MV Agusta is Betting on an Insane 5 Cylinder Engine

On this day in the year of our Lord, YAM 2025, we are in a pretty privileged position to talk about something we rarely get to talk about in the motorcycling world. A brand new, clean sheet, exotic engine that is unlike anything else on the market. And no, I'm not talking about Honda's V3R, I've glazed that enough. It is MV Agusta's new five-cylinder prototype. That's right, we got two wild new engine concepts to talk about this year. Two, what a time to be alive. This trapezoidal engine from MV Agusta doesn't come from rumors or leaked patents. It was teased in flesh and blood, presented stoically within a glass box at MV's stage during EICMA. It had sort of like a jewel-like quality about it, standing like a monolith on the showroom floor of a convention center in Milan. The future of motorcycling exotica etched into aluminum. And I think it's pretty sweet. We all thought we'd have electric motorcycles and now we get crazy new engine concepts. So this engine is called the Cinque Cilindri. Apologies for my Italian. And MV is promising it to be capable of more than 240 horsepower with a rev ceiling above 16,000 RPM. The engine layout, while exotic, is advantageous. It's narrower than an inline four and shorter than a V4. That sounds pretty good to me. Now, does that sound a little too good to be true? Well, that's kind of the point. MV Agusta didn't survive a century of chaos, bankruptcy, rebirth, and reinvention by playing things safe. That's not the MV anyone wants or frankly needs. Now, let's take a look at this engine a little more closely and discuss its merit, its potential red flags, and why experiments like this matter. Let's get into it. Following the EICMA teaser, MV Agusta published a press release outlining some more details of this power plant. They describe it as a modular platform that can scale between 850 and 1150 CCs. The five-cylinder architecture itself is certainly unusual. It uses three cylinders in the front and two cylinders in the back, arranged so that the whole block is compact front to back while remaining narrower than a traditional inline four. The packaging is one of the big selling points. MV claims the engine has the width of a three-cylinder but with the internal volume and breathing potential of a four-cylinder, with five combustion chambers thrown in just to keep things interesting. And I think it's gonna give MV Agusta some real exotic cachet in a marketplace that's dominated by mostly V4s. This press release also includes some pretty bold numbers. MV is claiming the engine's capable of producing 240 horsepower while revving to over 16,000 RPM and producing 100 foot-pounds of torque. Now, it's important to note, these are all just claims. We don't have dyno charts, real-world testing, hell, they don't even show this engine fit into a chassis yet but they've made it very clear that for some weird four-demonstration-purposes-only purposes, this is a science project that exists only to show that MV could make it if they theoretically wanted to. So it's kind of far away from ever seeing the light of day. MV says outright that a motorcycle with this engine is coming, however, and the claims about its modular nature, it may be coming to a handful of different models at that, which is pretty crazy. Innovation in internal combustion engine architecture is extremely rare nowadays. Most manufacturers have consolidated around the tried-and-true formulas that we're seeing everywhere in the marketplace nowadays. Parallel twins for virtual efficiency, like this Honda Hornet over here, V4s for ultra-high performance, and the odd triple thrown in here and there for middleweight novelty. We haven't seen a five-cylinder motorcycle since Honda's RC211V race bike. Five-cylinder motorcycles barely exist in production history, with a few examples coming from Honda. Beyond the aforementioned RC211V GP motorcycle, they also had a 125cc five-cylinder race bike all the way back in 1966. In the 60s, there were a lot of experimental race bikes, and there have been multiple experimental engines over the last six decades. People have tried a lot of different things, inline sixes, oval piston V4s, even V8s, but the five-cylinder remains elusive. A five-cylinder engine sits at a strange intersection of traits. They can rev out like a four-cylinder, they offer torque pulses closer to a triple, and the sound is absolutely distinct. It's not your typical inline four scream or your bellowing, raucous V4s, but rather a layered, more uneven sonic experience that is super exotic. In cars, five-cylinder engines from automakers like Audi or Volvo have gained cult followings for this exact reason. They have mechanical interest and intrigue, they're smooth but not sterile, and they're characterful in a way that a modern inline four usually isn't. So, quick fun story about five-cylinders. My wife's old car was a 2013 Jetta. She always said that it boosted off the line in a really fun way. I had to go buy a battery for it one time, and the guy asked me, oh, is it the four-cylinder or a five-cylinder? I kind of looked at him like some clueless AutoZone employee, and I was like, dude, it's a four-cylinder. Why are you talking about five-cylinders? That's crazy. And he said, oh, I don't know, maybe it comes in five-cylinders. Turns out, I take the battery back home, pop open the hood, and there it is, five exhaust headers sticking out of this engine. Performance Jetta, it was. MV Agusta is basically betting that in a world of homogenized engine designs, a premium buyer wants something that is not just powerful but special. And to MV's credit, that is right up their alley. They've never been known as a company that plays it safe. And to be honest, their current four-cylinder offerings do play it a little safe. A five-cylinder would make things pretty spicy. I've heard your cries. You say, yeah, and you're just giving away motorcycles all the time. I want to see you give away other stuff too. That's why we've introduced the first ever Discord-only micro giveaways. Every other week, I'm going to be doing tires, jackets, helmets, gloves, anything I can think of that you would want for your