Honda Reveals Wild V3 Turbocharged Engine Concept

Honda has used the EICMA show in Milan to unveil what might turn out to be the wildest concept bike of the 2025 launch season.

The engine of the bike is really the big news here, as it’s a very unusual V3 layout, with two cylinders at the front of the engine, and a single cylinder at the rear. The configuration is a 75-degree layout, and adding to the intrigue around it is that it includes an electrically driven compressor located on the top of the engine, in front of the airbox.

Similar in principle to a conventional turbo (which is driven by exhaust gas pressure) the electrically driven ‘turbo’ on the Honda concept can provide the engine with sustained and specific intake pressure regardless of the engine RPM. The electrically operated system also makes packaging the bike easier as the system can be mounted anywhere on the engine and requires no exhaust modifications or an intercooler.

Specs for the engine, such as displacement and power output, aren’t noted on the press release, although examining bike the images and eyeballing the wheels and tyres (which seem to be borrowed from the CB1000R) we’d guess it’s between 400 and 800cc in capacity.

This isn’t the first time Honda has looked to the tri-cylinder V configuration, with the two-stroke NS400R of the mid-1980s being the last time it was used. That bike was a screaming GP replica with around 70bhp. What type of bike this new powerplant will end up in remains to be seen. Honda is though committing to continuing the development of the platform, claiming the “potential of this new direction is obvious, with breathtaking possibilities.”