If concept bikes are supposed to be windows of the future, this thing here is a veritable glass wall. Created by British designer Matt Williams, the “KTM Motorbike” not only offers a great view over design brilliancy, but also has the innovation factor to back it up. Featuring a hub-center steering system which eliminates dive under braking, this KTM concept should handle like a superbike, while the steering angle is much more generous than on classic motorcycles.
Although it is supposed to be built around a small frame and powered by a KTM V-Twin engine, we simply cannot get over the aggressive looks of this concept and the cruiser-like riding position that it offers. If we’re right, if made, this motorcycle will offer the best of both worlds: superbike performance and cruiser comfort. Ouch, that will surely change some things in the motorcycle industry.
> More
The City is a concept vehicle designed by Jameson Klug to be affordable, lightweight, and simple. The idea came by joining a motorcycle with a car shell and, obviously, this brings benefits characteristic to both these types of vehicles: the versatility, low fuel consumption and thrill of riding a motorcycle when this is separated from the shell and the ability to carry two persons and cargo when attached to it.
Jameson Klug says: “My concept is based around the motorcycle architecture, and allows the car shell to attach when needed, to provide for extra cargo capacity, protection from the weather, or to carry two additional passengers. The driver still sits on the motorcycle even as he attaches it to the car, and utilizes its controls to save complexity.”
The entire bodywork is made of roto-molded high strength plastics, with a biodegradable honeycomb soy core, while the star rotor engine powering this entire assembly is capable of recycling heat that would normally be wasted.
> More
It looks more like a scooter to me, but it’s true. The word in Europe is that Yamaha and Toyota will team up to build the first hybrid motorcycle. We’ve even heard that it’s gonna be dubbed the ‘Prius’ (no, not the buzz car) and that it will be powered by both a 20bhp internal combustion engine and an electric motor, but that’s more than we can take. How’s that for you?
The internal combustion engine will be a 250cc horizontal single with two jobs to do: send power to the rear wheel and to a generator in order to supply the batteries with electricity. Everything is supposedly done through a high-tech ECU.
Inspired, most likely, by the always very hard to ride unicycles seen at the circus, the eniCycle excludes the pedaling part from the equation and brings in an electric 1000 watt hub motor that is set into motion by simply leaning your body forward.
It relies on mini-gyroscopes (that measure your vertical angle 100 times a second) and on an embedded processor to keep things balanced at all times and that’s what makes it so easy to ride. In fact, Slovenian designer Aleksander Polutnik claims it only takes people about 15 minutes to master the eniCycle.
Polutnik is planning to mass produce the small and funky vehicle as soon as he finds himself a business partner. He has already built two prototypes, but it will take more to make a global unicycle phenomenon out of it.
Hit the jump to see the action video.
> More
The Ghost motorcycle concept was created by Imran Othman, a designer living in Singapore and who was inspired by the famous adrenaline junkie known as “Ghost Rider”, but also by a flying falcon. Given the first source of inspiration, we reckon this concept bike is extremely fast, while the overall shape does share a few aerodynamic parts with the mentioned hawk, which is very cool.
Offering a very aggressive riding position and an appealing look, the Ghost concept most likely looks tempting even to “Ghost Rider” itself, but will this bike end up a fact or is this just one of those situations in which “Now you see it... and now you don’t...”?
> More
We’re quite familiar with unusual motorcycles here at TopSpeed, but this cigarette-shaped motorcycle shows we haven’t seen it all. The strange creation belongs to a man called MK Sudakar, who is an inventor and environmental activist living in India and who developed this for his country’s recent public smoking ban – “Break the Habit”.
Apparently, this isn’t the man’s first strange invention. He is also the inventor of a motorized suitcase and a motorized toilet. I wonder: part of which campaign those creations were?
> More
Inspired by the fact that Puma now also produces motorcycle clothing, but also by the actual items, Karl Sanders put to work his designer skills to create the Puma Motorcycle Project. Featuring a unique style and belonging completely to the anticipative designer, the project brought Karl the honor of being the Best CAD modeler at the Coventry University Degree Show 2009, which was voted by Autodesk.
As unique as the concept’s style might appear to be, it still reminds us of the Brammo Enertia and it isn’t even supposed to be an electric bike. Still, we have to give the designer, which also played the roles of modeler, visualizer and animator, credit for the idea of extending Puma’s range of activity at such extremes.
> More
The BMW Halbo concept looks like the kind of bike you can take with you in vacation. Yes, it is small and this makes it fun, efficient, but also very dangerous to ride, at least from where I’m sitting now. Actually, designer Pierre Yohanes Lubis claims it only takes up half as much space as your average bike.
That is due to some innovative construction methods such as the engine being an integrated part of the full-sized front wheel. At the back, you get a whole different scenario: the tiny spherical wheel is mounted on a moving arm that is supposed to balance the bike.
Addressed to "eco-minded young individuals," we can suppose it features
an electric motor, but why would anyone want to hit the streets on such a bike? Sure, it can be efficient at work places where you have to move a lot (and where workers currently use bicycles) as long as companies are willing to pay the price (currently unknown), but it looks too risky for the streets.
Designer Dario Caroselli has recently come up with a very aggressive naked motorcycle concept based on the Aprilia Shiver 750, a veritable Italian naked built around a V-twin engine. Called simply Aprilia Naked, the concept bike features compact bodywork and solo seat, while being defined by the lines and color schemes of the original bike.
We’re quite impressed by this concept although we must admit that it isn’t quite in strict accordance with the naked style, but simply a production bike taken to the extreme.
Maarten Timmer is a Delft design graduate that seems to have discovered the perfect recipe to really promote electric motorcycles. The whole idea is to drift further away from petrol-fed motorcycles as a result of using a dynamic look, which is incomparable to that of the, indeed, much cheaper and faster gas burners.
His project is called VertiGO and is anything but regular. There’s a space where the tank would normally be on a classic supersport motorcycle and the seat is suspended, allowing this electric bike to stand out as a unique alternative in a world of fairly similar two-wheelers.
Although not completely radical, the bike’s slightly futuristic and yet totally realizable design is allowed by the small battery packs and motors that can be placed very low in the chassis, achieving a favorable center of gravity as well as a feet-forward riding position.
While we’re aware of the fact that electric bikes are gaining more and more terrain on the market, the "bang for the buck" still makes the rules in this industry and that’s why we are not witnessing an amazing growth of the electric segment just yet.
Pages: 
Picture Gallery
1 comment
RSS -
Webmaster free news |