Ever since BMW launched the single-cylinder G310R, the question of whether it would be joined by a fully faired 310 sportsbike has been asked.
Well here’s that bike, but it goes under the brand of BMW’s Indian production partner TVS.
The TVS Apache RR310 was hinted at by the company’s Akula concept bike, revealed in early 2016, shortly after the G310R first appeared.
With 25kW, it’s a category below the likes of the Yamaha R3, Kawasaki’s new Ninja 400 and KTM’s RC390, but it outperforms other bikes like the Honda CBR300R and Kawasaki Ninja 250.
In mechanical terms, the bike is basically a G310R. It has the same unusual engine – with its intake at the front, exhaust at the rear and backward-leaning cylinder – mated to an identical transmission and bolted into the same steel trellis frame. Even the wheels and the ByBre brakes are identical. As is the Kayaba fork and rear shock. The bike’s peak power is the same but the torque is quoted at 27.3Nm while the BMW’s is rounded to 28Nm. Both the power and torque peaks – 9700rpm and 7700rpm respectively – are 200rpm higher than the G310R’s equivalents. That could suggest a remapped injection system, or simply a measuring difference.
The bodywork’s different, of course, as are the rearset ’pegs, the higher 810mm seat and clip-on bars which sit above the yoke rather than below it, resulting in a relatively upright riding position. The yoke itself resembles that of the BMW S1000RR, surely a hint there’s a BMW-branded version in the wings.
At 170kg wet, the Apache is 11.5kg heavier than a G310R, a difference that is surely down to the bodywork. However, it’s also faster, with a top speed of 160km/h, around 10km/h more than the naked BMW can manage. Watch this space.
By Ben Purvis
