I've never had a bike long enough to need to replace its tires. So I don't know if the wear I'm seeing on my back tire is normal or not.
I think it's obvious that I need a new tire. But what I don't know is how soon do I need to replace it? And if this is normal wear after 5 years (it's an '03 with original tire) or maybe more to do with my recent driving habits? Just this year I began doing wheelies a little more often.
So take a look at the pics and tell me what you think.
(http://hotlink.myspacecdn.com/images02/62/9d6d98b5b62b4ca6bacdaf8d927e23a4/m.jpg)
(http://hotlink.myspacecdn.com/images02/47/9a85679ff2384bd18b9600c77610047b/m.jpg)
(http://hotlink.myspacecdn.com/images02/3/8ed1fe76c2934834a12e97d0e15d7946/m.jpg)
(http://hotlink.myspacecdn.com/images02/58/6e30a5d8c47444e5bcc7f4d949815c63/m.jpg)
well I don't know that much about this, as I'm still new to Ducati. But I seem to remember reading in the manual that the tire's expected life span was like 5 years. I could be wrong. But still 5 years hard use (Frequent Riding or Wheelies) on a tire sounds good to me.
Personally I'd have likely replaced it two seasons ago based on those pics. That thing must feel horrible cornering.
Generally, tire life is measured in miles, not years. That said, I'd replace a stock '03 tire as a matter of principle. I don't wanna be riding around on 5-8 year old rubber. How many miles do you do a year approximately?
And I'd replace that tire cuz it's done. Once it starts to look like that, it's not long before you're at the cords. Replace it now. It's cheap insurance. Speaking for all my prior injuires, you don't wanna fook around by trying to stretch out tire life. Once it starts to go, ditch it.
Based on that tire wear, it looks like you do a fair amoung of straight up n' down riding. Go for a sport touring tire. They have a shit-ton of grip and last a lot longer than a sport tire.
I don't know if it's related to years so much as it's related to mileage. I've typically gotten no more than 4000 miles out of my michelin pilot powers.
Tires dry out with age. A 10 year old tire with no miles on it wont grip worth a damn. I just wore out a set of Powers that I put on in the spring but I do alot of aggressive riding. On a bike I wouldn't ride on tires that are more than three years old. Buy a new set (front and rear) and see what you've been missing. [thumbsup]
Quote from: porschaholic on November 04, 2008, 11:13:15 AM
Tires dry out with age. A 10 year old tire with no miles on it wont grip worth a damn.
A lot of it has to do with how the tires were stored. My wife and I have often used 3+ year old new tires and 7+ year old used tires that came on spares sets of wheels that we've bought. Worse case situation was that the tire will slide a little easier until you heat them up or wear through the outer oxidized rubber and get down to the more pliable rubber. Naturally, I don't recommend this for anyone who is a newbie or only rides 1000 miles a year and doesn't know how their bike is supposed to handle.
You live in the Midwest? - just a guess.
mitt
I have pirelli Diablos that I put on last summer & the back one looks like that right now... about 5-6 thousand miles... It is not ONLY worn down the middle (Chicken Strips), but the middle is where you will almost always wear down to the metal. I JUST ordered a NEW one! I would say that yours is worn out, nothing unusual, order a NEW one!!! ;D
that tire is done my friend. take it off the grill and put on some new meat 8)
Quote from: Statler on November 04, 2008, 10:56:46 AM
Personally I'd have likely replaced it two seasons ago based on those pics. That thing must feel horrible cornering.
+1
That tire should have been replaced a long time ago :-X
Quote from: Spidey on November 04, 2008, 11:00:52 AM
Generally, tire life is measured in miles, not years. That said, I'd replace a stock '03 tire as a matter of principle. I don't wanna be riding around on 5-8 year old rubber. How many miles do you do a year approximately?
And I'd replace that tire cuz it's done. Once it starts to look like that, it's not long before you're at the cords. Replace it now. It's cheap insurance. Speaking for all my prior injuires, you don't wanna fook around by trying to stretch out tire life. Once it starts to go, ditch it.
Based on that tire wear, it looks like you do a fair amoung of straight up n' down riding. Go for a sport touring tire. They have a shit-ton of grip and last a lot longer than a sport tire.
+1
Being new to riding, I was lucky enough to have a good friend who was willing to share some information with me when I started riding! I was not aware of tire age issue prior, and probably wouldn't have given it much thought. That said, I have to replace my tires every couple of years due to mileage.
One more thing, if you get new tires take it easy. You will need to be very careful at first, I was surprised how slick they are when new, this is not something you want to learn the hard way.
Glenn
FWIW, I'm lucky to get 3500 miles per rear tire. Typically a front will last through two rears. YMMV.
That tire is shot. To hell. Replace and enjoy. :)
Thanks for the good input.
First I should have noted that I have almost 11,000miles on my bike. I guess I'm assuming they were original tires but I know for sure I've put 7,000miles on 'em.
Yes I am from the midwest. How did you guess? By the wear patterns? I've just started noticing the wear over the past month or two. Riding season is for the most part over up here so at least I'm not losing riding time while searching for new rubber.
On that note... any suggestions? Brand, style, supplier... My bike's an 03', 1000cc, midwest rider though I like to take curves aggressively on the occasional chance I get.
Quote from: daftduc on November 04, 2008, 05:39:02 PM
Thanks for the good input.
First I should have noted that I have almost 11,000miles on my bike. I guess I'm assuming they were original tires but I know for sure I've put 7,000miles on 'em.
Yes I am from the midwest. How did you guess? By the wear patterns?
