The Royal Enfield Himalayan adventure bike has paused production while the company gets ready to implement some mild updates.
The Himalayan has had a bit of a rocky history (no pun intended). It was touted as the machine that would move Royal Enfield forward, an all-new design far removed from classic machines like the Bullet.
Unfortunately, an early promo video showed a footpeg breaking off the bike during a rough landing, which tempered the public’s expectations. Since its release, the bike has been said to sell well in overseas markets, but it still hasn’t made it to North America. And, there have been complaints about reliability.
Royal Enfield already planned to upgrade the bike to EFI (currently, it’s carbureted). But with the buzz surrounding the reliability complaints, gossip says the company also plans to rectify some of the quality issues that have dragged the bike’s reputation down. Maybe we’ll see the bike in North America after that happens? It will face an uphill battle if it does arrive here, as Japanese 650s have the budget ADV bike market already nailed down.
I take anything said with a grain of salt. The Himalayan was touted as “60 years in the making!” Perhaps another 60 years is needed. QC is on the back burner it seems with RE.
Sad, RE has gone backwards regarding reliability. This bike did look interesting. Guess I’ll be staying with my Mighty DR dirt pig.