BIKES4US

Ready to deal with street thugs? The Dacoit is your bike then!

Pics: Motoblog

The UK-based Nitin Khosa, head of Nitin Design, has come up with this rather interesting concept – the Dacoit. The concept bike is actually five years old, but it’s only now that Nitin, who’s of Indian origin, has decided to develop it further. The Dacoit is supposed to be an aggressive bike – the ‘street thug’ of motorcycles.

Nitin says ‘I was tidying up my art studio and came across some sketches that I had done more than five years ago. The brief at that time had been to design a bike for a thirty-something ‘born again’ biker who wanted a stunning, aggressive, and evil looking bike.’

‘The original spark for this concept had come from seeing a hooded man. When viewing the front portion of the bike, you can see an evil figure whose eyes are peeping from underneath the hood. To compliment this evil and aggressive design I named the bike ‘Dacoit,’ an old Hindi word for a class of robbers in India who act in gangs and are usually armed and dangerous,’ he adds.

‘The single-seat Dacoit is designed for pure, selfish pleasure. It is not a full-blown sports bike,’ says Nitin. Hmmm… we don’t suppose this bike is going into production anytime soon. But it would be interesting to see a game developer pick up this concept bike and use it in a dark, edgy game with lurid, manga-style graphics, scantily-clad chicks, murderous thugs and lots of street racing…

CB1000R XESS: Honda Italy add bling to a regular CB1000R...
Pics: Moto Revue

First shown at the EICMA in Milan a few months ago, the Honda CB1000R XESS streetfighter concept might possibly go on sale in Italy sometime in the next few months. The XESS project was, in fact, headed by an Italian – Vito Cicchetti – the Director General at Honda Italy.

Based on the regular 2008 Honda CB1000R, the CB1000R XESS has been fitted with Showa USD forks, petal discs with radial-mount calipers, a titanium exhaust system, Michelin slicks, velvet seat covers, various carbonfibre bits and, er…, a red chain. The bike looks quite good, we think. In fact, if you remember the Honda Hornet Cup which we wrote about last year, the Italians seems to have a special talent when it comes to doing up Honda streetbikes…

It's red, it's (half) Italian and we think the XESS really does look very sexy!

For fans of the All-Japan Road Race Championship Series, Honda have now announced the Dream Honda Racing-replica Fireblade, but only for the Japanese market...

...and here are some other race-rep Fireblades from the past. The Rothmans-replica 'Blade is our favourite, and the 2008 Repsol-rep is also pretty hot!

For those who think the K1200R wasn’t funky enough already, Wunderlich (Germany-based BMW hop-up specialists…) have built the Caranguejeira. A large Brazilian Tarantula spider, the Caranguejeira doesn’t wait for its prey to get trapped in a web. Nope, it simply hunts them down, killing its prey by injecting venom through its fangs. Definitely not one to be messed with…

The Caranguejeira K1200R was designed for Wunderlich by Bart van den Bogaard, a Netherlands-based designer. The mods comprise a new headlamp cluster, new taillamps, ZARD exhaust system, new handlebars, instrument relocation kit, dual air inlets (in place of the stock bike’s single inlet) with free-flow air-filters, adjustable brake and clutch levers and an aluminium bellypan.

The engine, chassis and suspension have been kept stock, though Wunderlich claim a 5bhp hike in power due to the dual air inlet thing. And while their website doesn’t say anything about this, we suppose they can do their ‘Killer Spidey’ thing on the K1300R as well. For more details on the Caranguejeira and other Wunderlich bikes, visit their website here

According to a report on MotoRevue, Voxan are almost ready with their new motorcycle – the Nefertiti – which they will launch ‘once the ongoing economic recession is over.’ (Which probably means nobody really knows when the bike will be launched!)

It seems the Nefertiti is based on the Voxan Super Naked XV, which was designed by Philippe Starck (who also designed the Aprilia Moto 6.5) and was first unveiled back in 2007. The production-ready Nefertiti is likely to be fitted with Voxan’s 1,166cc, 140bhp v-twin.

