CFMoto’s 200-horsepower Sportbike V-4

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CFMoto has been filing patents on a brand-new Chinese made 1000cc V-4. (CFMoto/)

Chinese motorcycle brands have recently been a controversial subject but there’s a clear path when it comes to the quality and performance that they offer. By making a 1000cc V-4 superbike, CFMoto could make the same leap into the mainstream that Honda achieved with the CB750 half a century ago.

That appears to be part of the company’s plan, as it’s filed a patent application for just such an engine. CFMoto specifically mentions targets of 1000cc and 201 horsepower and explains why it’s opting for a V-4 layout rather than a cheaper-to-make inline-four.

A view straight down into the intake tracts. (CFMoto/)

The patent itself revolves around some fairly mundane aspects of the liquid-cooling system and the flow of coolant around the engine, but the important element is that it’s directly relevant to both the V-4 layout and to the high specific power that CFMoto is intending to achieve from a 1000cc capacity.

The only image of a complete motorcycle included in the patent is a purely illustrative picture of the machine sold in the US as the 300SS (offered elsewhere as the 300SR and identical-looking 250SR). It’s used only to confirm that the new V-4 is intended for a motorcycle and to label key components like the frame, bodywork, engine, and transmission. While the choice of a faired sportbike rather than a naked machine might be a clue as to the style of bike that the V-4 will end up in, the chances are that should the new engine reach production it will appear in a variety of bikes, both faired and unfaired.

Measuring the Vee, it appears that the angle is roughly 78 degrees. (CFMoto/)

Looking at the engine itself, there are several details that can be gathered from the drawings. First is that it’s not a traditional 90-degree Vee. Instead, measuring the Vee-angle of the drawings shows it to be around 78 degrees, making for a more compact overall package but not one that’s as tight as the 65-degree Vee of Aprilia’s RSV4 engine. We don’t know if the drawings are to scale, so that angle could be a few degrees off (72 degrees would be a more conventional figure, as used by Norton’s V-4, or 75 degrees as in older versions of Aprilia’s RS-GP racebikes).

Could this be a race engine, perhaps a clue to a MotoGP effort from CFMoto? It seems unlikely. For starters, the design appears to use chain-driven camshafts, where gear drive would be the norm for a racing V-4, and secondly the patent specifically refers to the use of a thermostat in the cooling system, which is something you wouldn’t likely find in a MotoGP engine. The target output of 201 hp from 1000cc also screams streetbike rather than racer.

A side view of the proposed engine. (CFMoto/)

A cutaway of the cylinder head reveals the use of finger-followers rather than buckets and shims, in line with the latest superbike design trends, and of course confirm that the valves are conventionally sprung, not using a Ducati-style Desmo system or the sort of pneumatic closing that you might expect from a MotoGP engine.

A closer look at the valvetrain. Note, the finger-follower design. (CFMoto/)

Although CFMoto has a close relationship with KTM, there’s no indication that this engine is related to the Austrian firm’s long-canceled plans to make a V-4 streetbike. Not only does the engine not resemble any of KTM’s race V-4s from either its short-lived attempt at the 990cc era with Kenny Roberts’ team or the current RC16 project, but the patent has been filed purely under CFMoto’s name, not the official name of the joint venture that ties the two brands together.

As ever with stories related to patents, it’s worth noting not every project that reaches the stage of patenting an idea reaches production. We may never see any more of this CFMoto project than what’s shown in these drawings. Alternatively, however, this could become the first 200-plus-hp motorcycle to emerge from a Chinese brand and open the door to a new era of affordable, high-performance motorcycles, providing exactly the sort of revolution in the market that we saw when the Japanese brands blew away the established British and Italian sportbike makers of the 1960s and 1970s.

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