2021 Royal Enfield Meteor 350 launched, from RM9,780

A new entry in Indian motorcycle maker Royal Enfield’s catalogue is the 2021 Royal Enfield 350, the first of a series of single-cylinder motorcycles. Designed to replace the Thunderbird 350, itself a 350 cc single, the Meteor 350 comes in three flavours – the base model Fireball at 175,000 rupees(RM9,780), the Stellar at 181,000 rupees (RM10,190) and Supernova at 190,000 rupees (RM10,611).

In keeping with the design language of Royal Enfield’s single-cylinder machines, the Meteor comes with an all-new engine design, a 349 cc, SOHC thumper fed by EFI that produces a claimed 20.2 hp at 6,100 rpm and 27 Nm of torque at 4,000 rpm, reports carandbike.com. Royal Enfield says replacing the traditional pushrod engine design with an overhead cam and the addition of a primary balancer shaft combined with a five-speed gearbox lets the engine rev higher while minimising vibration.

The frame on the Meteor 350 is also new, a dual-downtube affair and the new Royal Enfield single is destined to be an international market model including countries such as Thailand, Europe and North America. Suspension is done with conventional 41 mm telescopic forks in front and twin shock absorbers at the back with six-step preload adjustment.

Weight of the Meteor is 6 kg lighter than the outgoing Thunderbird 350, coming in at 191 kg. Braking is with two-piston floating calliper clamping a single 300 mm diameter brake disc while the back uses a single-piston calliper and 270 mm disc with two-channel ABS as standard.

New to the Meteor 350 is a combination analogue and LCD instrument display with a secondary LCD display to the side. The secondary panel connects to the rider’s smartphone and allows for display of navigation information.

The Meteor 350 mounts a 19-inch front with 100/90 tyre and 17-inch rear with 140/70 tyre on alloy wheels while fuel is carried in a 15-litre tank. Seat height places the rider 765 mm off the ground while colour options are Yellow, Red and Black for the Meteor Fireball 350, Red and Blue for the Stellar variant and Brown and Blue for the Supernova.