A British magazine has published photos of a new twin-cylinder variant of Royal Enfield’s Continental GT.
MCN published the photos last week. They were supposedly snapped in the UK, presumably around Royal Enfield’s British R&D facility. The existence of the parallel twin engine isn’t a shocker — we’ve known for months that Royal Enfield had something like this in the works. However, it was unclear exactly when the motor would be revealed to the public. It seems from the photos (more here at MCN’s site) that we can expect the bike soon, as this appears to be a very polished prototype.
However, since it appears to be sporting carburetors instead of EFI, this bike is still not ready for sale in Europe, as it likely can’t meet the Euro4 requirements until that happens. Of course, thanks to Brexit, that might not be a problem for UK sales …
Will it come to North America? Royal Enfield is still in the middle of a massive brand overhaul in our market, and we haven’t heard a Canadian or American launch date for their most recent model, the Himalayan adventure bike, at this point. It may be a while yet before this new twin-cylinder prototype is sold as a finished factory model anywhere in the world, but expect an even longer delay for it to get to Canada.
Those aren’t spy shots – they’re pre-release shots.
I want a Royal Enfield, but I want it QA’d by Yamaha or Honda.
I’m with you 100%, Matt. Of course, there’s always buddy’s oncle’s wife’s friend’s dad that had a Lada for 50,000kms and never had a problem, but I prefer to take my chances with the proven guys.