On the road again…..so to speak

On the road again…..just means that I am back to blogging about this journey…the quest for an Enfield.

So let me start by explaining why there has been a lull in posts in the last year. Honestly…I got distracted by other things like life….So i have spent some time fixing my BMW and finally got my full drivers license. Now the wife and I can ride together.

As I might have mentioned before I am trying to convince my wife to learn to ride a bike and then the plan is to buy an Enfield for her. We are making progress and now debating what colour we should get. So I (or we) are closer to getting an Enfield. The other factor is finance….got to find a gap in the budget for the extra bike…all in good time I suppose.

I have realised that the Enfield is one of those bikes that I would like to have several variants of. Starting with the Classic, I would like to have it in various colours…Military, Maroon, Cyan, Chrome and Maroon, oh and why not the Desert Storm just for good measure. I would also like to a have a Cafe Racer version, either the factory one from Enfield (hopefully soon) or one with an after market kit. Then strangely enough I would also like a Trial/Scrambler version just to mess around on. Is this too much to ask….I think my bank manager would say so.

I recently went on a business trip to Toronto. Is was a great trip…besides meeting Rodriguez

, the first day I was walking around down town Toronto and happened to look up a side street and saw the unmistakable shape of…..an ENFIELD!!!

I chatted to the owner. Turns out that it was brought across to Canada by an Indian family. They had done the gear shifter conversion to comply with Canadian traffic law. But seemly had not ridden it much as it only had a few thousand miles on it even though it is an early 90’s bike. The guy picked it up for a ridiculous price, something like R 9000. As you can see the bike is in great shape.

This brings me to another point which I am sure I have mentioned before. I have been involved with the Gauteng Royal Enfield Owners club (https://www.facebook.com/REsouthafrica?ref=stream). Even though I do not own an Enfield, I am always invited to their outings and functions. To me this demonstrates the kind of people that own Enfields. Not an exclusive club.Whenever I meet an Enfield owner we get lost in conversation about the history and the charm of the bike.

The sound of Black Betty the Airhead

So in my last post I deviated a bit from the quest for an Enfield to tell you about the restoration of a ‘78 BMW R80/7 that I acquired from a friend. I mentioned that I would post a video of it running so you can hear what it sounds like. So here it is…

So it is not a Royal Enfield but it is a classic bike

So the main theme of this blog is about the quest to own a Royal Enfield, it is not the “Quest to own a bike”. However if you are in my position where you have wanted a bike for many years, pretty much any bike will do.

Now if I was to get my hands on a bike and it was not an Enfield, I would be chuffed if it was at least classified as a classic bike. So here is the deal, thanks to a friend of mine, I got my grubby paws on a 1978 BMW R80/7. Now that is a Classic (at least in my book). This bike has been standing idle for about 10 years. Actually I have a feeling it is a bit longer than that. Probably closer to 14 years. Tony and I struck a deal for me to take it off his hands and restore it.

This is what it looked like when I got it…

I have done a few things to the bike so far. Here is a list:

• Oil change
• Brake fluid change
• New battery
• Cleaned all aluminium parts (ongoing process)
• Repaired holes in the fuel tank
• New front mud guard
• Re-sprayed tank and front mud guard
• Repaired seat (ordered seat cover from the UK)
• Ordered new left hand side exhaust (ordered from the UK)
• Ordered new BMW badges for the tank, carb gaskets and float needles (turned out to be the incorrect ones)
• Fixed odometer as it was not ticking over
• Fixed the rev counter it was an electronic problem that a friend of mine helped me with.
• Replaced all the globes in the instrument cluster
• Replaced one of the fuel taps (sourced from BMW)

Bare in mind this bike had not been started for, as I am told, a minimum of 6 years. Once I had changed the oil, with the help of a friend we started the engine. It practically started on the third attempt. What a machine, a true workhorse.

