Boyhood dream come true... Ever since the purchase of my Aprilia RS50 in 2005 as a 16 year old, the desire for an RSV has been great. As a 16 year old far beyond my capabilities offcourse, but all those years I always kept looking what was for sale on the second hand market.

Meanwhile i've always had bikes but never came to purchasing an RSV. 
My bike history:
-2004 Aprilia RS50
-2000 Cagiva Mito 125
-1980 Suzuki GSX 750
-1996 Kawasaki GPX600R
-2012 BMW F800R

-2015 BMW S1000R
-2021 Ducati Streetfighter V4S

Si I've had and still have much more modern motorcycles with superlative performance, but the desires resurfaced for such an RSV, the illustrious motorcycle from my childhood. Once I saw one driving on down the street and that was enough to convince me to get one for myself. So a few months ago I occasionally looked at what was coming up for sale, I had a few color schemes that I could live with, preferably one with a full history and low mileage of course.

A few weeks ago found this one and immediately jumped on the phone, did short test drive, agreed price and immediately taken. Et voila here it is....

Replaced the indicatorlenses, they were all faded. Gave the bike a proper detail and polish.

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Sorry pics didn't seem to work.

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Oh en de nummerplaat is ook aangevraagd.

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sorry, it mean i requested a numberplate.

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Took the wheels out, need to fit new tyres

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new Pirelli rosso corsa 4's ready to be fitted

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Definitely one of the best colour schemes 

Classy and understated compared with the glaring,in yer face,shell suit graphics they usually throw up

some extra carbon pieces and the numberplate arrived ;)

Just ride it around, I only do trackday on 4 wheels. 

Got new sprockets and chain to fit to the bike.

Unfortunately you missed a trick with the gearing,should have dropped to 15 front and up to 42 rear

Way overgeared as supplied

I don't mind the OE gearing, i'm not really in it for the performance anyway.

no, stop it hahaha, get it on track.

car trackdays are like watching paint dry.

Set of Teflon washers can assist keep muck at bay but better than that they prevent side plate rub! 

It depends on car/track/weather. I've got a pretty quick car and some skills to match. 

I've never really explored the limits of a motorcycle on a racetrack, i'd like to do it but not with this thing, i'd be a shame to drop it in a gravel trap.

wigginsjp wrote: Whilst you’re down with the swingarm ensure you strip and degrease the dog bone link and the swingarm bearing set also. If it is the rubbish oem rubber and steel seals get the later updated ones too.  Set of Teflon washers can assist keep muck at bay but better than that they prevent side plate rub!

car track days in comparison to bike trackdays are kinda like the beginner tutorial. 

if your scared your going to drop it on a track id be 10x more worried that you would drop it on the road. riding on a track is a lot easier that riding around on the road with all of the hazards are car driving prats about.

100% agree however a " less pretty " bike for track is the way to go mainly for the loading and unloading always picking up the odd mark and scuff  the van 

I meant it would be a shame to drop this bike, it's to mint to go flog it around a track. 

I'd rather then buy something like an R6 to track. Tracking a bike is just more dangerous so offcourse more adrenaline is involved...I've got a collegue that does it on a regular basis and he's broken bones on several occasions. I guess that could also happen with cars but it's a lot less likely. I'd like to do it at some point, but not with these bikes.

Also, realisticly I can't do everything in life. I work a 40h/week job + do some work at home on motorcycles, cars, bicycles + have hobbies like these and cycling + still finishing up my house. There's only so much you can do or have energy/money for. 

relegated to going to get coffee once a month.

but as you said time energy etc i understand that i have been flat out and only done one track in the last 4 months, made me realize that the 1.2 has to go though.

but anyway im being a dick taking it off topic, lovely bike mate. you sticking with the current cans?

So orderd a brandnew set and replaced the bolts for the bar ends aswell, eventually replaced the bar ends aswell.
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fitted:
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Some titanium nuts and bolts to finish it up nicely

Also did the front as not all pistons moved at the same rate, one side example:
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Probably sticking with these, unless i find some hexagon akrapovic ones. These have a nice sound and look to them. Might remove the decal though.

