Aprilia have created a new kind of sportsbike with its new RS660! | MCN Reviews

Welcome to MCN. Now I have been riding Aprilia's new RS 660 at its world launch in Italy. It's eagerly awaited and it has been worth the wait and it's very very different. So in a nutshell it's a cross between a super sport bike like an R6 or a ZX6 or an F3 675. It's got that kind of character, that kind of edge to it, that kind of excitement and a softer sports bike. Something like a Ducati Super Sport, Honda CBR650R, Ninja 650. It's kind of a bit like them because it's got a similar kind of riding position and it's not too brutal and over the top. And the thing that's happened in recent years is sports bike sales have gone down the pan and the reason for that is they're getting faster, they're getting more extreme and they're getting more expensive and they've kind of priced themselves out the game. So the idea of the RS660 is that it's affordable even though it's not quite as cheap as we'd hoped. As we speak now it's autumn 2020, it's just over £10,000. So we thought it'd be a little bit cheaper but when you actually sort of dig down and see what it's got it's really good value for money. So it's kind of affordable and it's exciting and fun and it's not too brutal or intimidating and it's quite friendly to ride. So at its heart is a brand new parallel twin 660 engine which is actually the front slice of an RSV4 V4 1100 engine and it keeps all its really nice racy bits inside. So it's quite a race bred engine, it's quite a performance orientated engine, 99bhp which if you're a hardcore sports bike fan you might not think is a lot but it only weighs 183 kilos wet so it doesn't need a lot of power to push it along. And the bike is retuned, it's got different cylinder heads, it's got variable inlet trumpets and so it's got a lot of torque, actually makes something like 80% of its torque down around 4000rpm and 90% around 6000rpm. So you've got a lot of power at normal road speeds and that's what makes the bike so interesting. Unlike a super sport bike or a super bike all the powers at top and when you're riding it around on normal speeds on the road away from a racetrack there's not really a lot there to excite you. You've got to go silly speeds to get your fun. So you've got a lot of torque and the engine character, it's a parallel twin, they're not normally the most exciting engines in the world but they're kind of they're coming of age really now. You know you've got them in the MT07 and you've got it in the Duke 890R and this is a 270 degree parallel twin so it sounds really rawty. It's a bit moto 3 like quite droney at low revs but then the more you give it the more it kind of turns into a hard-edged 90 degree v-twin and it's actually got really good acceleration. It's enough acceleration that when you turn the wheelie control off you can easily pop up the second gear wheelie. So you know for the hardcore sports bike fans it's got teeth, it's got guts and it's got excitement but it's not always trying to ride you. You know once you get past 100 mile an hour I guess it will start to fizzle out. I reckon it probably do 140 if you you know just stayed under the fairing and kept it pinned but this bike is all about the fun you can have at normal speeds and keeping up momentum. So handling wise this bike is brought to you by the same people that created the RSV4 1100 battery, amazing handling bike. The Tuono V4 1100 factory again superb handling and this has kind of got the same character but again it's tuned for the road so the chassis isn't quite as stiff so there's loads of feel and it hasn't got the best of the best suspension and brakes but I suppose they need somewhere for it to go for a factory version in the future but the suspension is really controlled the brakes are really powerful actually probably better than any Japanese superbike and you've got really good grip from Pirelli Rosso Corsa 2 tyres which are kind of semi-track semi-road and compound and the bike yes it's just it does everything you want it promotes confidence it's easy to ride you carry lots of corner speed on it have a lot of fun at road speeds which like I said is what this is all about. So that's what makes the Aprilia sporty as well as well as its designer labels as well it's got loads of electronics which we'll come on to in a minute and also it looks the part you know sometimes with some of the softer sports bikes you look around them and they haven't got the best of the best equipment but you know it's got cruise control you've got lean sensitive cornering headlights you've got self-canceling indicators you've got everything really there to make a really nice road bike as well as a nice sports bike and then we come on to those electronics so it's powered by a new ECU which is more powerful than even the Tuono's and the RSV4 so it's a new generation ECU and it basically lets everything it controls everything really from the throttle response to the mapping to the rider aids and all the rest of it so it's very very advanced. It's got an up and down quick shifter as well which is really beautiful to use for short shifting and hammering through the gears. You've got three rider modes you've got two kind of set rider modes and then you've got a customizable one which you can change the amount of engine power, engine braking control, wheelie control, ABS, everything. To be honest on a bike with modest power like this with a lot of grip you probably don't need any of that it's probably overkill and some might argue that you're paying extra for those electronics which you probably are but probably not as much as you think and really they never get in the way it's a no-brainer having them because you know if you're riding in bad conditions then you'll be really grateful of just knocking the power down a little bit making the bike more docile making it a bit safer but the fundamental thing is that for riders coming up the ladder and to 600 from 125s and 300s and 400s or whatever it's nice to have that option to make the bike softer just so you can kind of you know feel your way in to your sports bike journey and to be honest after that you don't you don't really need to go any higher I mean for the days riding that we had up in the mountain roads of the Dolomites I never once wished I was on a super bike or a super sport bike because I had all the power I needed all the braking all the handling all the grip and I was comfortable and it was really really good fun. So we talked about what makes it sporty we've talked about what makes it calm the other big question is is it worth it so like I say it's over 10,000 pounds I'd say 100% yes you know it is a is a parallel twin cylinder engine which you could say is a lot more expensive than the Ninja but it's a different animal altogether it's also much sportier than the Honda and and much more involving much more exciting than a Ducati and it's much cheaper than the R6 it's much cheaper than any super bike so I would say it's definitely worth it it's a lot of bike for the money and then is there anything wrong with it well you know we're a picky bunch and there are a tiny few little things so for example the left switch gear block is massive it looks really ugly really in a sort of a sea of elegance and the the flasher switch it's really close to your left finger when you're using the clutch and that comes on every now and then but they're minor minor things also during the launch we were riding pre-production bikes and they had a problem starting sometimes not a major problem but it would take five or six seconds to start instead of straight on the button and I think that was causing some engine lights to come on but pretty say that these are just software glitches of these pre-production bikes and they'll all be sorted by the time the bikes hit showrooms which I think is November 2020. So in summary this is a bike that's going to really appeal to sports bike riders because it's fast it's exciting it's involving and it's got all the right bits it just looks right it looks beautiful but it's also going to be appealing to newer riders coming up and also for sports bike riders who are probably you know a little bit fed up with riding around with their knees around their ears and having sore wrists and sore backs and kind of deep down knowing that 200 horsepower really is a bit of a waste of time on the road. So you know the Aprilia is unique I think a lot of manufacturers have tried to create a bike like this and never really have and if this is the start of a new generation of 660s for Aprilia this engine is going to go in the Tuono at the beginning of 2021 and a Touareg Adventure bike as well so it's good times for Aprilia and it's it's really exciting to ride the RS660 and I think it's going to do really really well.