Mv Agusta F4 1000 Tamburini
MV Agusta F4 1000 Tamburini
CYCLE WORLD TEST
If the designer put his name on it, it must be good
MARK HOYER
SET ASIDE NORMAL CONCERNS. DISREGARD YOUR FINANCIAL status, ignore yOUr personal comfort, forget about your future goals and sacrifice your retirement. You must have this motorcycle.
Are we kidding? Yes.
But only a little. There is a lot you can buy for $42,695. None of it is as beautiful or exciting as the MV Agusta F4 1000 Tamburini, a very special, limited-production version of the F4 1000 S, which itself already is a very special, limited-production motorcycle. Parent company Cagiva will no doubt make as many standard F4 I 000s as can be sold, but only 300 Tamburinis will hit the roads of the world., with 59 coming stateside. If you want one, pick up the phone now. You may already be too late.
Vs~e who have been fortunate enough to ride this bike have seriously considered opening our wallets and busy ing Cagi~a USA phone lines. Because not only is this bike exceptionally fine to look at. it is awesome to ride.
Named for MV design chief Massimo Tamburini, this bike is what the most exotic Birnotas should have been, and per haps it really is the truest expression of what Tamburini (the ta~' on the end of `Bimo") was trying to do back in the old days. Or maybe it is the natural evolution of his last great work, the Ducati 916. You may have heard of that one. Whatever the case, this bike that bears his name is, according to Tamburini as quoted in the brochure, "My dream. Mv bike."
Mr. T, head of the Cagiva Research Center that acts as MV's design house. continues: "The dream of every design engineer is to come up with the most beautiful sports motor cycle in the world, then turn it into the fastest, most exclu si~e, sought-after and powertiil on the market."
Few wouid argue its beauty. And even if you never rode the Tamburini, looking at it might be enough. Gold-toned mesh covers fairing vent hoIe~. while forged-aluminum wheels are gold-anod i/ed to continue the theme, just as with the sixpiston billet Nissin front brake calipers. The low-friction tita nium-nitride coating on the 50mm Marzocchi inverted fork
sliders jives nicely with the gold-anodized uppers. Aside from the fuel tank, which is steel, the Tamburini's bodywork is nearly all carbon-fiber, finished to a very high standard. A nice touch is the F4 and CRC logo work on the fairing sides that lets the c-f weave "peek" through the high-gloss paint. Who needs decals when the underlying material itself is so nice you simply leave paint off?
"Man, that bike looks good backlit," remarked one staffer as the sun set behind the MV, to which another replied, "That's because it makes its own 1i~ht."
Despite the pleasing shapes into which they are formed, the materials themselves have intrinsic appeal. Take the mag nesium swingarm, frame sideplates and lower triple-clamp, or the TIG-welded chrome-moly trellis upper frame, the aforementioned carbon-fiber bodywork and machined billet aluminum pieces sprinkled around the bike. Net weight loss from use of these fine materials is 18 pounds, for a 428pound dry weight.
The Alcantara (suede-like) seat is in an appropriate brick-red hue, and when your ass isn't smiling broadly from the thrilling riding experience, it will hate you for putting it in this seat. No, comfort wasn't part of Massimo's dream, nor should it have been. There is no doubt this is one serious performance motorcycle. The boss even yelped when he hopped on for his first ride. The seat is high at 32.4 inches, the clip-ons low, and even though the billet footpegs have a very trick eccentric height adjustment, they go only from high to higher, in infinite increments. The mirrors are not of much use. We can hear you tearing up your check now...
Certain people may need never to suffer the pleasure of riding, for the Tamburini is gorgeous enough at a standstill that they may be willing to buy, simply to be able look at it at their leisure.
But the real art is on the road, unfolding beautifully at speed.
This was somewhat of a surprise. To be honest, while we didn't expect disappointment, riding experience with "super-premium" sportbikes of the past has taught us to temper our enthusiasm. Honda's exotic and expensive RC45 felt special to ride and had some excellent qualities, but its performance in street trim wasn't particularly remark able. The same went for the Yamaha YZF-R7 superbike homologation special. Race-kit parts were the only way to unleash the true glory and potential, but good luck having the required racing résumé or enough money to get them. Bimotas were always wonderful, but in our last full test of the Suzuki GSX-R1 100-powered DB6 in 1996, we essen tially called it a $23,000 kit bike, and that's exactly what it was.
