Aprilia Tuono 660 patent images filed

WHILE the Aprilia test riders are busy putting some miles on the new RS660 sports bike, the team in the design office has been busy getting the final shape of its naked sibling approved by the Italian patent office.

The image above is proof (not that it was really needed) that a scaled-down version of the Tuono V4 is definitely incoming. What’s more, if the timeline of events during the development of the RS660 are anything to go by, it won’t be long before the new machine is spotted on the road.

The patent image also shows that Aprilia has done little to the design of the concept we saw at the EICMA show in Milan last year. Everything is pretty much as the original was then, including the double skin fairing that seems to act as a kind of a spoiler, cleaning up the airflow.

When is the Aprilia Tuono 660 going on sale?

If the timeline of development around the RS660 is anything to go by, it won’t be long before the test riders from Noale will be getting spotted out testing the new bike on the roads. It was February 2020 when the official patent images for that bike landed on websites around the world, with the first spy shots from on the road appearing around early April. If the same schedule is used for the Tuono 660, we should have photos from road tests in the autumn or winter this year.

It isn’t clear when the Tuono will get officially launched, although with Intermot cancelled and EICMA hanging in the balance, the opportunity for flashy, big-budget launches is getting slimmer and slimmer. Italian website Motociclismo reports that the communication regarding the new model will be communicated next autumn, although to us that sounds a fair way away.