Response for Triumph’s new Scrambler 400x and Speed 400 has been mixed, since the bikes debuted earlier this week. Check out the commentshere犯人@CrapKerouac说:“看起来太棒了。我admit I’m a little surprised, I thought it would look cheaper. This will be an enormous hit in India, and south-east Asia.”

On the other hand, inmate @Deathsoswiftly summed up their feelings in two words: “a parody.”

So which is it? Are these bikes going to be a big joke, a winking homage to machines gone by, but unworthy of the Triumph badge? Or will they sell like mad overseas?

The second statement is almost certainly true, and we won’t know the answer to the first question without riding the bikes.

Big in India

The reality is, just as Americana sold Harley-Davidsons from the 1970s up until now, so faux-retro Brit bikes are becoming the halo machines of India’s home market. Royal Enfield is the biggest player in this big-bore retro market, and in case you haven’t noticed, their business is booming. But they’re not the only company making bank here, or planning to do so. Other manufacturers with far more volume make small-bore retros, or they are buying up other classic English moto marques. BSA is now owned by Mahindra, a gigantic Indian conglomerate. TVS, another Indian mega-company, owns Norton. Even Honda is in on the action. Its India-marketCB350 H’Nessmodel looks a lot like a classic Brit roadster.

These machines are the bikes that many of India’s 150-million+ motorcyclists aspire to. But, they are not Triumph. Just as Harley-Davidson alone defined American motorcycle manufacturing for half a century, Triumph alone has defined the British motorcycle scene since the 1980s, when the rest of the competition ran out of money. With an Indian distribution deal through Bajaj, Triumph now has quick access to a massive market, with a machine those riders can afford. Notallof them, but enough to make a big boost in Triumph’s bottom line. And building the bike in India is a big part of that. It’s not just a way of reducing production costs; Triumph can also do that in its factories in Thailand and Brazil (and it is doing so, for other markets). But the India-built bikes will avoid that country’s harsh tariff on imported machines, and that means lower prices for customers there.

我n other words: If the bike is mechanically sound, it should be a big success in a moto market with rider and money numbers that dwarf North America.

But is it the real thing?

But is this liquid-cooled Triumph thumper the real thing? Or a parody?

我t depends how you look at it.

No, it isn’t a carefully-assembled (or not-so-carefully-assembled, which was often the case) twin-cylinder, built in England and exported with pride to the far reaches of the Empire

So what? A lot of the Triumphs of the Golden Age of Brit Bikes were built for the exact same reason that this machine was created. They were built to attract customers with little money. Plenty of Triumph’s other pre-war and post-war models were recycled technology, parts bin specials made to keep prices down. We’re not talking about Brough Superior-level luxury here. For much of its existence, Triumph provided basic transportation with machines like the Model X, the Model Z, the BDG 125, and so on. And now, the TR400 series will take it back to those times.

Many people won’t like the bikes, or the direction Triumph is going. It doesn’t matter. The youngest members of the boomer generation are in their 60s, or almost there. They won’t be buying expensive big-bore bikes for much longer. Triumph is doing the smart thing, and adapting to the times with more affordable bikes—which is what they didn’t do a good job of when the Japanese OEMs showed up, causing decades of financial turmoil. So in that case, yeah, you could say that the TR series is a departure from the past, but it’s a departure that should keep the company going for years to come,只要新自行车英航ck up their flashy looks with good road manners.

Considering how hard it is to find a truly bad motorcycle these days, and considering that Bajaj is partnered on this project, with years of experience building fun bikes for KTM, it’s unlikely the Scrambler 400x and Speed 400 will be mechanical duds or boring to ride. Time will tell on that question, and considering the bikes launch in India in August, it won’t be very much time at all. Stay tuned.