Royal Enfield: the Complete Story

I bought this when I was tinkering with the idea of buying an Indian built Enfield Bullet. Before then Royal Enfield were, to me, just another name in the long list of defunct British bike makers, I had no idea of their innovative designs, nor their successes.Mick Walker's book gives a very good insight into Royal Enfield, as well as giving some information on the Indian operation. I had no idea of the size of the factory or its sales, far outdoing Norton's 200 bikes per week, for instance.I found what appear to be some minor errors, which might be typesetting ( dense ignorance on the part of the typesetter?)such as the reference to " Modular" crankshafts in the later twins - since the crankshafts were one piece, they could hardly be described thus, but more likely " nodular" a special type of cast iron giving greater strength. This is nitpicking, of course, and does not reduce the overall excellence of the book.Mick describes the disgraceful behaviour of the final owners, E & HP Smith, referred to more than once in the text as asset strippers; I agree. However, no-one can take away the impact made by the flood of Japanese motorcyces which killed off the British Industry, aided and abetted by lazy management,who would not invest, persisting in using machinery dating from the Great War, timid( or prejudiced)banks, and bloody minded unions.With its many excellent photographs and diagrams, and an informative text I can fully recommend this book.

A very good read. Only thing I would say is the print could be darker.

Really informative - covers history, technical details, business development... Lots of pictures and diagrams, briiliant present for Enfield enthusiast.

For the real enthusiast a must have. Could do with an update. Recent developments in India are not covered.

A good insight of one of the British bike builds from road, trials, scrambling, road racing and the military, and how they were updating the bike industry with new technology. A good gift for anyone with interest in British Bikes would recommend to anyone.

Concise with no boring bits. Really interesting if you happen to own a Royal Enfield ! It is the oldest manufacturer of motorbikes in the world still in production so there is a lot of history and a lot of reading.

Good book - a little heavy on the tech side!

Present for my hubby. He's just purchased a new Enfield bike and he loves the history of things, so this went down a treat.