QJMotor bikes largely share Benelli platforms, and the forthcoming adventure model will likely share some styling cues with the current 750cc adventure bike. (QJMotor/)It’s only been a year since Benelli’s parent company Qianjiang created its “QJMotor” brand, but it has already built an impressive model range across a variety of styles and capacities, from 125cc to 800cc, and these leaked images show there are even more bikes on the way.
At the moment QJMotor’s international plans are unclear. The firm is establishing itself as a high-end leader in China, aiming to break preconceptions of poor quality and low specifications by relying heavily on European components including Brembo brakes and Marzocchi suspension. Its bikes largely share Benelli platforms, which means they’re designed to meet international regulations, so there appears to be little standing in the way of the firm as far as when it decides to start selling models outside the Chinese market.
Leaked images show the new lightweight adventure model as having a four-cylinder engine based on the Benelli TNT 600. (QJMotor/)The first of the new models to be leaked is this 600cc four-cylinder adventure bike developed around the engine and frame of the Benelli TNT 600. The same underpinnings were also used for QJMotor’s first model, the SRK 600, which went on sale last year featuring styling and suspension specs that put the Benelli-branded version to shame.
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The new adventure model shares its styling cues with the firm’s SRB 750 parallel-twin adventure bike, itself set to be the basis of Benelli’s yet-to-be-launched TRK 800. As such it’s easy to see that even if QJMotor’s own offering doesn’t make it to international markets, a Benelli-branded reworking of the bike is a likely proposition. Tech-wise, official type approval information for the as-yet-unreleased model shows that it weighs 233 kilograms (514 pounds) fully fueled, with 80 hp on tap from the familiar Benelli-based four-cylinder engine. As with other bikes from the same company, it appears to use Brembo brakes and the ABS is Bosch’s 9.1MB system.
The other new image shows a naked SRK700, which uses a 693cc parallel-twin motor. (QJMotor/)The second new QJMotor model to leak is this, the SRK 700, and while it shares the “SRK” title and similar naked bike styling to the SRK 600 that’s already offered by the firm, it’s a very different machine under the skin. Where the SRK 600 uses the Benelli-developed four-cylinder engine from the TNT 600, the 700 uses a parallel-twin, 693cc motor. In its overall design layout and that 693cc capacity it’s a close match to the twin featured in CFMoto’s new 700CL-X, but the bike’s type approval documents list it as being an in-house-manufactured engine called the QJ283MU.
The decision to create a new 693cc engine, with a 75 hp peak power, is doubly strange because the firm already has a 753cc, 80 hp parallel twin of a completely different design from the Benelli Leoncino 800 at its disposal. With a 192-kilogram (423 pounds) wet weight, the SRK700 looks to be a pretty close match, spec-wise, to bikes like Yamaha’s MT-07, and with the addition of a Chinese-style price tag could prove tempting, particularly since it appears to be fitted with Brembo brakes and Marzocchi suspension.
