Brabus 1300R Limited Edition Superbike Launched In Partnership With KTM
The engine unit is identical to the one in the Duke it’s based on (1301CC V-Twin) and the 1300R shares the same power figures as well at 180PS and 140NM.
Science 19-Feb-2022
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What Is Brabus?
Brabus is a name which all car enthusiasts have generally heard of at some point because of the absolutely insane cars they come out with, but for those of you who don’t know that’s perfectly alright because I’m here to give you a quick background of the brand before we dive into their latest maniacal creation.
Brabus is basically a Germany based aftermarket tuning company which specialises in Mercedes-Benz, Mercedes-AMG, Smart and Maybach vehicles. In simple terms, if you give your Mercedes to Brabus and pay them an astronomical amount of money, they will make it look absolutely outrageous with high end expensive carbon fibre body parts and aerodynamic components, they’ll soup up the interior with a level of excellence and exclusivity that you simply wouldn’t get in the stock car and most importantly they take out the car’s original engine and fit it with a bigger, more powerful, more crazy and animalistic engine which they develop completely in house. This paired with a full custom exhaust system means that a Brabus tuned Mercedes is likely to be the loudest, fastest, wildest looking, most expensive and most exclusive car (a lot of the conversions are limited edition) in most places where it goes. For example here is a photo and specs of a stock Mercedes-AMG GLE 63 S 4Matic VS its Brabus 900 Rocket Edition counterpart.
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Okay so you get the idea, Brabus basically takes existing extreme Mercs and makes them ten times more insane than they already were. It’s a company where perfection and precision is key and performance wise, even the sky isn’t the limit.
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The Brabus 1300R
This astounding company famous for tuning high performance Mercs has now gone and done something superb; they’ve made a bike. As a starting point they chose one of the leading performance bike manufacturers in the world, KTM. Once they’d decided that they went and picked the most extreme hypernaked the Austrian manufacturer currently makes which is the 1290 Super Duke R EVO and then they souped it up Brabus style.
While this gorgeous bike shares its underpinnings with the Super Duke R EVO, the whole body is all new and the bike features some quintessential Brabus touches to make sure there’s no mistaking it for anything else other than the masterpiece it is.
The engine unit is identical to the one in the Duke it’s based on (1301CC V-Twin) and the 1300R shares the same power figures as well at 180PS and 140NM. It completes the sprint to 100KMPH in 3.2 seconds and has a dry weight of 194KG but the real beauty of this machine is in that all new body and the attention to detail Brabus has adorned it with. The 1300R has undergone comprehensive café racer treatment in terms of its stance, ergonomics and overall appearance and seems to have borrowed design cues from Husqvarna as well in the form of the circular headlight and edgy body components. The Brabus has been given a healthy dose of carbon fibre wherever possible and evidence of this can be seen on the air intakes, headlight shroud as well as the tail. The large sharp intakes do more than just look good, they provide better airflow to the bike’s colossal engine as well. The bike also gets a thicker, better padded heated seat which is beautifully detailed and sits 7.62mm higher than the Duke at 843.28mm.
The bike has a custom matte black ceramic coated Brabus slip-on double pipe exhaust designed to optimise back pressure (bet it sounds amazing too) as well as 5 riding modes which alter individual components and characteristics of the bike to best suite that particular setting. It also has a slipper clutch, quickshifter, cruise control and cornering ABS to make it an agile and precise performer. Like the Super Duke, the 1300R has WP APEX suspension at both ends with electronically adjustable damping as well as top spec Brembo Stylema callipers for the brakes and even a carbon fibre cooling duct on the front brake. The handlebar is fully adjustable as are both levers and even the KTM based 5 inch TFT display has a custom Brabus startup animation to it. So in addition to being absolutely beautiful to behold, the Brabus 1300R is absolutely dripping with features and technology making it even more phenomenal than the crazy Super Duke R EVO, which is indeed what Brabus does best.
There is a catch regarding acquiring this exclusive machine though, or rather there’s two catches. First of all when it’s launched it will cost the equivalent of Rs.35.28 lakh in the UK which is already around 2x the price of the KTM it’s based on and second of all they’re only making 154 of them, 77 in each colour; signature black and magma red which makes it one of the most exclusive superbikes on the planet, again something Brabus does very well. All in all this bike is a crazy fast, beautifully designed, exquisitely finished, wildly expensive and ridiculously exclusive masterpiece.
This is the first resultant vehicle of the Brabus-KTM partnership so we’ll definitely be seeing more of these fantastic bikes in the future. Lots to look forward to.
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Devashish Puranik
Devashish Puranik is a student who is currently pursuing his bachelor's degree in Transportation Design at MIT Institute of Design. He is extremely passionate about automobiles and enjoys sketching, digital art, 3D modelling and ocassionally even animating his automotive creations. He enjoys exploring a wide variety of art forms besides automobiles and likes to experiment with different media and surfaces too. Besides this he has a love for content creation in the form of video as well as text. He creates automotive reviews and videos on his two YouTube channels Ignite Motorrad and Devashish Puranik and intends to grow them further alongside his educational course. Delivering content and hosting videos in front of the camera is one of his strongest points. He is a motorcycle enthusiast himself and goes on long tours on his bike and is part of a few motorcycling groups in addition to having started one himself. He keeps himself in the loop regarding all things automotive and is always seeking to expand his horizons in these fields.