No not really, it just enjoy it for what it is. 

Fitted the tires and balanced the wheels, brake calipers refitted and bled. The titanium nuts and bolts give it a nice finishing touch. 

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Brembo, öhlins, Pirelli en titanium bouten/moeren  
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Back on 2 wheels
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yes i've noticed Ti aren't magnetic, even stainless ones don't work. So back to original bolts unfortunately.

I've put titanium nuts on the sprocket, yes.

Did a first ride, had a few issues(such as speedo not working due to Ti bolts) but nothing major.

Needed to fix:
-clutchfluidreservoir leaking, order a new one
-brakes not that good -> need rebleeding (forgot to bleed the mastercylinder)
-Speedo not working due to Ti bolts -> swap back to OEM after trying stainless ones.

to be honest I really like it.

The seating position is no problem for me, i would like some tank grips though so i'm ordering those pretty soon. The seat itself is quite hard and that's a bit of a suprise having ridden other Aprilia.

Engine has got plenty of torque from low down and in the midrange, it responds well to throttle inputs. The top end isn't amazing compared to a Duc V4 but that's what I expected so no complaints. The gearbox is great, better then my Ducati actually, it's nice and crisp. Shame there's no quickshifter but I don't ride it to win races so I don't mind using the clutch. The clutch is pretty good aswell, I've read people have trouble finding neutral at traffic lights but i've not come across that issue. I really like the exhaust note aswell. Not sure what the fuell economy is just yet, haven't ridden it enough.

Suspension is pretty good after I set it up for my "skills" it's not harsh, the damping is very nice. It's stable in corners but a bit lazy going side to side. I'd love to get some factory forged wheels for it. I haven't pushed the limits on this bike yet, but the tires feel good. The reason i've not been giving it the been are the brakes.

Brakes are OK at the moment, the hyrdaulic pressure is fine but the bite and stopping power isn't good enough. I figured it's those old brake pads, i've got new SBS sintered ones arriving next week.

Anything i've missed?

Probably more noticeable side to side on track though.

190/55 for me as well

And so would Aprilia if that profile had been available when they were current I feel.

Turns as quick as a 180 but with a bigger contact patch.

I just swapped boots on my Mille and the first corner I got to I almost laid the bike down it turned in so quickly

Luckily it was a left/right complex so I was already counter steering for the next one.

It turns out the scrub I fitted in a hurry the last time I tracked it was an 180/55 and I hadn't picked up on the slower steering as the track was new to me and I just adapted and slowed for the final day,the proper size tyre bought the handling back to what it should have been.

It definitely DOES make a difference,especially if you have your suspension dialled in.

Most suspension specialists like Maxton etc will ask you your weight,what type of riding you do and what make,profile of tyre you use before putting in a base setting as it matters that much.

While I'm sure it's been corrected by now there were instances of aftermarket pins with inadequate or non existent hardening doing the rounds. 

If the file does anything other than skate harmlessly off then don't bother fitting it

If they're genuine Aprilia parts that came in sealed Aprilia bags then no need to bother as they'll be correctly hardened and tempered otherwise always check just to be sure.

This is one instance where I'd always now go for genuine parts having suffered from having to do the job twice.

That also goes for the full complement bearings rather than the often seen caged variety commonly fitted instead.

Always better to err on the side of caution.  Otherwise ,well impressed

can't just reuse the OE ones that are in it? Or are the bearings a different inside diameter?

I’ve had the same painful experience Ian is describing on three occasions, so I only now go oem for the bearings and bushes along with the upgraded nitrile seals. 

That being said i did put a Racetorx one on my gen2 and it now lives on my Tuono V4. 

There are a third option available bearing wise I believe that is the best of all options but I'm not sure now where they're from,these are full complement rollers but have a shape like a rolling pin if you will and the cage has rolled returns on the ends so keeping them all captive.