In April last year, the president of Voxan, Eric Terrace had declared, ‘If I’m boss, I will not show a motorcycle unless I can deliver it the next day.’ So we wonder where that leaves the Nefertiti…

BMW officially revealed the S1000RR streetbike yesterday, before the World Superbikes race at Monza, in Italy. The bike isn’t really as good looking as the RSV4 or 1198S but the spec is pretty impressive – 183kg dry weight (204kg wet), 193 horsepower at 13,000rpm, 112Nm of torque at 9,750rpm, four-stage ABS and race-derived traction control means that this is one BMW that won’t be scared of any Yamaha, Honda, Suzuki, Kawasaki, Ducati, KTM or Aprilia.

The S1000RR’s other features include a slipper clutch, six-speed gearbox, fully adjustable 46mm USD fork, fully adjustable monoshock, ride height adjustment at the rear, Brembo brakes (with radial-mount callipers at the front) and an aluminium chassis that uses the engine as a load-bearing member.

The BMW S1000RR will actually go on sale in Europe and in the US only by early-2010. Pricing and other details coming soon…

Before the Ducati Streetfighter came along and knocked the MV off its perch, the Brutale 1078RR was pretty much the hottest Italian naked around. Even now, with its 1078cc inline-four, which produces 154 horsepower and 117Nm of torque, the Brutale 1078RR is a force to reckon with. The guys are Motociclismo recently tested the bike and here are some excerpts from what they have to say about this very beautiful machine:

The Brutale 1078RR is the fourth iteration of a bike that was launched in the year 2000. Engine has grown – from the original 750 to the 910 to the 989 and now the 1078 – but in terms of the styling, the Brutale remains unchanged. Then again, the Tamburini magic still works and the bike quite retains its appeal. In fact, the Brutale’s design is often imitated by other manufacturers for their naked sportsbikes…

Coming to its dimensions, the Brutale 1078RR is very compact and features robust, high-spec components. The 1078cc engine is simply marvellous – it produces enough power to propel this bike to a top speed of 252km/h, which is not bad at all for a naked. The acceleration feels incredible and it’s virtually impossible to avoid pulling big wheelies in first and second gear. Also, the mid-range if very strong. To give you an idea of how strong, the Brutale 1078RR accelerates from 60km/h to 160km/h in 7.6 seconds, which a Yamaha R1 does in 9.2 seconds.

Yes, the MV’s throttle can be a bit hard to modulate – you need to be careful while accelerating hard in the first two gears and/or while exiting fast corners. However, the gearbox is outstandingly accurate and works very well with the bike’s slipper clutch.

The Brutale feels extremely rigid – there isn’t a hint of flex on this bike. The 50mm Marzocchi fork and steel tube trellis frame impart a rock-solid feeling to the 1078RR. The steering is very quick – the front wheel moves in accordance with the slightest movement of the handlebars, so you need to be careful with your steering inputs.

Strong, rigid, compact and very well equipped, the MV Agusta Brutale 1078RR is a terrific naked sportsbike. It certainly isn’t for beginners and can be a bit hard to master, but its beauty, performance and unique character make it worthwhile. At 20,000 euros (US$26,500), it’s not cheap, but then there is no other bike that’s quite like the 1078RR.


MV Agusta Brutale 1078RR: Tech Specs
Engine: 1078cc, DOHC, 16-valve inline-four
Power: 154bhp@10,700rpm
Torque: 117Nm@8,100rpm
Chassis: Tubular steel trellis-type, with single-side aluminium swingarm
Front suspension: 50mm USD Marzocchi fork, adjustable for preload and compression and rebound damping
Rear suspension: Sachs monoshock, adjustable for preload, high/low-speed compression and rebound damping
Brakes: Brembo, twin 320mm discs (front) with four-piston radial-mount callipers, single 210mm disc (rear)
Gearbox: Six-speed
Fuel tank capacity: 19 litres
Dry weight: 195kg
Wheels and tyres: 17-inch wheels, 120/70 (front) and 190/50 Pirelli Dragon Supercorsa tyres