The only major item that is outstanding is the licensing. The bike needs to go for Police clearance and a whole list of other administrative hurdles. This is going to be done shortly. The bottom-line is that this bike to is ready to ride…..So meet “Black Betty”…

She runs like a dream. The balancing of the carbs could probably be tweaked a bit more but it is close enough for now.

So for those of you that are interested I sourced the parts from www.motobins.co.uk, www.feked.com and BMW SA. The repair on the tank and the re-spray was done by Kaleidoscope Customising (Ralph - 011 4938749). Seat recovering was done by Paul’s Auto & Aero Trim (Brian - 011 6838308)

I love this bike, it has character and we have bonded over the last 2 months that I have been doing the restoration. I will post a video shortly with her running so you can hear what she sounds like.

In spite of this, the quest for a Royal Enfield continues…so don’t worry it over yet!!!

Royal Enfield Riders–Part 2

Here is another happy Enfield customer….

Follow this link…http://www.vimeo.com/28460858

I think this video will make a commercial for Royal Enfield….What do you think?

Royal Enfield Riders–Part 1

Here is a photo of Stuart and his father with their new Military Enfields.

Stuart tells me that the reason they both got the military spec was because his late Grandfather was a dispatch rider in WW2 up in North Africa and they were equipped with Royal Enfields (Fly Fleas). So they got them for sentimental reasons.

Congrats guys…..I hope you both have many hours of fun on your bikes….

What’s your favourite colour– Part 2

So we have mentioned colours to choose from when it comes to the Classic model. As if the decision was not difficult enough here is an other variation. One of this blogs readers pointed me to a post that a fellow Royal Enfield Blogger made recently (http://www.royalenfields.com/2011/07/royal-enfield-to-offer-military-in.html). It speaks about a potential colour variation to the current olive drab military version. It seems like an obvious variation to me. The colour has been dubbed “Desert Storm”. I think it is an appropriate name

What’s your favourite colour?

I suppose that after choosing the bike, Enfield of course, you need to decide on the colour. I have blogged about this before, different paintjobs and which colour to choose.

No there is more choice. Some of you might have heard that there is a chrome version of the Classic available. This is true and it is on its way to South Africa. If you haven’t seen it here it is….

 

When I first saw a photo of this bike the first time I was not convinced that it was an option for me. This was until I saw an aerial shot of the tank. Now I love it. As if I did not have enough problem making a choice in colour.

1000 Bike Show – Feedback

As you might know the 1000 bike show was held at the Germiston High School this past weekend. I made a turn there on Saturday to see what it was all about. I have never attended this event before, probably because I never knew that it existed. Fortunately Allan (Royal Enfield Gauteng) mentioned it to me when I visited the showroom recently.

So what were my expectations? Well I didn’t really have too many except as I knew I was going to have a chance to see lots of classic bikes and off course the Royal Enfield. I had mentioned to my wife that I wanted to attend the show and she agreed to come along. This was perfect, now show her the bike that I am so passionate about.

I was pleased to see such a large turn out. Of course there were plenty of bikers that turned up and their bikes were parked in front of the large marque tent. There were many beautiful bikes to be viewed, ranging from superbikes to Harleys. But the really treasures were in the tent.

 

Of the course the best treasure were the Royal Enfields. I had a chance to meet Brice the man behind Royal Enfield South Africa. Here he is alongside the poster of the new Military version. He told me they only have one left as the others have been snapped up already.

I am happy to say that my wife was impressed with the Enfields. She prefers the teal colour over the maroon (my choose). The teal as I understand is a more “classic” Enfield colour so that might not be a bad choose when I eventually purchase one of these beauties.

Here are photos of the other Classic Bikes that were on display

 

Triumph

Norton

BMW

1000 bike show

The Classic Motorcycle Club is hosting the 10th annual 1000 bike show this year. Royal Enfield will be represented there, so go have a look at the bike that is built like a gun. Below are the details….See you there