Royal Enfield's Continetal GT easily does the ton: in km/h

The Royal Enfield Continental GT's speedometer makes it easy to do 100.

When Mike O'Reirdan of New Jersey picked up his new Royal Enfield Continental GT on March 22, his first reaction was that "it looks absolutely beautiful, and very very evocative of its 1960s namesake."

But then he noticed something:

"There are, however, a few oddities which I thought might need a bit of explanation. The most noticeable is that it is supplied with a kilometers-per-hour speedo with a subsidiary scale in miles per hour. I do have to wonder if that even conforms to U.S. law.

"Of course it does make you feel you are going faster since those kilometers slip by faster than miles!"

Others had noticed too, and Classic Motorworks, the U.S. importer, asked for and got this brisk explanation from M.Govindaraju at Royal Enfield in India:

"Law allows both but not specifically told which should be on top."

That appears to be correct. Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 101, Table 1, providing for speedometers, requires that speed be listed in miles per hour. But kilometers per hour may be listed as well and there is no indication which must be dominant.

 "If the speedometer is graduated in miles per hour and in kilometers per hour, the identification must be 'MPH and km/h' in any combination of upper and lowercase letters."

I'm with Mike. It's odd but, on the other hand, it was the one no-cost way to make the Royal Enfield Continental GT seem faster than it really is.