What is so great about the Tamburini is that it is a finished motor cycle. There are no rough edges that need smoothing, no special parts for sale only to racers to uncork some hidden potential. It's got all the fancy bits, right out of the box. And even the box is fancy, a special reusable shipping crate that can be easily broken down and stored. Also included are a rear work stand, bike cover, ner workshop handgrip coy ers (don't want any greasy fingerprints), and a num bered certificate of authenticity signed by Tamburini him self. Additionally, there are race-only "RG3" stainless-steel silencers, a titanium mid-pipe and ECU chip. These latter pieces were naturally already installed on our testbike. We have come to expect nothing less from Italian companies. Despite being billed as racing parts, the quad-tip silencers have a mellow, good sound and are not overly loud. Fuel delivery from the reprogrammed chip is excellent, the best we've experience with an MV. There is a slight "fluffiness" just off idle, particularly when conditions are very hot, but other than that, this engine runs beautifully. Under most conditions, the fourvalve-per-cylinder 996cc powerplant usually just “turns on,” as in lights after the crankshaft has hardly twitched a rotational degree.
The bottom end is the same as the 1000 S right down to the transmission gear ratios, while the cylinder head has hand-finished ports to ensure excellent flow. Valve sizes are unchanged, while intake and exhaust camshafts have more lift and duration than those of the 1000 S. The compression ratio is bumped a point to 13.0:1. But what truly sets the Tamburini’s engine apart is the manipulation it undergoes to improve both peak power and rideablility. The so-called Torque Shift System uses dual-mode intake runners to broaden torque and increase top-end power on acceleration (see sidebar), while the Engine Braking System controls the engine on overrun.
The latter works through an ostensibly simple air bleed on the engine side of the number 2 cylinder’s throttle butterfly. The ECU controls an air valve and also delivers a small amount of fuel via the standard injector on deceleration that gives the engine a throaty, staccato growl when you chop the throttle and provides just enough horsepower to overcome a significant portion of the engine and drivetrain’s internal friction and high compression. And while this technique does sound pretty simple, how well it works hints to some refined programming. Its function is better than a slipper clutch and stability while using the excellent brakes is superb. Even in normal street riding there are benefits-when you roll off the throttle, the front end doesn’t load as much in comers, keeping steering light and neutral. At the same time, there is “enough” engine braking, and the system works so transparently that the bike never feels like it is freewheeling.
The TSS worked similarly well. Torque delivery and bottom-end power is excellent, while peak output on the CW dyno was an impressive 154.4 horsepower, 3 more than the 1000 S. The 78 foot-pound peak torque was down 3 ft.-lbs., although the curve is more broad and peak comes 500 rpm sooner. Dragstrip testing conducted in extremely hot weather yielded a 10.22-second run with an excellent terminal speed of 142 mph. Road Test Editor Don Canet thought the E.T. could have been better, but there was some clutch slip in first gear, likely a result of the hard early life we gave the bike-see the “Mission Mile” sidebar for our lovingly conducted breakin procedure... Top-gear roll-on numbers were exceptional.
An interesting side note: Acceleration wanes as the revs pass through 9000 rpm, then the engine comes alive again at 10,250 rpm. Testers felt this on the road, and the dyno revealed the transition during runs. Makes perfect sense, because the TSS intake horns lift at 10,000 revs, confirmed Ingenere Andrea Goggi, chief engine man at the factory whose previous experience includes working on Cagiva’s 500cc two-stroke Grand Prix racebikes in the late ’80s and early ’90s. “Goggi is the one who puts the valves in the heart that powers MV Agustas,” said a company rep. He’s probably also the one who ensured that the six-speed cassette gearbox shifts like that of a lovingly prepared racebike. As for the chassis, the Tamburini has the heartening stability of the best Ducatis, but with a nimble ease in direction changes that no Bologna bike can match. Feedback is unparalleled, and the adjustable
Öhlins steering damper hardly seems necessary. Other than cranking it up as a security blanket during the 179mph top speed runs, we kept it at the minimum setting.
Damping rates front and rear are what you would expect, as in firm. The suspension is fully adjustable, and even more fully adjustable than usual: The rear Sachs shock features highand low-speed compression and rebound damping screws with numbered indexing for ease of use. Rear-spring preload features a threaded adjuster. Really, the only fault we can find with the spec is that the shock uses a steel spring rather than one of titanium...
Other than this egregious oversight, the Tamburini is quite successful as an overall package-there are brief moments when the bike is leaned far over and you are rolling on the gas at 7000 rpm that $40K doesn’t seem an unreasonable price to pay.
So white aYZF-R1 is more plush, a ZX-1OR more brutal, a CBR1000RR more polished and a 999 more visceral, the Tamburim brings more of each of these elements to the table in one highly integrated, purposefuI~yet-beautiful package.
Sure, you could almost buy all four of those bikes for the price of the MV, but it wouldn't be nearly as convenient. This is serious money for a motorcycle, yes, but the Tamburini excels in both performance and aesthetic terms
in the same way that Ferraris do. The differ ence is that there are a lot more motorcycle enthu
siasts who can afford this MV than car crazies who could make the $650,000 nut on an Enzo, the finest Ferrari. Of course, you should factor into the Tamburini's purchase price the cost of building a museum-quality garage in which to showcase it. Just promise you'll never leave the bike parked for very long.
MV TAMBURINI
$42,695
