike like this but if you open your mind to a motorcycle such as this and i'll get onto this a bit later on in the video such as the meteor such as the 350 classic open your mind to a bike like this then they can be some of the most glorious bits of two-wheel fun you could ever possibly imagine and it's got an authenticity to it for example if you look at the norton motorcycles and i'm a huge fan of the way they look they are probably and i welcome your opinion on these they are more garage queen motorcycles they're extremely expensive they are extremely impressive but they are not your everyday bikes the reason i like royal enfield so much is because they're made by indians for indians and the indians absolutely love their motorcycles and they use these motorcycles as everyday transport and i cannot help but feel extremely warm inside when i get on a bike like this knowing that this is used in india across all different terrains as a proper genuine mode of transport with a bike like this there are limitations for example motorway going over 60 miles an hour it it does shake a lot meaning that after 15 minutes or so honestly i i really was ready to get back onto the side roads and just enjoyed at 50 miles an hour which is where this bike really does make perfect sense build quality it shows how far royal enfield have come in terms of build quality more than any other other motorcycle brand in the past even the past five years the difference if we compare the 500 classic right here to the meteor it's absolutely gigantic they have come on leaps and bounds there are a few areas here where i can tell you know it's been built down to a budget whereas with the meteor the 350 meteor it defies belief how they've managed to build that bike for 3879 pounds that goes beyond expectations whereas this sits very neatly within that more lower end of the budget scale of motorbikes for example a bit of the fit and finish a bit of the paint work just on the edges and also just a few of the materials used you can see it's been built down to a budget and then we get on to pricing this was about 4 800 pounds when new you can get used ones and they do hold their value incredibly well bearing in mind they came out in 2008 used ones anything from 2 000 to 4 400 pounds now the problem for me with that is that you've now got the media that's come along at 3 870 pounds or so and the new classic 350 which i think is 4 300 pounds they are now worryingly close to used versions of this bike and in my mind the difference in overall build quality the handling the ride quality the fit and finish and the parts used and also funnily enough the 350 engine are all significantly better on the new variants of these bikes the new 350cc meteor and the classic 350. the thing that surprised me the 350 engine i find smoother and more refined on the newer bikes so actually they're far far more pleasant on the motorway when i did an hour and a half motorway journey on the meteor it was completely relaxing on this it's quite the opposite despite the bigger engines so for me if it were my money i would and sometimes you don't even need to spend more i would go for the new 350 classic or the new meteor and i would either take a hit and accept that i need to pay a bit more money to get one of those but it's 100 worth it or if you're lucky you don't even need to pay that much more and you get the warranty and stuff so the only problem for me this spike over the fact that it's not the greatest motorway cruiser there may be some slight issues with build quality the big problem is the huge advances that royal empire have made now the meteor and the classic such huge advances that i would end up trading a little bit of the character of this for the extra refinements the build quality the reliability of those new models do you want a fun fact as to how far royal enfield have come in the past five years or so in case you can't hear that monica nodded away this bike is very much niche in fact it's so niche it sits right at the end of the niche scale you've got to be a character to go out and buy one of these motorcycles and i am so grateful that there are people in the world that are characters that would go out and buy it because it's a fantastic motorcycle that makes you feel alive but there are other better bikes out there however royal enfield have come along so far that this motorcycle in its new guys of meteor 350 has gone from being an incredibly niche motorcycle too in november 2021 the royal enfield meteor was the uk's number one selling motorcycle it didn't just beat the bmw gs it also beats all of the one two five cc motorcycles on the market and that is absolutely phenomenal a little different than all the rest a quite a fashion where i had sometimes played chess and when i'm out so hard to finally seem impossible to look this bike in modern day terms is not a good motorcycle but it's the bike that i will remember more so than almost any other bike that i've ever ridden in my life it's got more character this bike than every single other motorcycle currently on the market by such a gigantic margin there's no point me even discussing it every time on the rare occasion that i do actually see these classic 500s on the road in the uk the only thing that goes through my mind is that they must be the happiest motorist on the road at that specific point this bike is pure innocent fun it's a childlike joy before we learn the meaning of what insecurities are so just let your inhibitions get blown away in one of the most charmingly unique motorcycles i've ever had the privilege of riding and of course if you want to rent this very motorcycle from here in tenerife go and check out easy ride itinerary for this bike and a whole host of other brilliant modern classic motorcycles and there is no finer way to enjoy this glorious island than on one of these bikes and i'm also curious just before i finish off today any royal enfield classic 500 owners i would love to hear from you whether it's in europe the usa or india let me know your thoughts let me know i want to know the mileage you've done in it i want to know if it's your daily ride i just want to know about these bikes and the type of people that own them thank you so much for coming along with us today please do give the video a like subscribe to the channel and we'll see you in the next one
2022-03-17 16:11
