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Owning an APE

K

Kiwi_rsvr

Joined Sep 2008
2K Posts | 0+
Shoeburyness, Essex
Okay, my tale's of trouble with the RSV are quite well known (I'm not exactly a shrinking violet), and yes they are expensive in terms of time, money & frustration.

I bought my APE after owning an R1 for 3 years , in those 3 years I spent quite a bit of money on it but never on a mechanical or electrical failure, I needed a change as I wanted to go back to a V-Twin and money was getting tight

To be perfectly honest I have never owned a bike that breaks so easily and so expensively, APE ownership is definately ruled by the heart and not the mind and quite possibly not a bike for those on a budget or a short temprement.

H O W E V E R

I never did enough research, never looked around and bought the first (well almost) APE I saw from a place 200 miles away from where I live.

For the 1st 3-4 weeks of ownership I did nearly a 1000 miles far more than I ever did on the R1 for an equivelant period of time, WHY well thats easy because it was such a joy to ride !!

The handling is superior to any other bike i've ridden (I am a fat ******* 17+ stone on a good day) the torque is thunderous when coming out of corners or just rolling on the throttle (I destroyed a back tyre just playing with the power on corner exits).

when it works it works bloody well and its one of a few bikes where the sum of the parts does indeed equal the whole.

PLEASE do not be put off by my vocal complaints about it being a "a piece of piggin ****" to me it always will be and I will always expect the worst, but that is JUST me and MY bike......................One bad apple dont spoil the bunch folks

Kiwi steps down wanders off and cant remember the last time he wrote so much...........The APE does that to you , passion, anger, pain, pleasure and rewards.
 
Hey Kiwi

Dont be disheartened, I keep thinking of all the money I spent on the wife and get frustrated to :) Nothing replaced, just general maintenence etc, lol.

I have had my MILLE for 1 1/2 years, in that time ridden around 3000klms, and spent over 2K on service, clutch, more clutch and other goodies.

I finally started toying with the suspension settings from the previous owner, and as such have seen the LIGHT (well the handling LIGHT). It is a dream to ride, and one ride displaces all previous (read "clutch") anomolies.

ENJOY, I am pretty sure we are all the same boat mate :)

Cheers Pete
 
It's just the way it goes unfortunately.

I'm lucky that both my aprilia's were new but my 2nd still ate it's electrics with 70 miles on the clocks and dumped acid over itself. Having never had a single issue with my first bike it was a bit of a test on my patience.

Owning S/H is often as good or bad as the treatment from the previous owner and partially out of your control. If they hammered the sprag how are you to know till it craps out.
If you follow your tale of woe it does follow maybe a logical pattern.

weak stator output causes batt to slowly die which means previous owner hammers sprag. You buy it and the batt gives up the ghost which reveals the sprag is toast. Once sorted that then reveals possibly the starting point of the whole thing and that's the stator going south. it's just a theory.

To sell it now would be selling it after the horse has bolted so to speak. It's done and sorted and now you know about sprags and batts and have new parts so unlikely to happen again. There are no other real nasties that commonly afflict the rsv so you have every liklehood of actually getting to ride it and not spend days in the garage having a swear up.

If you had been on my spanish tour and seen the grief we got from a Yamaha that ate 2 batts and 2 regulators in 5 days and 3 visits to dealers then it can put things in perspective. That yamaha came close to living out it's days at the bottom of a deep Pyrenees canyon.
Ohh forgot to mention it's shock dropped it's guts on a bumpy road as well so it was like a pogo stick for 2 days.
It's just the way it goes, sometimes you draw the short straw on a S/H purchase and have to put it down to experience.
 
Last edited:
Had mine for 2 and a half years, done the brown connectors mods and all thats gone was the oil pressure switch, touch wood

Mate of mine sold his R1 cos he had problems after problems, another mate sold his zx6r cos of all the problems, after a year decided he wanted another zx6r cos he liked them that much.....5 months later sold cos of problems with it, sensors kept packing up

Luck of the draw sometimes i think
 
Kiwi , good write up mate, you will forget all about it when the suns out and your mono wheelying down a private road and firing it out of corners, lets face it wht else can go wrong :eek:
 
rekon the servicing will be 'mind blowing' too.
Nah, I'l stick with my 6 year old RSV, ....that still weighs 4 kilos less than the new duke ..arf
 
I know how you feel.

Brought mine last year and within the first month of having the bike my rear break seized on, blown laster cylinder, New rear caliper, New Speedo sensor, Failed to start about three times, clutch drag and plus service.

Always fancied a mille but was put off because of the cost and having a TL1000R standard and hated it.
I did a little research into the cost of most common parts like clutch plates, tyres etc and all seemed to be not bad. when I say not bad I found clutch plates to be about the same as my old ZX9R until now when All I can see is the barnett clutches for sale. wow!

