Hitchcocks Forum

Hi everyone, just wondered if anyone on here has an Enfield Indian ? or Indian Badged bike ( not one made in India but one as sold by the Indian motorcycle company in the USA ) I am in the process of doing my 2001 regd 500 Bullet as an Homage to these bikes, I believe the 500 single was marketed in the states as the Fire Arrow ? ...

Welcome! I have one-and-a-half Chiefs and recently acquired a very sad Trailblazer from our Hosts because I thought, "I've got the missing bits for that!" and now I'm not so sure... As to the 500 it was actually marketed as the Woodsman (East Coast US spec, more similar to UK Trials use but with lights,) and the Westerner (West Coast, more suitable for desert racing.) The Fire Arrow was the 250 Clipper. Have a look at Phil Dolan's site REIndian.com for more info. The Americans aren't really interested in these bikes as they aren't "real" Indians although recently interest in them has picked up over there. What do you plan to do?
REgards, Mark

Hi Mark am envious of your collection ! Lol

I'm doing it all on a fairly tight budget as I only work 20hr week as a care so funds are not great ..
But here's the plan / what I've done so far ..It's seems from your comment that I'm working more along the lines of the 350 ( but with a 500 )

Fitted a single un sprung saddle with tassels, fitted higher wider handlebars, ( not too sure about fitting a Harley style screen? ) fitted a front light bar under headlamp with twin peaked driving lights, will be changing the petrol tank from chrome with flip cap to painted one with twist cap with indian badging ( once I re spray it as the replacement one i have just finished primer fillering )have fitted old style throttle , will do away with modern switch gear in favour of retro lucas / miller style ones, will be fitting 350 mudguards, have the front primer fillerd just looking for a rear one, will be painting the chrome chain guard, have an Indian / Harley style 30" sliencer with fish tail end, possibly fit white wall trims ( as i love whitewall tyres on cars & bikes ) and have a set of tasseled saddlebags which i have studded added chrome rimed red reflectors to back ends, and done edges in white as I have seen several with this and i think it sets things off..
colour wise i'm thinking of a nice burgundy colour ?? The bike was originally a classic chrome and reg'd as red so i wouldn't need to re register the colour change , though all those I have seen on the net have been either red, burgundy or black , did they do any other colours ??

Would love to see some pix of your bikes ... All the best mate Kev .. [email protected]

Kevin, sounds like you're on the right lines! Colours, there was also Indian Red (which everyone is a bit vague about but seems to be Signal Red (think Post Office Red,) which is still a standard colour, and a metallic blue.For a rear mudguard, email our Hosts as they bought all the old Watsonian stock and I know they have loads of guards that were taken off Trials versions and the like. My bikes are projects at the moment so not much to show! For ideas, try looking in the Customer Bikes in the Photo Gallery as several folk have gone down a similar route to you. I saw a Bullet done up as an Indian while I was riding to work in London last year and it looked very good! REgards, Mark

Thanks for your positive comments Mark Really appreciated, will look at the pictures you mentioned all ideas poached err I mean appreciated lol ! Kev

Hi,

the best looking Indian-badged Bullet variant has to be the Woodsman, IMHO. I managed to get my Electra-X looking like a reasonable tribute to the '56 model - separate headlamp and 50's brackets, alloy top yoke, stainless guards front and rear, high-level exhaust with optional boot leg melt, and lose the R/H side panel and air box. If I've got this right, see picture below.



If you have a look in our host's gallery pages, you will find brochure pictures for the Indian-badged RE models such as this:



Hope this helps.

A.

Oops, didn't work, copy and past the links!

A.

Thanx Adrian ! will have a butchers ..

Here are the above mentioned images:

Thanks Exile !, How do I go about uploading pictures on here , so I can show you the look i'm going for ?