Kawasaki might be doing everything they can to keep their new models for 2019 hidden from us, and although we haven’t actually seen the new supersport Ninja 636, either in road tests or production version, Kawasaki wasn’t able to keep this project secret anymore.
According to a set of papers registered at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the association that regulates homologations in the United States, Kawasaki filed documents that confirm the arrival of a new Ninja 636.
Kawasaki did ask to the NHTSA to don’t show the documents “As the embargo lift date for these models is October 11, 2018, we request that this document not be posted on the NHTSA website until after the embargo lift date”, a date that coincides with the AIM Expo show in Los Angeles. But we won’t need to wait until then, because at the INTERMOT Cologne motorcycle show, Germany, between 3 and 7th of October, Kawasaki will reveal the new Ninja 636 in all its glory.
According to the NHTSA document now turned public, Kawasaki confirms there will be a slight lost in engine performance, and the inline-four should lose around 3 hp at its peak comparing to the old Ninja 636, for a total of 127 hp.
That lower performance has a reason: Euro4.
In order to get this engine to meet Euro4 homologation standards, Kawasaki had to make intensive changes to the exhaust system, like the use of a three-way catalytic converter. This way Kawasaki engineers guarantee that the new generation of the Japanese supersport will cut in half the current emissions level, including noise level.
There’s no information about how the bike will look like, but if we take into account that Kawasaki has been making all their bikes as close as possible to the powerful ZX-10R Ninja, in terms of design the new Ninja 636 will surely be similar to its bigger sister.