V2 V2 Bayliss Yay Or Nay

in order of importance:

1) the heat, easily ran 20% hotter than a 959 and was unusable in temps over 25 degrees. Even if you watch the 44t review video back, he mentions it’s running warm, on a wet day in November it was running over 100 degrees, track use granted but I was there in September and rode a mates 959 and it got to 101 degrees in a 38 degree day, so much cooler than the v2. Apparently some are worse than others but mine was terrible.

2) the amount of warranty work, bodged bike track install, sold as a free package with most Ducati’s now so not something I spec’d and the dealer melted the earth on the loom causing havoc when wet, but also I had the rear brake fail twice, had switch gear fail, had a headlight replaced as it filled with water. Mine was an early bike, the 2021’s hopefully better

3) power delivery, standard mapping between 3000-4750rpm is like someone has stood on the rear brake as it accelerates, you either ride way above that or it gets rather tiring

4) the blipper, had the tendency to not work or ‘shove’ the bike forwards in any scenario other than high revs and hard on the brakes. I stopped using it on the road after a while.

5) fit and finish of some of the parts, I don’t know if the tank is lacquered but the paint was wearing thin within 1000 miles.

6) the dash, it’s a nice idea but it’s too small and low resolution to just have out the corner of your eye

7) horrendous mirrors, even by 899/959 standards, these used to make my eyes go funny so I was planning to just take them off

id have kept it if it was purely for track, but even @JamieW had issues with his.

finally by chance I got to ride a mates 959 at Jerez as my mate had written off the bike we were sharing and I genuinely went out thinking it would be crapper than the V2, and it just wasn’t. It felt like it had an arrow straight power curve, fuelled nicely, handled very similar, which led me to believe I’d just been a bit caught up in the hype… since then I’ve been looking at 959’s more and more

 

Not sure it helps you, but I’m either keeping and tarting up my 959 or am going for either a 1299s or an 1199r.
My 959 already has underslung pipes which is a bonus.

 

mate of mine has had a similar experience with his V2, runs hot, continual niggles/problems. Last track day at Brands he made one session before his gearbox gave up the ghost, refused to change out of third.

 

V4 run very hot too. But the heat is generally not an issue on v2 or v4 so long as you avoid riding in a town. The 1299 & 959 do run cooler in comparison.

 

The new V4 shuts the rear bank of cylinders when at a standstill, doesn’t it? And I believe a software upgrade does the same for older models?
Or I may have dreamt that!

 

I think it does actually on newer ones.
Mine was a 2018 and did not shut any cylinders off (AFAIK). The V2 was a loan bike I had for 2 days. It was bloody hot, and that was in late winter.

 

For balance, I have seen several v2’s on tracks this year and none had any issues to my knowledge.

 

It sounds to me that your reason for the bike is primarily about the way it will make you feel to own it - you have a daily ride - this is the weekend nice weather bike - the one you want people to look at.

In which case forget all practical considerations and try to imagine that moment when you open the garage - you don’t want to be having second thoughts - you just want it to put a smile on your face every time you see it.

The base V4 is the better bike - but from what i’m reading in your responses it is just a bit vanilla for what you are wanting from this purchase.

I personally wouldn’t go for a Bayliss V2 because it feels like too much of a marketing ploy and there would always be the slight nagging doubt that I might have been been had.

Go with your heart on this one - not your head.

 

I had an issue with mine similar to this where the gear lever kinda got jammed and it wouldn’t come out of gear until I basically kept pumping the clutch and blipping and eventually it did. It only happened once near the end of owning the bike so thought I wouldn’t mention above.

for balance also I found the demo bike I rode really smooth, and enjoyed it a lot, clearly it had been ridden hard from new and maybe mine would have been better if that was the case, even my old 899 took a few thousand miles to loosen up, and a friend just rebuilt his 1299 track bike at 16k miles and said the bores looked new, so clearly they are made fairly hard to break in.

Maybe I did just get a bad one.. but at £15k when I only got £5500 for my 848 and was sticking a bunch of finance in, just left a bit of a sour taste.

on top of this. All the time we were in lockdown I was loosing warranty time, I couldn’t get any of the work done on my electrical shorting issue which was causing false bike track alarms and there was talk of Ducati extending warranties but it never happened, so in July I had a bike with 2k miles on it, 4 or 5 warranty claims under its belt and only 6 months warranty left. I even had to pay out of my own pocket for Motorapido to fixed the bodged wiring as it wasn’t covered by Ducati because Ducati Oxford did the original work… I figured I’d pay MR Rather than risk my life allowing Oxford to work on my motorcycle again.

as I said above. Maybe I got a Friday bike, I’m not naive, I’ve owned 5 Ducati’s, I’ve been reasonably lucky with them and I’ve had issues with other bikes also on occasion through my riding life so it’s just one of those things.

go ride a V2 but not on a winters day like I did, make sure you get it out on a warm day!

 

Nobody is saying they bought a V2 and solely ride in London or that their rides consist of cruising through towns. But the reality is that any more than 1 or 2 sets of traffic lights into/out of your house on a summers day and the bike (at least my bike) was unusable. I have a main road that links all the various housing areas, so it has maybe 4-5 sets of stops out of the town and it was horrid every time. If you open your garage door onto the mountain section at the IOM then I applaud you. But it's not the reality for most people.

When I Spoke to MotoRapido they flat out said "yep they are running seriously hot now, it's Euro 5, there's twice the amount of exhaust building up that heat and they haven't magically found a way to get rid of it. On top of this, it's why cars don't have temp gauges anymore, because owners wouldn't want to see how hot they are running.

The OP needs to ride one and make his mind up, although tbh I don't think it will feel as special as stuff like a 1299s/v4s, it just feels like an updated 959 with some nicer looking parts like the swingarm. I still gush when I see one, but I do when I see a 1299s and I think that would have also been a good option as the prices were similar.

 

No dream, my 2019MY V4S drops the rear bank at a certain temperature but mine only ever ticks over when I'm waiting to be released from the pit lane Andy

 

It was very odd, for a few laps the gear indicator was randomly cycling through all the gears (when not changing) then finally whatever happened, happened and there was no resistance on the shift lever at all, stuck in 3rd.

The chap (evoboy?) on here that does the wraps certainly makes standard bikes look incredible, that's where I'd be starting, along with maybe suspension/map to improve the ride, CF wheels to really go for it, some of which you'll be able to remove and sell when its upgrade time.

 

I have a 959 for track and inclement weather and a 749R for those special Sundays. If I was buying a brand new V2 I'd probably stump up the extra for the Bayliss but I wouldn't trade the 959 in for one (have thought long and hard about it). For less, you can get a second-hand base V4 - that's the way I'm heading after another summer of track riding. Now, if we're talkng V2R with a different engine I may well feel totally different.