Honda CX-01 – What it’s all about?

A COUPLE of days ago you might have read about Honda’s CX-01 concept bike on these pages. Revealed with little fanfare at the Auto Expo in Delhi and created by the firm’s Indian R&D department, no technical details or production plans were given.

So, what is the CX-01? Well, the central section – the engine and frame – are pinched straight from the CBR250R (or the near-identical 2014 CBR300R), and the swingarm is from the latest Integra 750. We haven’t managed to place those forks just yet, but they’re virtually certain to be off-the-shelf parts from another machine. The wide bars and the controls look like they’re from the NC700S, and that bike has also donated its digital display, albeit with the warning lights redistributed to the sides instead of lined along the top.

So, bodywork aside, we’re looking at a mishmash of pieces from existing models. Is that a bad thing? Not at all. Instead it’s a reflection of how Honda is cutting costs and gives an indication that this bike may actually have a future as a production model.

We already know that Honda will soon launch a naked version of the CBR300R, probably to be called the CB300F to align with the relationship between the current CBR500R and CB500F. You’ll notice that the 500cc twin-cylinder range, one step above the 300cc singles in Honda’s range, also carries a third model in the form of the adventure-style CB500X. With such focus on ‘adventure’ bikes at the moment, Honda would be mad not to be considering a CB300X as well. How would such a bike be made? By bolting together a bunch of existing production components along with some restyled plastics to create another model without any significant R&D cost.

Hmmm... CB300X. Wonder where Honda got the idea for that ‘CX-01’ name for this concept?