Victory Motorcycles reveals the all-new liquid-cooled Octane, the newest addition to the 2016 fleet. It looks like our expectations as far as the engine is concerned were a bit too high, and instead of engineering an all-new power plant for the project, Victory preferred to beef up the mill that animates the Indian Scout.
Nevertheless, the Victory Octane is a bike that looks modern, aggressive and quite cool to begin with. We suspected right from the get-go that the two custom machines built by Urs Erbacher and Zach Ness already looked much like the final version of the Octan, save for the exhausts, and we were right.
Now, the Octane does indeed seem to borrow a lot from the Scout. This can be, depending on each individual, a good thing or a bad thing. Could Indian deliver such a muscled-up version of the Scout? Chances are they could. Is Octane the Mr. Hyde of the Scout and, therefore, better suitable for belonging to the Victory line-up? Most likely!
103 horsepower is nothing to write home about, but these figures can definitely generate a lot of fun
Octane comes with a cast aluminum frame with steel backbones and using the engine as a stressed member. The forks are traditional 41mm ones; we hoped that they would be USD units, but at least they are equipped with dual-rate springs.
The racy DNA led to a 298mm rotor and steel braided brake lines for more precision, and the Octane uses an 18" front wheel and a 17" rear one, both aluminum and with wire spokes.
Victory Octane packs a 1,179.3cc displacement, with 101x73.6mm bore and stroke. Judging by the similar looks, the Octane is powered by a beefed-up Scout engine, and the additional tweaks grant it superior tech specs.
Indian claims that the new Scout produces 100 horsepower, but sources mention that the Dynojet only showed just under 85 hp at 7,900 rpm. The official Octane papers speak about 103 hp at 8,000 rpm and 99 Nm (72.9 lb-ft) @ 6,000 rpm, as opposed to the under 98 Nm (72.2 lb-ft) at 5,900 revs per minute Indian says they get from the Scout. The same Dyno test yielded 86 Nm (63.5 lb-ft) at the same rev count.
Even though we dreamed about much more power for the Octane, these figures may be just enough for some "hooligan" street antics. We remember doing 196 km/h (122 mph) aboard a Boulevard M90 with a passenger and leather saddlebags, so if Suzuki's 106 hp can do that, we see no impediment for the Octane.
Octane comes with a belt drive and a 6-speed transmission, and the standard ABS tells us that Europe will be one of the important markets for the bike. The 658mm (25.9 in) seat will surely appeal to shorter riders, too, while the 12.9-liter (3.4 US gal) could have been bigger for touring purposes.
The curb weight of the Octane is only 243 kg (536 lb), and this will surely make it way nimbler than the 289 kg (638 lb) dry H-D Night Rod Special. With a $10,499 price tag to it, we can also tell you that the first hundred Octane machines including pre-orders will get a special engine cover with the Project 156 logo on it.
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