Italy Steals the Show
ITALY STEALS THE SHOW
ROUNDUP
NEVER MIND THE AMERIcan buying public’s infatuation with feetforward cruisers, for the rest of the world, rearsets are in. And if the recent Milan Show was any indication, 1998 will be the Year of the Sportbike.
Undisputed star of the show was Cagiva’s long-awaited F4 superbike, which debuted with the name of the most revered Italian marque of all on its flanks: MV Agusta. Cagiva boss Claudio Castiglioni purchased the rights to the MV name some time ago, and what better way to revive the marque than in the company of Count Rocco Agusta and racing legend Giacomo Agostini (who won 13 world titles with MV) at Italy’s largest bike show? The F4 project began some seven years ago with an engine designed by Ferrari. Since then, Cagiva’s engineering team has continued to refine the liquidcooled, dohc inline-Four to the point that it now produces a claimed 126 horsepower at 12,200 rpm, good for a claimed top speed of 171 mph. Fed by a Weber-Marelli fuel-injection system boasting one 47mm injector per cylinder, the vastly oversquare engine measures 73.8 x 43.8mm for
degree V-Twin developed by Austrian company Rotax.
Chosen to minimize the overall length of the engine, the narrow Vee angle posed a potential vibration problem that the development team resolved by fitting twin balance shafts, one in the crankcase and the other in the rear cylinder head. Another a displacement of 749cc, with the four valves per cylinder arranged radially.
Looking at photos of the F4, it’s impossible not to be awestruck by its many trick details. Witness the twin stacked headlamps in the MV trademark red-and-silver fairing (itself patterned after Cagiva’s 500cc GP racers); the modular tubularsteel/cast-alloy chassis with single-sided swingarm; and, most notably, the four exhausts exiting in organ-pipe fashion under the seat. Not visible is the GPspec extractable six-speed gearbox and 916-style adjustable steering head.
In building the 396-pound bike, Castiglioni and company scoured the globe to select the highest-quality components: Nissin six-piston calipers,
Showa 49mm inverted fork,
Öhlins shock, etc. Only 200 of the individually numbered $28,000 bikes will be built initially, with production slated to begin in April, 1998.
Slightly less eye-catching, but no less significant, was the first-ever large-displacement sportbike from Aprilia.
I Called the RSV Mille (the Italian word for “one thousand,” denoting its displacement), the new bike is powered by a liquidcooled, dry-sump, dohc, 60familiar shortcoming of V-Twins is rear-wheel hop caused by massive engine braking, and the engineers got around this by developing a system that uses fluctuations in intake-tract vacuum to vary clutch-spring pressure.
Measuring 97.0 x 67.5mm, the RSV’s 998cc engine utilizes two sparkplugs and four valves per cylinder, with its camshafts driven by a hybrid chain/gear setup similar to that of Suzuki’s TL 1000. An electronic fuelinjection system with 51mm throttle bodies helps the big Twin produce a claimed 128 horsepower at 9250 rpm.
In contrast to its engine, the 416pound April ia’s chassis is fairly commonplace, with an aluminum twin-spar frame and arched swingarm, plus standard-issue Showa suspension and Brembo brakes. Remarkable components include the threein-one headlamps, on-board laptimer and adjustable shift light. No word on when the bike might come to the U.S., but it is expected to sell for the equivalent of $ 17,000 in Italy.
Another noteworthy sportTwin was the revamped Ducati 900SS, now known as the 900FE (for “Final Edition”). Cloaked in a stylish new fairing penned by Supermono designer Pierre Terblanche, the air-cooled 904cc V-Twin now boasts Weber-Marelli fuel injection, a few more horsepower and a revalved Showa shock.
Last but not least, Moto Guzzi showed one new model called the V11 Sport. Sort of a cross between the old 1100 Sport and the semi-new VIO Centauro, the V11 is powered by the latest version of Guzzi’s venerable longitudinal-crankshaft pushrod V-Twin, with fuel injection and a six-speed transmission.
Guess you could say that Milan ’98 was worth the wait.
Brian Catterson
