Some time in the 1970s, riding a Norton twin up the legendary A303 back to London from Cornwall, I was halted by the sight of a chromed petrol tank in a roadside motorcycle shop window.
To this day, I remember that square-ish, polychromatic red tank’s deep, lustrous chrome. I didn’t know much about motorcycles, I just rode them (only passed my car test at age 28), but it was the chopper era then, and I might have had some daft notion of incorporating that charismatic tank into a chop of sorts. Or just buying it to display at home, like a piece of sculpture…
The bemused elderly shop guy did tell me what model Royal Enfield the eye-candy tank came from, but I don’t remember. Probably luckily, there was no room on the Norton for me to carry the tank away, and the next time I passed that way, the shop had gone. Youth, eh? But as also demonstrated by the Constellation and the Continental GT, Redditch did know how to get young riders’ attention, with lashings of (exceptionally well-applied) chrome.
Tinker Taylor
Well over 40 years later, I was standing next to a motorcycle bearing that same tank, a 1961 Royal Enfield 350cc Bullet. The big chrome slab-sided tank had been introduced for 1959, in 3.75 Imperial gallons for the Crusader Sports and 350cc Bullet, and in 4.25 Imperial gallon for the 500cc Bullet, the Super Meteor 500cc twin, and the 700cc Constellation.
The 1961 Bullet’s new owner was retired garage owner Alex Taylor. Alex’s machines have been frequent fliers in this publication. In fact,, January 2022), and had wanted to compare it with the relatively rare (1958 only) D5.
