Honda to remained focused on bringing more mass market products to India
Honda Motorcycles and Scooters India is eyeing the Indian bike and scooter market as one of its most important markets worldwide and wants to ensure that it covers all its bases in the country. However, it has emerged that HMSI is in no mood to shift its focus to high-performance machines as it has ruled out plans of bringing the Honda CBR500R to India in the near future. It maybe noted that the CBR650F was launched in India in July and it was being expected that it would be followed by the launch of the CBR500R. It maybe noted that this middleweight supersports model was showcased at the Indian Auto Expo 2014 in February last year and Honda was earlier speculated to be working on localisation of the bike to keep its costs down and bring the CBR500R via via CKD-route.
[box type=”shadow” ]Also See- Honda CBR650F launch on August 4[/box]
Specs & Performance
The bike has a 500cc parallel-twin engine as its heart which is a liquid cooled unit. This engine is good for a maximum power of 47 BHP and a peak torque of 43 NM which make it quite the performer. But the only thing which pulls it down is its weight, it tips the scales at 194 KGs. The bike does the 0-100 km/hour sprint in 5.7 seconds before it touches the top speed of 185 km/hour. The bike is available in ABS and non-ABS guise and we expect both of them to come to India. Honda might as well decide on bringing only the ABS one in India. Bringing the bike to a stop will be a 320mm single disc brake up front and a 240mm single disc brake at rear. The bike also has a naked street-fighter sibling with the same underpinnings, the Honda CB500F, which might just come as well to us in near future.
[box type=”shadow” ]Also See – Honda CB Hornet 160R Launch on Aug-4[/box]
Rivals
Internationally, the bike locks horns with the Kawasaki Ninja 300R and the KTM RC 390.
2013 Honda CBR500R 360-degree
The CBR500R is a twin-cylinder unit and the KTM RC 390 will be a single cylinder unit. And that is where the difference will kick in. But there’s no denying the fact that the 2013 Honda CBR500R will open up an all new biking segment in India, just like the Honda CBR250R did.
[box type=”shadow” ]Also See- New Honda Livo[/box]
Stay tuned to Car Blog India for more on the Honda CBR500R India launch.
