1) Yamaha has kicked off an interactive program to boost its brand image and serve existing customers. The three-day affair even has Japanese safety personnel to teach kids something we often forget to excercise – motorcycle safety.
Head over to Indian Motos Blog for full details.

2) Honda CBR250R will come to India in the first half of 2011 for an affordable price. If you can’t enough of the bike, head over to Indian Motos Blog to see the official video.

Is Honda planning a minivan on the Jazz platform in the US to lock horns with the Prius minivan? – Click here to read more on that.

The commonly held opinion of China’s automotive products being unsafe was safely guarded by the Geely CK1 as it brought more shame to the Chinese motoring industry by scoring “zero stars” in the Latin NCAP safety test. Can the newly acquired Volvo help change things around for the parent company? Click here to read more.

KTM releases new video of its 125cc bike (KTM 125 Duke) revealing never before seen angles of the fully complete bike. Click here to see it

Is the VTR250 Honda’s Diwali gift to Indians? Click here to learn everything about the VTR250

HMSI talks about sub-Twister economy motorcycle for Indian market. Is this their rural market workhorse that’s short on style and tall on fuel economy? – Read about the 100cc Honda bike.

KTM’s 125cc streetfighter concept is finally named! Someone comes up with “Avatar” which everyone seems to like. The 125cc bike gets an identity and one lucky Russian gets a motorcycle to ride home! – Read about the 125cc KTM bike.

The Tata Nano isn’t along after all. Now a Yamaha R15 makes red hot headlines after it encounters unexpected fire while negotiating a climb – Read about the Yamaha R15 fire

Image Source – Gudel Modification

Honda’s CBF Stunner 125 has proven it ability by winning the ‘Best Machine For New Riders’ award at the 14th Motor Cycle News (MCN) Awards.

This bike has been targeted towards beginners in UK and became this year’s best selling bike in the country. The bike is a blend of stylish looks, performance and reliability and this overall riding experience which this bike provides to its customers made it the choice of the panel of judges as the best choice for newcomers to two wheels.

As we have already mentioned in one of our articles earlier, Honda launched a new white-black paint scheme for CBF 125 in UK.

Apart from this the bike is also available with a couple of swish new top boxes, to hold 26 or 35 litres of stuff. The boxes cost £109.99 and £129.99 and are very useful for storing things like helmet, pizzas or any other material.

Source – Mirror

With 9 bhp of power and a claimed mileage of 70kmpl, Honda’s new CB Twister promises to shake up the 100-125cc segment. The lion’s share of the 100cc market belongs to Hero Honda, and their bikes also boast of such credentials. The path Honda took with this motorcycle is entirely different to one adopted by its Indian partner.

The CB Twister looks everything but a Hero Honda Splendor or Passion. Many of us yesterday expected to see a plain and boring commuter with puny tires and no personality.

By making the move of introducing a lower capacity motorcycle, Honda expects to see a change in customer perception and expand this section of the market.

As the name denotes, the 110cc CB Twister is inspired by bigger the CB1000R. The core USP of this motorcycle is its style, but there are plenty of other reasons why customers would buy this product.

You get features which aren’t seen on this side of town. Tubeless tyres, maintenance free battery and viscous air filter improve performance and reduce maintenance cost. Other features like short muffler and half chain are attributes that define how stylish this motorcycle is.

Though the design of the Honda CB Twister has been penned at Honda’s Italian design studio with the CB1000R as inspiration, the motorcycle is manufactured for the demanding Indian customer. Primarily to address the need of the Indian youngster in both rural and urban areas, the motorcycle will also be exported to other countries in the future.

Honda isn’t planning to introduce fuel injection or more powerful engines on the CB Twister, though it expressed interest in bringing bikes of capacity 180-250 to India in the future. Honda is also studying the possibility of electric and hybrid two-wheelers for Indian market in Japan (as revealed by Japanese designers of this motorcycle) but they too are at quite a distance.

The CB Twister is available in five colors – Yellow, Green, Black, Red and Blue. The base model is priced at 42,000 rupees and will be available in showroom in India by the end of February 2010.

