Benda’s BD700 Four-Cylinder Cruiser Is Coming

If the bike seen in these new design patent images wore a famous Japanese or even Italian brand, it wouldn’t come as a surprise. It’s a bold, confident-looking motorcycle with considered proportions and sophisticated shapes. So it might come as a surprise to hear it’s a new model from China. Although its maker—which uses the unfortunate-sounding Benda name in China—isn’t one of the Chinese firms, like CFMoto, that has established itself on the export market, the bike is one of the most technically advanced machines yet to emerge from the country.

The inline four-cylinder engine in this bike—code-named BD700—is only the second to appear in a Chinese-made bike. The first is the Italian-designed 600cc four used in various Benellis and manufactured by its parent company, Qianjiang, but given this bike’s code name, it’s a safe bet the Benda four-cylinder displaces around 700cc. If appearances are anything to go by, this powerplant borrows some of its design from the Honda CB650R engine; the cases look remarkably similar to the Honda’s, with an identical bolt pattern around the covers. However, the Benda’s cylinder head appears to be bigger than the CB650R’s and features noticeable differences in its castings, so the jury’s out as to how much the Chinese motor owes to the Japanese one.

Regardless of the engine’s heritage, the bike it’s fitted to owes little to any other current design. There’s a hint of Ducati’s XDiavel in its stance thanks to the long wheelbase, forward footrests, and low seat, but the BD700 is by no means a copy of the Italian bike, not least because the chassis appears to be a cast aluminum design rather than a steel trellis, with a massive double-sided swingarm made of the same material. The overall look is of a muscular dragbike, further emphasized by a huge rear tire that appears to be at least 240-section in width.

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Interesting details include the exhaust, which features a belly-mounted collector/silencer with four separate side-facing outlets under the right-hand pillion peg. It’s the sort of design that a concept bike might feature, but the Benda is intended to be a production model. The headlight would also suit a concept bike; riffing on the traditional round design, it features a main LED bulb in the center of a turbine-like arrangement of subsidiary LEDs. Still more LEDs are used for the turn signals—the front ones appear to be molded into the front edges of the air intakes on either side of the tank, while the rears are on the license plate hanger—and a tiny taillamp.

Despite its concept-like appearance, the BD700 is clearly designed as a production model, with practical necessities like the rear license plate bracket already featuring on these images, which have been published to patent the styling and prevent other companies from copying the bike’s look. Although Benda hasn’t yet officially revealed the bike (it’s just hinted at it in teaser images) the BD700 features most of the modern technology you’d expect on a midsize machine. There’s clearly ABS on both the front and rear brakes, with sensor rings clearly visible in the designs and radial-mounted four-piston calipers not only on the front wheel but also the rear. The instruments are neatly tucked into a single TFT screen mounted on the handlebar clamps, making for a clutter-free look.

Will we ever see the Benda BD700 here? That’s an unknown at the moment, though the firm has set up operations in markets outside China, initially in other Asian countries like the Philippines, and the emergence of a big, four-cylinder model suggests it has its sights set at increasingly affluent markets in the future.