Aniket’s Royal Enfield Musket 998 V-Twin

First glance at the Musket 998 V-Twin was one of those rare moments where the lack of imperfection in a true masterpiece misleads one into thinking that this beauty came right out of the factory and not out a small garage. The V-Twin has been so beautifully crafted that your mind happily skips past the fact that there’s a V-Twin in place of the usual single cylinder and it takes a while for the instantaneous love potion to ebb away and the world comes to a standstill while you wonder who is this crazy bloke who engineered this piece of art? Meet Aniket Vardhan.

Aniket Vardhan was an architect in New Delhi, who moved to US to study Industrial Design, well at least that’s the official stand. On a personal level, Aniket admits it was the lure of the potato-potato that pushed him to visit the land of Harley Davidson. After a stint as an Industrial Design faculty, Aniket moved full time into realizing his dream of building a Enfield based V-Twin. Shown above in ‘Indian’ motorcycle colors is his first attempt, the Musket 700cc V-Twin with an angle of 70 °. Aniket wanted to push the boundaries and the result is the new Musket 998cc V-Twin.

This is professionalism at an all new level for a hobbyist. The crankcase has been designed to accommodate both the 350cc and the 500cc engines, the choice resulting in either a 700cc twin or a 1000cc twin. The angle Aniket has paid attention to the details, notice the beautiful copper pipes that have been retained to cool the oil flowing through the engine? This donor Enfield sold in the US comes with a four speed gearbox with a not so reliable linkage that brings the shift lever to the left side. Aniket has received praise for his design which retains the shift on the right side, and use a much more mechanically reliable setup.

Aniket’s biggest engineering challenges were shaping the exhausts to retain a symmetric design within the confines of the space restricted by the downtube of the chassis at the front. “The classically beautiful symmetrical exhaust of machines such as the 1939 Triumph Speed Twin is very dear to many and was a worthy cause to strive for, in spite of the challenge posed by this V twin as opposed to an inherently symmetrical parallel twin.” says Aniket on his website.

The downtube was also curved to accommodate the relatively larger engine and this has enabled him to keep the wheelbase much lesser than normally would’ve been required for such a V-Twin. Just take a look at the Musket 700 and you’ll know what we mean.

“It was taken for a brief yet *truly exhilarating* ride – she goes, solid punchy torque available right from idle. Tying up random loose ends while it’s still below freezing and snowed up. Wiring, re-routing cables, new tank emblems done this weekend, couple of other things next and then waiting for warm weather.” he concludes.

Riot Engine wishes you the very best Aniket, and we hope once the winter passes you’ll delight us with some videos of the new Musket in action!

All images courtesy of Aniket Vardhan’s website www.musketvtwin.com