If electric cars aren’t ready to take over the motorcycle world just yet, perhaps forced induction may rule the next era. Honda has just unveiled its innovative high-capacity V3 combustion engine with electric supercharger to EICMA.
The Japanese giant announced an all-new platform just after lunch on Tuesday. It’s a compact V3 four-stroke engine, revealed in a gorgeous drop-dead tubular trellis frame with red highlights on the front two cylinder heads and the rear single cylinder head. A small snail of an electric compressor peeking out from the frame above the front head.
Slim, barely wider than the fork, it has a beautifully curved exhaust that looks great even in a naked setup, and an easily accessible oil filter on the left side. However, front bank valve clearance will be troublesome.
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The pistons are positioned at a 75 degree angle and are water cooled throughout. There are no visible radiators in the presentation chassis. This electric compressor is the first of its kind in the world and is specifically designed to increase torque at low and medium speeds.
While turbochargers operate using exhaust gas pressure and superchargers are driven directly from the engine’s output shaft, Honda’s electric compressor operates using battery power. This completely decouples it from engine speed. The ECU can force as much air into the intake as needed at any time. Honda engineers can use this to completely eliminate any kind of delay before boost kicks in, or tune it to improve all kinds of efficiency and performance.
We’re curious to know how the overall efficiency of this system compares to a traditional belt-driven supercharger. The supercharger consumes a significant portion of the engine’s power at low RPMs before it spins up and begins to contribute. Honda still has to get the power to power that snail from somewhere. This bike requires significantly higher energy output from the alternator and likely a larger battery to run this compressor.
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Although the efficiency of an electric supercharger is usually lower than that of a supercharger directly driven by a motor due to losses in converting mechanical energy to electrical energy and vice versa, it still improves overall riding performance. The experience can be superior in the end.
The V3 E-Compressor is built from scratch and is incredibly compact. Honda claims this engine is “newly developed for large-displacement machines,” and we can see it being used in all kinds of applications, from street and touring to track-focused machines. . , could also work in the adventure field.
However, remember that this is still a concept. The fact that it is shown mounted on a chassis with 200/55 wide section tires does not imply that it is intended for use on the Fireblade. It will be some time before Honda reveals where it will start using this.
Roz Blaine / New Atlas
It shares the same cylinder layout as the NS400R 2T, a one-off two-stroke triple that made waves about 40 years ago. And if it reaches production, it will join Kawasaki’s formidable H2 as one of the only forced-induction production bikes on the market.
And here it is actually intended for production. “Honda sees the development of this V3 engine with electric compressor as a new challenge in the field of internal combustion engines, and our goal is to allow our customers to experience even more the pleasure of riding and owning a motorcycle. ” says the company’s press release. . Honda also said it will “continue to develop” the new three-cylinder concept toward mass production.
Is it too early to get excited?
Source: Honda