Almost forgot to mention the pain of not being able to wash the bike in the normal way :)

The thing that keeps me going is when the bike does start and im riding about its puts the biggest smile on my face. love the handling, the power. Everytime I stop I pray to the gods that the bike starts. At least I have AA cover now for the bike:)

It's a high maintance bike, yes but when you ride it well that goes out the window.

Fingers crossed most of the problems are all gone after this weekend. Going to do some wire mods (brown wire etc).

01 version next in Yellow :)
 
It's definitely in the hands of the previous owners, for a 2nd-hand Mille.

I had only one problem with my original Mille which was bought fairly blind, but which had been previously owned from new by someone who was apparently an Aprilia nut, so it was well looked after. The problem was caused by a well-intentioned mechanic putting a spreader washer on the sump plug, which is machined and not meant to have one.

In all that time, I never had any real starting issues as I replaced the battery anyway - maybe I was just lucky, but like everyone else on here, after riding my mate's RRY Blade which I found rather insipid, the Mille is a fantastic and rewarding riders bike.

When I bought my more recent bike, I made sure that it started as it should, and that there was plenty of receipts and history, cos buying 2nd-hand you ain't got a lot of comeback.
 
carbon kid said:
rekon the servicing will be 'mind blowing' too.
Nah, I'l stick with my 6 year old RSV, ....that still weighs 4 kilos less than the new duke ..arf
Click to expand...

mate of mine rode one 3000 miles across europe in under 2 weeks mid winter and it never missed a beat
 
ducati 1098/848 service interval 7500 miles.

Minor service £124 bigger service £327 at DP recommended prices.
The days of huge service costs has gone on new generation ducati's. 848 even has a wet clutch.
The warranty is also very well enforced with no reports of unwilling dealers.

Trawl the forums and you'll see they are pretty reliable. I know cos i looked myself. My 848 comes Saturday.
 
I can feel your woes, it seems like the previous owner wasn't very sympathetic with your bike, but all manufacturers have moments with bike reliability.
But as everyone has mentioned, all that goes away when you ride the ape :D
I have to say though, out of every bike I've ever owned my mille has been the most reliable bike I've ever owned, only thing that has really gone wrong was the starter solenoid packing up.
And to think all my mates took the piss out of me or buying an 'unreliable' italian bike, I do however remind them of this fact when their jap bikes won't work!!
 
Yeah

Listen go and have a look at a 2000 yr RSV and then have a look at a GSXR 1000 of the same age, in fact a ZX9r or R1.

The quality of finish is miles better on the APE.
 
:thumbup All good bud.I have one for.I got my 02 rsvr it 7000 miles on it.I got it from a dealer out here and went to pick it up it pissed oil out of the cases and took to the back the machanic tightend things up witch I thought they are suppose to do you know go through the thing,geuss not.ok get her home 100 miles away so nice smile all the way home .pull up to the house wife and kids love it.beuatiful yellow loud beast.put three thousand miles on it the spragg goes.now mind you no hard starts .if really fired up with no problem.drop it off to the dealer it was there for 6 months waiting for parts.what the hell I was soooo pissed three months of waiting I called them told them to keep the bike and bought a 636 05 nice bike but I missed the millie so much and being 6'4 the 636 was too small .anyways three months go by and the dealer called and said the bike is fixed and they did a complete seal job and batt and starter.well i talked with the wife the next day traded the kawi in and got her back and I now have 2500.miles on her and not a problem knock on wood.and in july could of bought a duck but came home with my 07 rsvr:inlove donnie
 
the latest used bike guide did a test against a 8yr old r1,fireblade and a gsxr, and the fireblade was the only one they could recommend as it still looked and felt fresh.

Unfortunatley, fireblades are the tampax of the biking world, every c***s had one, so do yourself a favour and get a mille, lol
 
Well it would seem we all understand what it takes to own and love your APE ... Im not going to lie as well. I've owned or know someone that owns nearly every company of bike. And I must say, i sometimes keep some of the small things from them when we all speak of the expense of owning our bikes. But I must say .... I would not ride any other bike if you asked me which one I would take if i could only take one to ride a winding expressway if that were my purgatory. We all can agree aside from its low dependability on staying off the injured reserve list when everyone gets together for a big bike ride. There is no other bike I have ever ridden or owned, that when all of the group is going into that twisting on-ramp that says "ramp 25mph" at over 70, would give me the confidence that this bike does. Hands Down!
 
whitetrash said:
mate of mine rode one 3000 miles across europe in under 2 weeks mid winter and it never missed a beat
Click to expand...

There's nothing wrong with the reliability of Aprilias - I did approx 2500 miles in 6 days on mine the year before last. The only issue that we had was with the Blackbird that accompanied the 3 Aprilias! :nana
 
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