Royal Enfield Scram 411 Ride review

So Royal Enfield launched the Scram 411, a motorcycle based on the famed Himalayan, an ever-so-capable mountain goat of sorts. According to RE, they positioned it under the Himalayan as a more road-biased, Scrambler iteration. They also claimed to have made a lot of changes to tweak the character of the motorcycle to help differentiate it from the highly adventure-focused big brother.

I’ve ridden the Himalayan extensively and also ended up buying one for myself a few months after which made it easier for me to point out the performance and visual differences between the Scram and the Himalayan. Mind you, there is no comparison between these two, since they are both built for different purposes, although the target audience may be a mix given the huge demand for adventure motorcycles among the youth today.

Making of the Scram 411

The Royal Enfield Scram 411 is essentially a Himalayan underneath. It has the same long-stroke 411cc motor sitting in a half-duplex cradle frame, makes the same amount of power and torque, still the engineers and designers at RE managed to redevelop the character with a redesigned front-end and shedding some weight, something that the Himalayan had in oodles.

The idea was to create a motorcycle for your daily hustle, be it on the road or off it. It’s honestly really easy for one to assume that the engineers must have said “Remove this, remove that, add this and voila!” But deviating away from the hardcore adventure focus of the Himalayan and giving birth to a different persona altogether was a bold move for Royal Enfield, especially for the mass market appeal. They even managed to make the bike appear more ‘fun to ride’ with the appealing colour schemes that you will also see on the Hunter 350. Is it actually built for the State of Flux? For someone constantly switching between modes in their life?

What are the key differences?

Let’s start from the front! To play around with the styling, to give it a more ‘lightweight’ look, Royal Enfield has done away with the top frame which was mounted on the frame and housed the headlight, instrument cluster (and tripper) along with the indicators and windshield visor. With the top frame removed, RE had to make provisions to mount the headlamp and cluster on the fork assembly. Gone is the fixed-axis headlamp setup, swapped for a sweet-looking compact cowl design that houses the headlamp and cluster.

The design now is neater and certainly a few kgs lighter. The new cowl design gets a more compact, semi-digital instrument cluster as seen in the Meteor 350. You also get a tripper navigation pod which can be connected to your phone for directions.

The absence of a windshield visor was a small problem on long rides, but the new instrument cluster was a breath of fresh air. Mind you, Himalayan fan boys, i never said it is better than the cluster we get. The headlamp, indicator and cluster wiring were neatly tucked into the compact cowl giving it a clean look. The tank gets badge plates on either side of the tanks aside from swanky looking graphics matching the paint schemes. There was more Scram 411 branding on the left and right side panels that cover the air filter housing and the battery. The dual mudguard setup was done away for a simple tyre hugging mudguard in the front.

If you aren’t scrupulous enough, you would never notice the fact that the tail section is redesigned too, with the indicators now being fitted in the number plate holder itself. The mudguard is of a different design, shorter than the one on the Himalayan. What hurt the most however, was the absence of the tail rack which we saw on the utilitarian Himalayan. The Scram gets a simpler grab handle to match its design and duties. That's not it. It gets a single-piece seat which I found 10X more comfy compared to the dual piece on the Himalayan, mainly because the pillion sits slightly lower than before and because my bottom fits quite well on this single seat.

Tweaked Hardware

As a matter of fact, Scramblers do not require mile-long travel suspension, or the compulsion of high ground clearance. The guys at Royal Enfield gave the front forks a slight tweaking. Yes, they retained the 41mm forks, but now have 190mm of travel instead of 200mm on the Himalayan. This was the major reason as to why the Scram sat lower too, with Ground clearance of 200mm, almost down by 20mm. This also reduced the seat height from 800mm to 795mm. To suit its ‘Scrambler’ stance, RE took away an important aspect, the 21-inch front wheel and swapped it for a 19-inch wheel shod with 100/90 section tyre for a more road-biased setup. All this mix-match resulted in a 10mm shorter wheelbase and 30mm reduction on total length. Most importantly, this has all managed to reduce the kerb weight by a full 14 kilos! That is a lot of weight reduction for motorcycle like this!

The LS410 motor still makes the same power figure of 24.3bhp and 32Nm of torque. RE did mention that the fuelling and throttle response was modified to an extent.

How does it handle?

The new setup adds so much more on-road capability. With the 19-inch wheel, the Scram feels more planted in the corners compared to its sibling. It is so much more nimble courtesy of the strict diet and the slightly stiffer set front suspension. The Scram is easily a more practical option compared to the Himalayan if you chose to use it as a daily motorcycle. The ergonomics wont hurt your back, as you sit upright.

We did most of our test off-road, quickly realising that the wheel size and tyre aspect ratios makes a huge difference on the bikes capability on gravel or mud. The Himalayan would usually find its way through ruts thanks to the 21-inch front, but the Scram was slightly harder to tame and would wash out very easily on off-road trails that too in the monsoon. Come to think of it, the Scram was not made for this! It was made to handle a mix of both. It is a lovely motorcycle for the urban commute and to jump around trails if you are brave enough. At a price tag of Rs 2.03 lakh (ex-showroom), it is almost Rs 10,000 cheaper than the Himalayan. If you are in the market for a daily that is insane fun, can do long distance and won’t burn a hole in your pocket, this deserves a place on your list.