Performance:
Zero to 100km/h: 3.9 seconds
Standing kilometre: 20.9 seconds
Average fuel consumption: 9.0 litres/100km

MCN's riding impression of the Brutale 1078RR

What do you do with a ‘basket case’ CBR1000F that’s more than 20 years old? If you’re Roguemoto, you simply build a custom special based on the old Honda. A lot of work seems to have gone into building the bike – the completely reshaped fuel tank, custom-built chassis cover, subframe, fenders and swingarm brace must have taken a lot of time and effort. Can’t say anything about the bike’s performance and handling but at least it looks cool. More pics of the bike on Flickr

What’s the most amazing, stunningly magnificent street-legal sportsbike you can think of? A production machine, not a custom-built one-off. From recent years, the Ducati Desmosedici RR, MV Agusta F4 CC, Ducati 1198S, 2009 Yamaha R1, 2005/06 Suzuki GSX-R1000 and 2004 Kawasaki ZX-10R are some pretty special machines.

Going a bit further back, there would be dozens of other bikes that we can name. The first Yamaha R1, the original CBR900RR Fireblade, various 1990s Bimotas, the Kawasaki ZZR1100, Honda RC45 and RC30 and many, many others. But if we had to pick one single motorcycle which outdoes everything else – in terms of design and sheer engineering audacity – it would probably be the Honda NR750.

Introduced in mid-1992, the Honda NR750 was the world’s first production motorcycle with oval pistons. Based on Honda’s oval-pistoned NR500 racebikes, the street-legal NR750 was fitted with a fuel-injected 750cc V4, which utilised oval pistons, each of which used eight valves and two con-rods. Each piston was actually two pistons joined together, so the NR’s engine was really a V8 disguised as a V4…!


To quote a recent article that Superbike magazine did on the NR, ‘Honda effectively paired up the pistons in a V8 to make it a V4. In terms of valve to piston area, the engine was much more like a V8. Also, because the pistons were so much larger, the stroke could be kept shorter, allowing the engine to rev to well over 15,000rpm.’

By modern standards, the NR750’s power output is merely commonplace – 125bhp at 15,000rpm wouldn’t impress too many people today, when a stock GSX-R750 makes 150bhp (at the crank) at 13,200rpm. The NR weighed in at around 236 kilos and top speed was around 255km/h – again, figures that are easily surpassed by many contemporary sportsbikes.

Still, the NR’s PGM-FI fuel-injection, USD fork, carbonfibre bodywork, titanium-coated windscreen, underseat exhaust (that’s where the inspiration for the Ducati 916’s exhaust system came from…), magnesium wheels, digital instrumentation, single-sided swingarm and of course, that V4/V8 engine with its oval pistons made it pretty special.

‘When I look back at it, I'm not sure if we were experimenting with cutting-edge technologies or obsessed with foolish ideas,’ says Toshimitsu Yoshimura, who led the development of the Honda NR500's oval piston engine. ‘At least we were doing something that was beyond the realm of conventional thinking. I'm not just talking about us, who were designing the engine, but also those who were creating the body,’ he adds.

‘The reason was simply that we were all so young, we had nothing to fear. You could even say we had no preconceived notion that a piston had to have a circular cross-section. We didn't think much about whether the engine would actually turn over, or even whether it would be practical at all. We weren't worried about those things, since we just wanted to make it work!’ says Yoshimura.


‘To create anything, you must put your heart and soul to it. The development of oval piston engines impressed that upon me, as well as on the other young engineers,’ concludes the man responsible for designing one of the most remarkably innovative motorcycle engines in the world.

Priced at more than US$60,000 the Honda NR750 was hugely expensive and Honda only produced around 200 units (300 units according to some sources…) of the bike. Honda must have ultimately decided that oval piston engines are a bit too complex and expensive to produce, with not enough benefits to offset the cost, hence they seem to have abandoned the idea for good. But as an engineering masterpiece, the NR750 remains utterly, compellingly fascinating to this day.

A video of the Honda NR750 in action