Horizons Unlimited - The HUBB

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- - Tyre opinion ! (https://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hubb/equipping-bike-whats-best-gear/tyre-opinion-38408)

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Have Metzeler Sahara on my airhead. Seems that life of tyres going to end in a short time though possibly will continue to ride another 2-4 K/kms. Due to air leak, intended to change them before (tube type tyres on tubeless rims).

What tyre will I buy and fit on ?

Some people says below is the best for enduros (fits more to Europe IMHO):

DAILY RIDE : TKC 80 On the front / Tourance on the rear
MUD/SAND/OFF-ROAD RIDE: Metzeler Karo on the front / Michelin Desert on the rear (Karo can be dangereous in wet weather).

Daily ride mentioned above is written due to %80 tarmac, % 20 light off-road.

This combination allows better mileage and same time wear with tyres.

This is not my experience. Just writing other peoples opinions and would like to ask if anyone has any experince with this?

? ? ? ?

I wouldn't recommend different types of tyre on at the same time. different tyres have different shapes, profiles and grip characteristics and to mix them is just asking for trouble.

I found Pirelli 80/20 MT90 to be the longest wearing tire of all that I tried so far. Good street tires, ok for light off road/bad road.

I use Michelin T63 for almost everything.
Pirelli MT21 is maybe a bit better in the dirt but not much.
Michelin Desert doesn’t fit multi-purpose use (for me) because it doesn’t like anything that’s wet.

TKC80 is great for road-use but in dirt I don’t like it at all. The front slides easy and it’s not much grip on the rear. Used it for 30kkm but after I tried MT21 and T63 I will never use it again.

“TKC 80 On the front / Tourance on the rear” is a combination I don’t like. It means that on wet roads your front will loose it’s grip when the rear still have lots of traction.

Example: Just about any mix and match of tires works just fine

Quote:

Originally Posted by mollydog (Post 212335)

This is kinda old school thinking, IMO. Mixing tires can work fine .... but does not always work. So it depends on the bike and tires used and in what combination they are applied.

Example: Just about any mix and match of tires works just fine on
a Vstrom. I've used about every combo within the class of tire spec'd for the bike: Distanzia, Anakee, MT90, D607, Tourance .... they all perform fine in about any combo front to rear, brand to brand.

YES... there are subtle differences but mostly this has to do with the amount of wear on the tire. With new or near new tires the Vstrom is very tolerant
and never displays any sort of dangerous behavior.

Dirt bikes too are not too fussy about mixing. Once again, YES, you may feel a slight difference but nothing dangerous or weird is going on .... most of the time. Some tires are just plain weird and don't suit the bike. So a bit of fiddling needs to be done to find out which combos are best.

With lighter weight bikes like XT's, AT's, DR;s, XR's you can have a more pronounced difference felt that may put you off. Whether I'd call this dangerous or not is up for debate.

Obviously, some tires don't work well in rain ... ie many knobbies for example. And most knobbies won't provide the kind of side grip you get from a pure street tire.

But as far as the bike going into a massive tank slapper like the "Bad Old Day" of old Brit bikes, well, this is not too common in my experience.

Sport bikes are in some cases more sensitive to mixing tires, mostly due to
very radical geometry. So here I would be more careful.

Cheers,

Patrick :mchappy:

Patrick, on the V-Strom which tire gave you the best mileage, and how long did they last? I'm guessing the old style Tourance gives the best mileage from what I've read. I am heading to Alaska in July on a 650 Strom and I was going to try to make it on one set of Tourances and a set of TKCs. I will mount the TKCs when I get to AK and just ride them until they are done and then switch back. I'm looking at about 14,000 miles round trip, and was hoping to do it with these two sets of tires. Do you think I can get that much out of the two sets if ridden easy with frequent pressure checks?

Most definitely you can do the ride
Watch for mud

Thanks so much Patrick, I'll be going with Tourances for the trip!

Tourance is very expensive. One set is 300 euros :helpsmilie:

So looking for another tyre :confused1:

Also wondering which tyre is the best at wet ?

Try to find Heidenau k60 tyres. Cheap, sticky and good enough off road too. Did I mention they're long lasting and cheap as chips.

Metzeler, Michelin, Bridgestone, Continental and Pirelli works for Turkey. No Midas, No Heidenau etc...

Tried to find on the net but failed...

I've done more than 200,000km on two GS;s, and has always riden with a TKC on the Front wheel, and whatever gives the best milage on the back. I like Michillin, so prefer the Anakee. The Tourance is fine as well. I had the TKC on the back while riding the sand dunes in the Middle East, but they do not last on the rear for long (about 10,000km)
I get about 18,000km on the TKC front and 16,000km on the Anakee rear.

The reason why I always have a TKC (off road) tire in the front is to have max grib and confedence when going off road. Although it is only less than 10% of the time. The grib on tar road makes no difference what tire you have on, I've scraped the footpegs while cornering with Sportbikes on the GS with TKC's on, so dont let anyone tell you they do not grib as good as 'road tires'. The only disadvantage the TKC tires have is that they are noisy on smooth service roads, but that is a small price to pay for a better ride off road.

Good luck

Johan

PS: I ride a 1150GSA