2021 Aprilia RSV4 & Factory Full Revealed!

When Aprilia first announced the new RSV4 Factory, a lot of people didn’t like the Lava Red colour. Well if you didn’t, you are in luck as there are two different colours.

The standard RSV4 only comes in one colour, Dark Losail or as I like to call it, grey. Personally I think it looks fantastic. The grey looks great and the red accents on the wings, front fairing and tail add some highlights. In typical Aprilia fashion, they’ve also thrown in the Italian flag, but it’s done in a subtle way that I like.

The Factory is coming in two colours. We have the already announced Lava Red, which is a 1990’s RS250 throwback colour. I’d honestly just call it purple! And the other colour is, Aprilia Black. Well, they say black, but it has a lot of red. And it looks good. What you are getting it a mostly black bike with the same red highlights as the grey RSV4, but then the front fairing has a ton of red, there’s a bright red seat, three red strips on the tank and some more red on the belly pan to keep up with the theme. I can almost guarantee that a fair few people won’t like the bright red seat. I’d say this will be the most popular colour of the two Factory options.

The Lava Red has all the same red highlights as the Black bike, but also has the purple on the tank, tail and upper fairing. Personally, if I was to choose one, I’d go the purple, just because it’s a bit different. Which colour do you all prefer? Let me know in the comments.

The bike as a package looks like a cross between the new RS660 and the current RSV4. It has extremely similar head lights to the 660 along with DRL’s. It also has the bending lights feature that works in conjunction with the IMU. So when go around corners, the IMU tells the inside light to turn on so you can see through the corner.

The integrated winglets are very fascinating and are quite a bit different to the RS660. Aprilia state they divert airflow away from the rider and help cool the engine. If we look closely you can also see three slits on side of the bike that also help with air flow.

Besides the fairing, probably the biggest change on the bike is the swing arm. The swing arm was very divisive when the bike was revealed. Personally I think it looks fine, I mean it isn’t ugly and if it improves performance, I’m all for it. What is interesting is it isn’t symmetrical. If we look at the exhaust side it has kind of three sided shaped hole, but then we jump over to the drive chain side and its solid piece that divides on the underside for the chain to go through. It’s actually pretty trick.

Now we have some more angles, the seat is definitely a different shape. It’s longer and much more sculpted. You can see just from photos that the rider triangle is going to less aggressive than the current and previous models. To me, I’m all for a more comfortable riding position. I mean, it’s still aggressive AF, just slightly less so.

We have our first look at the dash and handle bar layout. The factory bike in particular with the Ohlins semi-active forks looks impressive. The dash looks big and clear too. The top triple clamp is badass too with 1100 Factory etched into it. Unfortunately we don’t have a photo of the standard RSV4 dash, but you know it won’t say 1100 Factory and there won’t be electronic plugs coming out of the forks like something out of the Matrix.

A couple of other things about the fairing, the tail is a different shape and the belly pan has been redesigned too. I’ll tell you this; you would NOT want to crash this thing. The fairing looks quite intricate and would definitely cost a pretty penny to replace.

I like the licence plate bracket, its inoffensive and should be easy to swap out for a tail tidy and the rear pegs look easy to get off too.

One thing that is surprising in a good way, the exhaust is normal sized. I thought with Euro 5 compliance it would be some monstrosity, but I think it’s smaller than the last model. Or maybe they’ve just shaped it in a really clever way. In any case, I’d be ripping it straight off and putting on a boisterous (and lighter) aftermarket can.

Specs wise, Aprilia haven’t really given us any new information. The RSV4 comes with Brembo’s all round, a total of 6 riding modes, three of which are adjustable and Pirelli Supercorsas. I can confirm that the Factory comes with forged aluminium rims, Ohlins Smart EC 2.0 semi –active suspension and Brembo Stylema brake calipers.

So there we have it, the redesigned RSV4 in the flesh. Is it just me or does the grey look the best? I mean they all look nice. I will say the Lava Red (purple) definitely has the most wow factor. Alright that’s it from me, keep it OnTheBackWheel people.