Honda CB Twister Image Slideshow

If you can’t view the slideshow above, visit the Honda CB Twister Image Gallery for images

Honda CB Twister Official Image Slideshow

If you can’t view the slideshow above, visit the Honda CB Twister Official Image Gallery for images

Press Release

We have already seen the spy pics of Honda’s new 110cc motorcycle called ‘CB100 Twister’. Although the Twister series comprises of powerful engines of 250cc or 300cc but the one introduced in our country tomorrow would only be 110cc capacity. The high capacity Twister series bikes are operating very well in the Brazilian market.

In India, Honda is aiming at the customers who are oriented towards stylish bikes and not just fuel efficient bikes in this commuter section. This would mean this bike will be very different from an ordinary 100cc boring commuter bike.

The 110cc Twister is also expected to have class leading power and torque ratings, much better than market leader Hero Honda. It is said to come with a 22mm carburetor with a one of a kind exhaust system. The bike will house a completely new engine which won’t share common grounds with any of the Hero Honda commuters. You may expect an upgraded version of this bike with Fuel Injection, the similar way Honda did for its CBF-Stunner.

The bike will borrow its design from bikes like CB1000R and the CB300 Twister. The tank shroud design would be somewhat similar to CB1000R. The headlight has been designed keeping in mind the designs of the CB1000R, the CB300 and the Hornet 600.

The bike’s fuel tank will be borrowed from CBF Stunner 125. Now coming to the rear section of the bike, it would be based on the CB300’s design. In order to keep the costs low, LED tail light is not expected. The bike will feature disc brake up front with the rotor having a completely new design and a drum brake at the rear. The rear suspension will have two individual shock absorbers with the red springs that can be seen on most of the HH commuters. Honda is trying to provide this bike with all the latest features and technology and the bike is expected to be around 45k mark.

Personally I would suggest that if any of our readers is planning to buy a motorcycle from the commuter section, hold on for now and wait for this bike to hit the market. The bike is expected to set a new trend in the 100 cc market and I don’t want you guys to repent later.

Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India will launch a stylish 110cc motorcycle in India day after tomorrow in Delhi. The company has been working on this motorcycle for more than a year now and could christen it CB Twister.

What Honda isn’t planning to do with its latest motorcycle is compete directly with India’s largest two-wheeler manufacturer – Hero Honda.

Honda is going to pitch its entry-level bike to youngsters. The Hero Honda counterpart Splendor is targeted at the middle class family man. Honda will also price the motorcycle roughly 10% higher than the Splendor which should draw a clear line between the two commuters.

Shinji Aoyama, president and CEO, HMSI -

We don’t expect competition with Hero Honda as a joint venture brand. I am not in a position to compete. Our position of new model introduction is to expand the market itself. I believe we can activate demand from youngsters with this 110cc motorcycle.

Honda entry point in India is the 125cc Shine, which looks plain jane. It shares its space with the stylish CBF Stunner which is aimed at the youngster looking for an element of style in that segment. Would Honda follow the same strategy with the 110cc motorcycle, only this time the stylish variant comes first?

Source – Economic Times

update – this is an older post. The Honda CB Twister is launched in India and will hit showrooms in February 2010. Click here to view images and read more on the motorcycle.

Finally we have the spy pic of the new Honda 110cc motorcycle, named CB Twister. As you can see this bike by no means looks like an ordinary commuter.

The Honda entry-level motorcycle looks stylish and we are sure that it will lend a new lease of life to the 100cc segment in India. Honda will unveil this bike at the upcoming Auto expo next month. The CB Twister is also expected to be equipped with some useful features which are not present in the other bikes from this category in the market.

Like its elder sibling CBF Stunner, the Honda CB Twister should also receive good response mainly because of its looks and features. So let us see how the real package turns out to be next month!

update – this is an older post. The Honda CB Twister is launched in India and will hit showrooms in February 2010. Click here to view images and read more on the motorcycle.

Source – BS Motoring

Honda, earlier in this month, launched a new white and black color scheme for its CBF 125 (known as CBF Stunner in India) in the European market. The CBF 125 was launched last year to replace the old CG 125 in the Europe.

The White-black paint scheme looks attractive and it wouldnt be a bad move to launch this color scheme in India as well. As we all know that the CBF-Stunner in the 125cc segment,  is popular among the youth. This color scheme would provide another reason for the people to go for this bike in its segment.

So lets wait and watch if this color arrives in India as well, may be we’ll see it in 2010 Auto Expo?

Source – Motorcycle News