Why doesn’t Royal enfield use tubeless tyres?

Tubeless tyres:

With Tubeless tyres, there is no worrying about the tubes. Though the initial cost is a bit on the higher side, but overall the life of the tyre is a lot more than tubed tyres. The reason being tubeless tyres are made available in medium as well as hard compound tyres depending upon the usage requirements and their lifetime. Harder compound tyres last longer. In case of tubeless tyres, the air is directly filled in the tyres, so there is a need for the tyres to form an airtight seal with the wheel so as to not let the air escape. Hence tubeless tyres are always used in case of alloy wheels as they do not have the stretching tendency.

See also: Difference between tube tyre and tubeless tyre

Why doesn’t Royal enfield use tubeless tyres?

The main reason for Royal Enfield to not offer tubeless tyres for its bikes is the absence of alloy wheels. Spoked wheels have small perforation near the point of attachment of spokes and hence air will leak out from these places. Although there are some spoked wheels present where you can mount tubeless tyres but these are very expensive and would increase the cost of the bike by around 10–15 ks.

Now coming to another aspect: why does Royal Enfield not offer alloy wheels? The reason behind this is the vibration which the engine produces. The alloy wheels are rigid in nature and cannot damp the vibrations of the bike. Moreover if you happen to hit a pothole on the road, which is a common issue, the spoked wheels may adjust to it and not suffer much deformation. Even if it does, you can fix it. But alloy wheels, due to its rigidity might not be able to withstand the force and may deform. And once deformed there’s no other way but to replace it. Also installation of alloy wheels causes the shaft bearings to fail often due to the vibrations not being damped and it would be a menace to keep them replacing time and again.

Cost. Switching to tubeless tires would mean switching wheel construction, and that means new machinery to produce them, re-training workers, rearranging suppliers.

Repairability.Royal Enfied aims at a market where people may take trips away from service shops. Tubed tires are a lot easier to repair by yourself out in the middle of nowhere than tubeless ones, and a properly repaired tube is good to go for many miles.

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