Here’s What The Royal Enfield Meteor Could Be Like

There’s a lot happening on the Royal Enfield front, chief among them the development of the ‘J platform’ - a new mid-displacement single-cylinder engine platform. This modern unit will be the spiritual successor to the 500cc UCE engine, now that the latter has been discontinued after failing to meet BS6 emission norms. The first bike expected to be powered by this new engine is the upcoming ‘Meteor’. So, what can we expect from this much talked about motorcycle?

The Heart Of The Matter

Well, of course, for starters, it’ll have the J platform motor at its heart. We expect this motor to be in the 400-450cc displacement range, boasting modern (at least by RE standards) tech like OHC architecture, fuel-injection and a 4-valve head. This would place it neatly between the more basic 346cc range and the (relatively) cutting edge 650cc twins.

The displacement number may put it in a similar ballpark to the Himalayan, but we don’t think this motor is based on the adventure tourer’s unit. That being said, RE’s learnings from developing the more modern 411cc unit in the Himalayan and the 650cc parallel-twin will certainly be poured into this J platform engine.

Is It A Bird?

One look at the spy pictures of the Meteor is all you need to discern where its inspiration came from. The cruiser-like body style is quite obviously derived from the Thunderbird, leading us to believe that the Meteor will replace the now discontinued Thunderbird 500.

The tall, wide handlebars and downward swoop to the seat are signature Thunderbird design elements. Though it hasn’t happened yet, we expect the updated, BS6-compliant 346cc UCE motor to make its way into the Thunderbird chassis and give us the Thunderbird 350 BS6, which will be sold parallelly with the Meteor.

Up To Date

Another certain conclusion from the spy shots is the addition of some modern features on the Meteor. The upcoming bike will get an LED DRL ring around the headlight, though the bulb will most likely continue to be a halogen unit.

The trademark twin-pod Thunderbird instrument console will also make way for a fully digital round single-pod unit, a first on any RE. One area that will be truly retro is the switchgear, with the Meteor expected to get old-school rotary-style switches for the kill switch and headlight.

Coming Soon

Various bikes sporting the J-platform motor have been doing test runs for quite some time now, indicating that Royal Enfield is working long and hard at getting this right. Fortunately, our dealer sources tell us that the work is now nearing completion, with the Meteor just a couple of months away from arriving at dealerships.

This is in line with what we see in the spy pictures - bikes that look quite close to production-ready. Things are a little shrouded in mystery at the moment but it seems all will be revealed quite soon. We can’t wait to see what the next chapter in RE’s story holds in store.

Image Source: GaadiWaadi