Spied! New Honda Transalp Patent

[advrider]

For months, we’ve seen hints that Honda is about to bring out a new Transalp. Now, with Italian moto-mag Motociclismo publishing a list of specs and patent drawings, it looks like those hints were bang-on, and the new bike might be released in just a few weeks.

Motociclismo’s write-up concerns a patent that details the Transalp’s chassis (see the Italian-language article here, run through Google Translate here). Specifically, the patent relates to the swingarm’s attachment to the frame. Not very exciting stuff, but the accompanying line drawing (seen in the title image) gives us several other hints about the Transalp.

Judging from that drawing, it looks like the Transalp gets a 21-inch front wheel and an 18-inch rear, which would hint at more dirt capability than we might have expected. It also appears to have similar headlight and frame to the CB750 Hornet that Honda just revealed at INTERMOT. Also, the engine appears to be the same, a 270-degree parallel twin with four-valve heads.

If that’s the case, then we can bet on getting 90 hp at 9,500 rpm and 55.4 lb-ft at 7,250 rpm, unless Honda re-tunes the engine for off-road capability. This is possible, as we see different tuning between some of the current-gen 1100 engines (the Rebel 1100 and Africa Twin make different horsepower). It’s also possible that Honda wants to keep the price down and will keep all these engines at the same configuration to keep costs down.

If you head over to Motociclismo, you can see spy images that actually show what appears to be a prototype of the Transalp undergoing testing, and if that’s the case? It seems highly likely we’ll see this bike unveiled at EICMA, with all the information that’s come out over the past year.

 

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