When I got back into motorcycles in late 2007, I investigated getting a RE.  The same Suzuki dealer who services my S40 had just given up his RE franchise.  He said he had horrible problems with them on the business side of being a dealer - hard to get parts delivered timely, took forever to get paid by them for warranty work- those kinds of issues that a consumer doesn't see in the business relationship between a manufacturer and a dealer.

The closest RE dealer to me is about 60 miles away in a small town in southwestern Ohio.  For a guy like me who does not do his own wrenching, that is a deal killer from the beginning.

Perhaps the Suzuki dealer is right about the problems with being an RE dealer, or RE would have a far better dealer network.  I don't know of any larger dealerships who carry RE products; most of the RE delaers are very small operations.

I saw a few of these today in person and sat on one. Seems like a really decent bike and I could actually touch the ground with both feet!

Here's a link to a writeup about the Enfield. He says he likes it but it has limitations.
http://www.chuckhawks.com/royal_enfield_letter1.htm

http://www.chuckhawks.com/royal_enfield_letter2.htm

My first bike when I was 15 in '65, was a 1937 RE 500cc Bullet Super Sport. It had four valves, dual exhaust, wet sump lubrication, 2 sparkplugs, a single carb, foot shift, weighed 390lbs. It was a trials bike. You could remove the mufflers and headlight in a few minutes to make it a racer. I bought it from an old guy down the street for 50 bucks. He was the original owner, and bought it because it was the only bike at the time that had a foot shift. I had it up to 98 mph once, but it scared the crap out of me so I never did it again!
The mufflers rusted out so fast you bought them by the dozen. No kidding!

makes my old heart go pitter patter.

Lupo wrote on 09/27/10 at 17:26:18:

very true statement.

mick have always love the bsa

RE $7k
almost buy 2 ls 650