Unofficial Royal Enfield Community Forum

Royal Enfield Motorcycles => Bullet Iron Barrel => Topic started by: LotusSevenMan on October 13, 2007, 09:17:20 am

Title: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: LotusSevenMan on October 13, 2007, 09:17:20 am
Thought this might be of interest to some (all!!!) of you out there in Enfield Bullet Lover Land!
Found this in an old magazine. May have been seen before but I hadn't seen it so thought I'd share it.

(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2100/1557781229_7220eed9a0.jpg)

And

(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2071/1557781231_f59506edb5.jpg)

Print is small so you'll need to print off the 'pictures' and still use a magnifying glass!!!

 ;D
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: dave48 on October 13, 2007, 10:33:06 am
Fascinating! Copied to My Photos and blown up, legible if a bit blurred - as must have been the tester's vision at the 85.6mph max!!
Particularly of interest to those who might wish to know correct period riding apparel (mind you from what I can remember the rider's clothes are pretty much what everyone wore at that time - apart from the helmet and goggles!). How depressing that I REMEMBER...
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: deejay on October 13, 2007, 01:09:18 pm
i can't read that at all, any chance of getting a higher res scan? It looks interesting!
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: LotusSevenMan on October 13, 2007, 06:45:49 pm
Paper/print quality has suffered after 52 years.

Perhaps your eyesight has too ha ha  ;D
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: prof_stack on October 13, 2007, 08:37:49 pm
I've got a good scanner.  Send me the original and I'll scan it and make it available to the forum members here.  I'll even pay the return postage!   :)

Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: LotusSevenMan on October 14, 2007, 10:22:33 am
My scanner is good too. It just loses it in electronic translation here. I have already sent a couple over the wires to Bullet fans here on this site. Anyone want to send me their email address to Speedybear7 at blueyonder.co.uk and I'll send better copies on?

This is too frail to send anywhere after 52 years!!!!!  :o
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: Leonard on October 14, 2007, 01:06:06 pm
Let me try this copy of an old road test I recently came across........Leonard

[old attachment deleted by admin]
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: Leonard on October 14, 2007, 01:09:41 pm
Page one looks huge on my computer.  Guess you could save it and read in some other program.  Here is page two..........Leonard

[old attachment deleted by admin]
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: Al on October 14, 2007, 02:00:15 pm
 It would be appeciated by many if you could post this article in the files section of the Yahoogroups' Royalenfield. We could then download or print the file.
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: deejay on October 14, 2007, 02:19:20 pm
Paper/print quality has suffered after 52 years.

Perhaps your eyesight has too ha ha  ;D


I hope not! I just turned 30, maybe I need to see an eye doctor.  ;D
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: RagMan on October 14, 2007, 03:03:53 pm
Leonard thank you so much for those pictures. I read them happily, using my viewer - resizing them to fit on the screen made reading easier. So fascinating - where d'ya think we could get hold of a manual advance lever?  I would have loved to have one of those fitted 7 weeks ago. It is interesting that the review reports the performance as better than the recent reports on the modern Bullet.
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: dave48 on October 14, 2007, 03:29:39 pm
"It is interesting that the review reports the performance as better than the recent reports on the modern Bullet"

Presumably in part due to current "restrictions" and in part to much cosier relationship between the manufacturers and the m'cycle press back then. A poor review was pretty much "not the done thing"  until at least the '70s - a trend to honesty started by Bike magazine as I recall.
Road tests in the main simply re-packaged the factories' press releases!
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: Leonard on October 14, 2007, 06:50:25 pm
A friend found an old Floyd Clymer publication of road tests.  It covered many models, all Brit and USA, from 1955-1957.  Now that you mention it I didn't see anything but positive reports.  There might have been some "damning with faint praise" something like "gee, for a fat girl you don't sweat much", kind of stuff but nothing but good for the most part.

"It is interesting that the review reports the performance as better than the recent reports on the modern Bullet"

Presumably in part due to current "restrictions" and in part to much cosier relationship between the manufacturers and the m'cycle press back then. A poor review was pretty much "not the done thing"  until at least the '70s - a trend to honesty started by Bike magazine as I recall.
Road tests in the main simply re-packaged the factories' press releases!
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: dave48 on October 14, 2007, 09:45:51 pm
FWIW, the prices are interesting!
For the UK, it took approx 14 weeks average earnings to buy the Bullet in mid-'50s; the comparable figure now is 5 weeks! This is of course in part a reflectiuon of shift of production to India: if still built here would probably be c. 9 weeks.
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: cyrusb on November 26, 2007, 02:14:22 am
Ah! so thats where the horn is supposed to go ,thanks.
Title: Re: Royal Enfield 500 Bullet Roadtest Report from 1955
Post by: Roger on November 26, 2007, 09:08:21 am
I have a 1955 publcation by "The Motor Cycle" entitled "Motor Cycle Engines" 2nd Series. There is a short preamble that say:

Famous British Designs Analysed: Details of modern power units, with unique explanatory-type drawings.

It has the usual stuff like Triumph BSA twins as well as a number of popular single cylinder engines, the RE Bullet 500 being one.

It is an interesting read and I will endeavour to scan the pages covering the RE Bullet  and post them ASAP.

Roger