The 2018 Husqvarna Vitpilen 401 Brings Café Racer Style To The Small-Displacement Bike Market

It's been three long years since Husqvarna first unveiled its Vitpilen 401 concept bike, announcing to the motorcycle world that the Austrian firm had no intentions of just rebadging KTMs in the company's white, blue, and yellow color scheme.

EICMA 2015 and 2016 were filled with both excitement and disappointment as we longed for production models, left only to spend more time riding the KTM 390 Duke (with which it shares an engine) and thinking about how cool it would be to have that platform in a pretty package.

The wait is finally over (well, almost, as the bike won’t be on dealer floors until next spring) because we finally have a production version in the 2018 Husqvarna Vitpilen 401.

As we previously knew, the Husqvarna Vitpilen 401 is powered by the same 375cc single-cylinder engine as the KTM 390 Duke. That means it will make the same claimed 43 hp at 9,000 rpm and 27 pound-feet of torque at 7,000 rpm. That also means it gets a chrome-moly steel-trellis frame and subframe and a six-speed transmission.

The Vitpilen 401 features suspension by WP, with an upside-down 43mm fork and monoshock providing 5.6 inches of travel in the front and 5.9 inches out back.

Brakes are from ByBre, with a single 320mm disc up front paired to a four-piston caliper plus a single 230mm disc and single-piston caliper in back. The Vitpilen 401 also gets the Bosch 9.1MB two-channel ABS.

The Vitpilen shares the same wheelbase and steering head angle as the KTM 390 Duke (53.4 inches and 25 degrees, respectively), but seat height grows slightly from 32.7 inches on the Duke to 32.9 on the Vitpilen (the Duke actually grew to 32.7 inches from 31.5 inches for 2017).

Pre-fuel weight stays the same as the KTM 390 Duke, though those figures vary with fuel as the Vitpilen gets a gallon less gas as it gets only a 2.5-gallon tank.

As with all things EICMA, no word yet on pricing or when these things will actually appear on dealer floors. But, you can expect to see them come springtime and the KTM 390 Duke has an MSRP of $5,299 for those of you keeping score.

Check out the rest of our coverage of all the new motorcycles released at EICMA this year!