Team Green’s flagship sport-tourer is getting the Bosch radar upgrade for the 2022 model year, adding adaptive cruise control, blindspot monitoring, and forward collision warning to the Kawasaki Ninja H2 SX.
Here is something to keep an eye out for as the 2020 model year comes closer to reality – it is an upcoming sport bike from British marque Hesketh, which has a supercharged 1,000cc three-cylinder engine.
Details beyond what I just said, and the concept sketch above, are non-existent, but the boutique brand is keen to make this motorcycle a reality in the next 365 days (if not sooner).
The eggheads at Kawasaki have been busy readying themselves for the 2020 model year, and it seems that they have something special in the works.
We say this because Team Green just dropped a teaser video for a new supercharged motorcycle – and we expect it to be sporty.
Details are pretty limited, but we know that the new bike will belong to Kawasaki’s “Z” family, which consists of its sport bike models. Could we see the supercharged version of the Z1000? We certainly hope so.
It would seem that BMW Motorrad is the latest motorcycle marque to explore the idea of forced induction for motorcycles.
This means that the Bavarians will join the ranks of Kawasaki, which has already three supercharged H2 models on the market; as well as Honda and Suzuki, which have been toying with the idea of turbocharged two-wheelers on dealership floors.
Spotted by Ben Purvis at BikeSocial (he’s on a roll lately), the German brand has filed patents locally for an electric supercharger design, with drawings seemingly using the S1000RR as its basis (for whatever that is worth).
Ducati’s announcement that it is making its final production run of the Ducati 1299 Panigale R Final Edition got me thinking this week. This could be the very last v-twin superbike from the Italian brand, making it a true “Final Edition” motorcycle? It certainly appears so.
Right now, the Italian marque is betting its superbike future on the V4 platform, which means it could be another 5 years or longer (10 years could be a reasonable number, even) before Ducati debuts its next superbike platform.
What do we imagine that motorcycle will look like? Where do we imagine the motorcycle industry will be in the next five to ten years? That future isn’t too far away, but the answer is still hard to fathom.
Can we really see a future where Ducati builds another v-twin engine? Understand, the Superquadro motor is the pinnacle of v-twin design, and pushes the limits of what kind of power such an engine configuration can create.
This is the very reason that Ducati abandoned the Superquadro v-twin design for the Desmosedici Stradale V4. That is a big deal in Ducatista land, but it is a notable move for the motorcycle industry as a whole.
So, the thought experiment evolves from this, and we begin to wonder what is not only in store for a brand like Ducati, whose history is rooted in a particular engine design, but also what is in store for the other brands of the motorcycle industry, who have been tied to thermic engines for over a century.
For the Japanese brands, the hand that holds that future has been tipped, with turbocharged and supercharged designs teased by three out of the Big Four manufacturers. We have even see Kawasaki bringing its own supercharged motorcycles already to market already.
But, is this really the future? Or, is this resurgence of forced induction for motorcycles dead on arrival?
It appears that the rumors are true, and that Kawasaki is set to debut another supercharged motorcycle at the upcoming EICMA show.
We have reported already that Kawasaki is rumored to have a sport-touring model of the supercharged Ninja H2, and it seems that rumor is close to the mark.
Releasing a teaser video today, the new Kawasaki model appears to be less about outright performance, and more about enhancing the journey. In short, it sounds a lot like a sport-touring model is nigh.
Whether or not this new supercharged model, the third in Kawasaki’s lineup, is based off the H2 platform remains to be seen, however.
Despite what the DMV says, you might not consider the Can-Am Spyder to be a motorcycle, but the three-wheeler is part of a growing segment of on-road fun machines that have a pretty strong overlap with two-wheeled buyers.
It is not necessarily our cup of tea, but we wouldn’t mind swinging a leg over BRP’s latest creation, a turbocharged Can-Am Spyder F3 concept, which just debuted at the Daytona International Speedway.
The venue comes from Can-Am’s involvement as a title sponsor in the series, so naturally the Canadian brand wanted to spice things up with a special concept.
As such, the turbocharged 1,330 three-cylinder Rotax engine puts out 150hp (considerably more than the stock 113hp figure), and is aided in its breathing by its custom Akrapovi? three-into-three exhaust system.
Bimota is known for making drool-worthy motorcycles, and at EICMA the boutique Italian brand debuted two fine motorcycles. But, we think the real show-stopper for Bimota was its add-on supercharger system for its Ducati-powered motorcycles.
Good for 15% to 20% more power (probably more, if you like to tinker), the Bimota supercharger kit uses a Sprintex dual-screw supercharger, which has been tastefully made to match the belt covers on the Ducati Testastretta engine.
As you can see from the photos below, the supercharger looks pretty damn good, especially when paired with the “Bimota Experience” package, which adds a carbon fiber frame and swingarm to the chassis.
The Bimota Impeto is the first model to officially have the supercharger as an option, but the Italians say it can be made to work with any of its water-cooled Ducati-powered models.
Bimota continues to impress, ahead of the company’s new-model debuts at the 2015 EICMA show. Not only will Bimota have two new models to show us, the Bimota Tesi 3D RaceCafe and Bimota Impeto, but the brand from Rimini says it is also getting into the forced induction game.
As such, Bimota has developed its own supercharger, which will be available on all of the company’s Ducati-powered engines that are liquid-cooled, which effectively means the DB8, DB9, & and DB11, as well as Bimota’s models that will debut in Milan, Italy this week.
That should be good news to those owners, as the Bimota supercharger is said to add roughly 15%-20% to the maximum torque figure, as well as smooth out both power and torque delivery.
The internet motosphere is buzzing right now with the idea that we will see some more supercharged models from Kawasaki for the 2016 model year.
The wave of news is really just the parroting of a report from Japanese publication Young Machine, which has a hit-or-miss record with predicting new models from the Japanese OEMs.
And as usual, some publications are mistakenly taking Young Machine’s photoshop renders as the genuine article, so we should dismiss this tom foolery out of hand, right? Not so fast.
News from Japan seems to suggest that Suzuki is making a production version of its Recursion concept. For those that don’t remember, the Suzuki Recursion Concept was based around a turbocharged 588cc two-cylinder engine.
The idea was to achieve liter-bike power from a middleweight-sized machine, thus offering enthusiasts high-power but nimble machines to ride.
The news that Suzuki is putting the Recursion into production isn’t too far-fetching, though the original source does seem to be the not-always-accurate Japanese publication Young Machine.