Doomed to failure: the Aprilia Moto 6.5

Yesterday I was looking again at some pictures of the Brammo Enertia electric bike. It felt like I’d seen this motorcycle before, a long time ago. And then it came to me: it looks uncannily like the Philippe Starck-designed Aprilia Moto 6.5 of 1995.

The Aprilia was doomed to failure from the start, with dynamics that failed to match its radical looks. The Rotax engine offered sub-F650 perfomance, and the build quality was flimsy. (Production was equally erratic, with the model being deleted in 1997 and then exhumed in 1999 for three more years.) On Brammo’s Enertia microsite there used to be a section called ‘Design Influences’—but funnily enough, there’s no mention of the Moto 6.5.

As Philippe might say, quelle surprise.