CFMoto

CFMoto 500SR Voom By Ben Purvis


China's CFMoto has unveiled its first four-cylinder sports bike in the form of the 500SR Voom - and while it's officially only for the domestic market, there's already pressure growing to export it to more countries.
Although CFMoto hasn't announced technical details yet, the 500SR Voom is just one of multiple models expected to be built around the company's new four-cylinder engine. The engine itself is a modern, liquid-cooled DOHC design that puts CFMoto into competition with Kawasaki's Ninja ZX-4RR, but the 500SR Voom takes a surprising new approach to the styling by evoking sports bikes from the 1980s and 1990s thanks to a stylised version of the classic twin-headlight style of that era. 

It's unexpected as CFMoto has already previewed a modern-styled version of the 500SR with styling more like the twin-cylinder 450SR, having shown a disguised prototype in action at a fan event last September. Now it seems that both the modern-styled 500SR and the retro-inspired 500SR Voom will be sold side-by-side, and a naked 500NK is also expected to follow.
The 500SR Voom's styling is an impressive mix of classic cues and modern elements, and the result is a machine that looks like a concept bike, but will actually be sold to the public. Those twin round 'headlights' are actually nothing of the sort - they're air intakes for the engine, rimmed in LED rings that act as daytime running lights. The real headlight unit is underneath the nose, tucked largely out of sight.
Like other CFMoto sports models, the 500SR Voom and the modern-styled 500SR will share a tubular steel trellis frame, allied to an aluminium dual-sided swingarm and upside forks, and while CFMoto hasn't announced technical details yet, there's a clue to the bike's performance from a snatched glimpse of the instrument display, which includes graphs for the power and torque right there on the dashboard.
Those graphs appear to show a peak power of just under 60 kW (80 hp) at around 12,000 rpm, and maximum torque of a bit less than 50 Nm (37 lbs-ft) arriving at around 10,000 rpm. The rev counter reads to 16,000 rpm. Chinese type-approval documents confirm a certified power of 58 kW (78 hp).
Although CFMoto says the Voom is a domestic market model only, the company's Australian importer has already started asking customers via Facebook whether it should import the bike, and China's current emissions laws are fairly close to other global standards, so the new four-cylinder engine should be able to comply with regulations in Europe and America without too much trouble.