ride. Pick a lucky person on Discord and they're going to win some cool prizes. You have to sign up as a member on my website, yammityradco, to get access for that. And December 26th is actually the last chance to get entered to win this Honda Hornet 750. Now, if none of that sounds good to you, head over to the website, pick up a hat, a hoodie, a t-shirt. Every dollar you spend will be an entry to win. We've got a bunch of great new designs that I'd love for you to go and check out. Head over to my website, yammityradco. Now let's get back to the show. And that's what makes MV Agusta a special company. It's worth discussing their attitude and presence in the motorcycle industry a little bit more closely to add greater context to the debut of this new engine design. MV Agusta has never been a manufacturer that produces motorcycles in large volumes. They've never targeted commuters, beginners, or mass market practicality. Their customers buy bikes the same way some people buy art. They consider them sculptures or mechanical jewelry. And I can't really disagree. They are incredible to look at. They're bikes that feel bespoke, intentional, and exclusive. So from MV's perspective, the five-cylinder engine isn't a wild gamble. It's completely on brand. And honestly, they should have been doing it years ago. They're the company who is largely responsible for bringing back the inline four engine into popular nomenclature back in 1966 with the 600 GT before Honda caught on and took it mainstream. They were producing three-cylinder engines way back in the 70s, long before they were in vogue, even before Triumph started conceiving of fun, sporty three-cylinders. When every Japanese sport bike was starting to look the same by the late 90s, Massimo Tamburini designed the F4 with its organ pipe quad exit exhaust. They've built some of the most extreme and polarizing naked bikes on the planet, adorned with eye-watering price tags. But people will pay $40,000 for a Brutale Double R. Maybe not everyone, maybe not many, but some people do. Now, following their split from the Piero Mobility Group, the somewhat infamous group formerly behind KTM, Husky, and Gas Gas, maybe there is some symbolism with this engine. It's like when a girl is broken up with by her boyfriend and decides to get bangs, or when a guy is broken up with his girlfriend and decides to start crypto trading. From the outside, it feels like MV is once again proving they intend on doing things their own way, free from their corporate overlords, just pure, unapologetic, over-the-top Italian engineering. The trapezoidal five-cylinder engine feels like their way of saying, where is MV Agusta as we've ever been? Economic uncertainty dwindling customer base? F**k that noise. As long as there's one wealthy enthusiast for every 10 million Honda owners, what are you gonna make the most unbridled motorcycles we can think of? And I believe there is merit to that. To build something for the sake of passion, inspiration, and with a potential buyer being an afterthought is artistry in the truest sense. If any company in the world is gonna build a five-cylinder engine in 2025, it's MV Agusta. But I don't know, with the direction that Honda's going with these days, maybe in another five years, they'll be fully invested in mechanical science experiments once again, and maybe we get a five-cylinder Honda. I don't know, the world is crazy nowadays. But let's be honest, none of this means guaranteed success. Every time a brand pushes engine architecture into a weird territory, history has proven how much turbulence can happen as a result. Take Kawasaki's H2 Mach 4, a two-stroke inline three dubbed the Widowmaker. It was a wild and rambunctious bike, but ultimately unwieldy and unsafe. Or what about Honda's CBX, the glorious inline six that sounded like an F1 car? Roar! But it lasted just a few years. It was heavy, expensive, and complex. Or even Honda's own NR750, an oval piston V4 that had 32 valves that was designed to mimic a V8. These experiments are legendary and they sit in museums for us to gawk at. The bikes become practically mythical in history and lore, but they're often more symbolic than widespread successes. And that leads us to the most recent five-cylinder motorcycle engine, the V5 found in Honda's RC211V MotoGP bike. It was a dominant machine in the early days of the four-stroke takeover, yet the V5 never made it into mass production. And then they even moved away from a V5 to a V4 for their racing program, which offered better packaging cost and performance. What all these examples show is that many of the most interesting engines in motorcycle history don't often last too long. They flare out brightly and they just burn out, but their influence lives on. And that's really important. It lives on in the design language and the engineering lessons and the mythology of a brand. So is MB Agusta risking creating an engine that may become yet another short-lived legend? Totally, absolutely. But that's not a bad thing at all. Some innovations exist for the sake of artistic expression, engineering curiosity, or even building brand identity. Even if MB Agusta only builds 200 bikes with this motor, the halo effect could influence bikes in their lineup or even outside of the company for decades to come. Progress isn't always linear. It's often a result of experimentation and the successes that stem from failure. And if any company knows that, it's MB Agusta. I think this is one of the most interesting engine announcements we've seen in a long time. And it's really cool that it came out the same year as the V3R announcement. It's great to see something completely out of left field when so much of motorcycling is trending towards conservatism and efficiency, which makes sense. Businesses have to make money. And I'm not surprised MB Agusta is the company behind this. But what do you guys think? Will this five-cylinder engine make serious waves in the industry? Or will it exist solely as a short-lived gesture from MB Agusta, assuring us of the future the company sees for itself? Let me know down below in the comments. I appreciate you all watching till the end, and I'll catch you in the next video.