From an engineering perspective the more rollers the better as given the very small arc of movement the surface loadings are only ever put on small number of rollers and so are correspondingly higher than they would be for a fulling rotating bearing,hence the need for a properly hardened and tempered pin to take the loads.

This is what happens after a couple of hundred miles otherwise

so this kit from apworkshops isn't any good?

it’s all been sorted stop scare mongering 

on that thread regarding dogbone bearings  it even mentions Griff found out a bad batch had been supplied and offered to replace it all

go ahead and buy the kit from AP workshops there are no issues 

That's great to hear as I've already purchased this kit  and waited over a month for them thanks to our wonderfull customs office. 

That's NOT what I said

I also said 'I'm sure it's been sorted by now '

 I was under the misapprehension that the bad batch were aftermarket when it seems they were in fact OE and who knows how many are still in circulation world wide

My sincere apologies to Griff and those I misled. 

Although I shouldn't really be shocked as OE ( bought in parts) as well as manufacturers offerings are sometimes found to be defective or out of tolerance when supplied these days, probably due to increased automation and the less than 100% inspection regime now common in the manufacturing industry.

I well know the temptation to sneak in an out of tolerance part when deadlines loom,and so did all of my past  employers,fortunately any of our Nuclear and Defence related parts affected were picked up by the customers stringent goods inwards inspection and the whole batch was returned before acceptance so there was a safety net,but we certainly did it knowingly.

 I was also aware Griff was standing on his reputation and replacing any defective parts     however in my case as I'd long since thrown any receipts I decided it was my fault as I should have known the part was defective just by looking at it.

I've spent my working life manufacturing precision parts many of which are heat treated during their creation and should have tested it. My bad.

As the ghetto test of almost all hardened and tempered parts it's ALWAYS worth doing the file test if you have a sharp file.

That's even with an OE part,because as we've already seen,mistakes can happen at source,nobody's perfect and it's a PITA when you find out too late.

Regarding bearing design types and surface loading all 3 types should be well within operating parameters for our stated use as long as the bearing pin is of sufficient hardness,

I decided to go back to OE spec before I discovered the 3rd type, although the ' uprated ' caged ones I had already fitted would probably still been serviceable with just a new pin to bear on.

End of apology/sermon

That made me remember a past incident many years ago when I was fulfilling an order sub contracted down to us from the American D.O.D.   It was for a full suite of tooling for the new H.U.D. and F.L.I.R on one of the blocks of F16 Viper fighters then being upgraded with the latest equipment our customer was supplying.

We were well behind on the jobs and it was coming up to the last day of panicking from our customer as the yanks were getting anxious and putting pressure on them and we were still not finished machining let alone sending all the tooling out for anodizing.

My employers solution........... They'll never know the difference

He went down to Halfrauds and bought up every case of matt black paint they had while I finished the machining,he then  spent most of the evening covering everything in sight with the stuff,the floors,saw-horses,everything was covered in it,no mask either. Fool.  even decades later there are still traces of it on the walls and floor.

As our tooling work traditionally bypassed the goods inward inspection and as it due to be on a plane stateside before we actually delivered,the whole lot was just wrapped and flown off without anyone this end looking at it.

Never did hear any more about it but I used to wonder what the Yanks thought of our anodizing.

He was also the only person I ever heard of causing a VAT inspector doing on onsite,in depth evaluation to just pack up and leave within a couple of hours. 

 

-air filter
-spark plugs
-coolant (motul motocool hybrid tech)
-Brake pads f&r SBS sintered

Having praised SBS I'll admit I've never tried their street sintered offerings as I've always fitted their race sintered and they're awesome road or track.

That's only the front though as I think they don't do the rear in race material?    From that understanding I've just fitted a set of SBS Race Carbon in the rear of my Tuono to see how that works out,if it needs too much pre heating to work properly it was still worth it as an experiment.