Husqvarna Svartpilen
Unconventional looks, unfashionable engine, strange name… yet the Husky makes sense
PIN THE THROTTLE and the Svartpilen wheelies in first and second gears. It’ll hit the motorway speed limit in second too, on its way to an intense and engaging 9000rpm. A-road overtakes are fired out with enough urgency to easily stay in touch with the other three bikes here, despite being the smallest, and it’s perfectly content whirring smoothly at 5000rpm and 75mph in top gear. Oh, and it does 63mpg on roads and at speeds where the Indian struggles to get in the 40s – with the patience to bimble at lost tourist speed the Husqvarna’s capable of over 80 miles from a gallon.
The reason for ranting? The Svartpilen has one lonely piston. Preconceptions are it’ll therefore be crap. But you can forget everything you thought you knew about single-cylinder engines being shuddering, cranky, asthmatic wastes of time. There’s still a bit of single-cylinder truculence; the Husky will do 30mph in fourth gear but needs third, and though it’ll pull from below 3000rpm there’s a fair bit of shaking if you try it in fifth or sixth gear. But you avoid these situations on feel, without thinking about it. It’s the most impressive and arguably the most flexible engine here. Of course, it’s the same 693cc single as used in the excellent 701 Supermoto, with twin-plug ignition and a clever balance shaft in the cylinder head that also works as a centrifuge and extracts oil from the breather. A very real 71bhp reaches the rear tyre – whip-up a time machine from a tumble drier, iphone and elastic bands and you could skip back 20-odd years and clean up in the European Supermono Cup. For a big single to be so punchy, revvy and powerful yet still smooth, frugal and have 6200-mile service intervals is astounding.
Husky take the engine from KTM’S 690 Duke. And they take other bits too: like its café racer Vitpilen non-identical twin, the Svartpilen is effectively the Duke with a fashionable makeover – in this instance with semi-knobbly tyres, larger diameter front wheel, dirt-track-ish looks and a helping of fine Husky detailing. Though the dynamic is obviously close to the KTM, the Svart’ has its own character. The 690 encourages you to ride like an inebriated teenager on a field bike, but there’s something about the 701 that makes it feel just as natural sauntering around
up summer. Like the similarly-inspired Indian, it’s as happy charging about as being… well, cool.
Physically there’s not as much between this single and a 1203cc American V-twin as you’d expect, and sat next to the visually-tall Yamaha the Husky is every bit as sizable. But hop aboard and the Husky feels about half the weight of the others – it’s a ballet dancer next to the Suzuki sumo wrestler. At a paltry 158.5kg the single is 56.5 kilos lighter than the four, and handling is light, direct and accurate as you’d imagine. It changes direction with an ease only the flickable Yamaha gets anything close to. It has better ride quality and superior damping to the Indian, too; WP forks and shock feel quite stiff, but you sense the quality of the movement. That single front brake disc is plenty.
Sometimes the blocks of the tyres squirm slightly when pushing hard on a buckled B-road, or attempting Moto3-style corner speed in long, fast sweeps. It’s not an issue, just the price to pay for style that’d blend in at the Bike Shed.
I’m not sure about the numberboard thing, nor the all-black looks. There are some great details that get lost in the Svart’s light-absorbing dullness. Steve Herbert, Bike’s digital designer, would paint everything black if he could, but he’s not sure either. ‘Even on a bright day, a black bike with black engine on black tyres on a black road surface looks boring. They should use bronze for the frame, or wheels.’ The big, round dash is a bit strange too. All the information is squeezed into the central panel (accessed by scrolling through the options using squidgy buttons at the side), with a couple of inches of nothingness round the outside. Huge headlight, too. The pillion seat feels funny and is a bugger to keep clean, and the left-hand switchgear has a previous-generation feel (and is located too far round the ’bar, making your thumb stretch).
The Husky is also £8899. It’s a quality machine but this sounds a lot for ‘just’ a single when the faster, comfier, plusher MT-09 is a few hundred quid cheaper. But I have another issue. The Svart’s 18-inch front wheel and flat track-esque tyres can’t rival the pin-point accuracy, composure and grip offered by the 17-inch rim and pure road tyres on the donor Duke. And you can get brand-new KTMS for six grand…
‘It’s a ballet dancer next to the Suzuki sumo wrestler’