On that note... any suggestions? Brand, style, supplier... My bike's an 03', 1000cc, midwest rider though I like to take curves aggressively on the occasional chance I get.
I would sh!t if you got 11,000 miles on the original tires - they were Michelin pilot power sports, and I only got about 3,500 to 5,000 on 3 rears with the same 2003 1000cc bike and living in Iowa. 7,000 is probably closer, but you were stretching it.
Yes, the midwest riders typically only use the center of their tire due to the flat roads, the edges still look good.
I am trying a set of Michelin Pilot power roads this time around, but I doubt I will get over 5,000 on them based on the first 2,000 miles I have done.
mitt
Is this a trick question?
My bike EATS tires. I go through 5 rears and at least 2 fronts per year. If I'm careful I get barely over 2000 mi. on a rear tire. From my experience, if Ducati had designed the S4R/RS to destroy tires, they couldn't have done any better.
Thank goodness [bow_down] [bow_down], my local bike shop gives me very good deals and mounts on the rim for $20.00, because I use so many tires per year.
LA
Quote from: LA on November 05, 2008, 04:37:50 PM
Is this a trick question?
My bike EATS tires. I go through 5 rears and at least 2 fronts per year. If I'm careful I get barely over 2000 mi. on a rear tire. From my experience, if Ducati had designed the S4R/RS to destroy tires, they couldn't have done any better.
Thank goodness [bow_down] [bow_down], my local bike shop gives me very good deals and mounts on the rim for $20.00, because I use so many tires per year.
LA
+1 That tire wear is not normal. I go through at least a set each year. 5 years? You must be pulling our leg.
maybe I have magic tires. But since they are all out of em any recommendations?
Quote from: daftduc on November 06, 2008, 06:39:06 PM
maybe I have magic tires. But since they are all out of em any recommendations?
go for the Michelin pilot roads. they are a sport touring tire and wear awesomely. I got them due to the commuting wear I put on tires. they last alot longer than pure sport tires, but will still grip hard when you lean them over when you are out riding the piss out of your bike.
I have a friend that has done a lot of track time on Pilot Roads and says they grip very well and last long too.
LA
Quote from: Le Pirate on November 06, 2008, 06:56:43 PM
go for the Michelin pilot roads. they are a sport touring tire and wear awesomely. I got them due to the commuting wear I put on tires. they last alot longer than pure sport tires, but will still grip hard when you lean them over when you are out riding the piss out of your bike.
They now make Pilot Road 2CTs. Kinda on the expensive side though. I just picked up my first pilot road 2ct rear.
Quote from: Clickjack on November 04, 2008, 10:47:10 AM
But I seem to remember reading in the manual that the tire's expected life span was like 5 years. I could be wrong. But still 5 years hard use (Frequent Riding or Wheelies) on a tire sounds good to me.
[laugh] [laugh]
so what should we expect then?
Quote from: MendoDave on November 05, 2008, 04:46:19 PM
+1 That tire wear is not normal. I go through at least a set each year.
Around here it is fairly normal wear for people who ride fairly agressively. LA and I ride the same roads, and probably somewhere around the same pace. My wife and I went through 18 tires last year and 14 tires the year before. Here are two examples of tires from my wife's GSXR.
This tire has a little over 300 miles on it...
(http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d32/Kramer_Krazy/vicki_tire.jpg)
I think this one only had about 2200 miles or so on it....
(http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d32/Kramer_Krazy/vicki_tire-1.jpg)
She's going to finish off another set today, so we can change them out for the weekend, this evening. The ones on her R1 had 1600 miles on the front and rear and were to the wear bars. Yesterday, she had bald rings around the left and right of center on the front and almost bald on the rear. She'll probably hit cords by noon, today.
How do you guys do that and in what temperature? Looks like heavy track use, perhaps a moto gp race was won with one of those? I have been riding in low autumn temperature 2000 miles and my rear tire still looks new :D
Quote from: semyhr on November 07, 2008, 05:42:59 AM
How do you guys do that and in what temperature? Looks like heavy track use, perhaps a moto gp race was won with one of those? I have been riding in low autumn temperature 2000 miles and my rear tire still looks new :D
The first tire was around 70 degrees and a single run up Hwy 215 to the Blue Ridge Parkway (about 15 miles) from Rosman, NC. The road is quite coarse and will chew tires up really easily....especially soft tires. That tire is a Dunlop D208, which is soft and doesn't get crap for mileage. It had 36 psi in it, too.
We have three really coarse roads around here that will chew tires up....Hwy 276 (Caesar's Head) in South Carolina, Hwy 215 in North Carolina, and Hwy 348 in northern Georgia. I think the second tire may have been a Pirelli Diablo, IIRC.
Quote from: Desmo Demon on November 07, 2008, 05:26:24 AM
Around here it is fairly normal wear for people who ride fairly agressively. LA and I ride the same roads, and probably somewhere around the same pace. My wife and I went through 18 tires last year and 14 tires the year before. Here are two examples of tires from my wife's GSXR.
This tire has a little over 300 miles on it...
(http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d32/Kramer_Krazy/vicki_tire.jpg)
I think this one only had about 2200 miles or so on it....
(http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d32/Kramer_Krazy/vicki_tire-1.jpg)
She's going to finish off another set today, so we can change them out for the weekend, this evening. The ones on her R1 had 1600 miles on the front and rear and were to the wear bars. Yesterday, she had bald rings around the left and right of center on the front and almost bald on the rear. She'll probably hit cords by noon, today.
Damn Terry, The wife gets with the program. And I'd say you got your money's worth and then some outa that last tire. [clap]
La
Quote from: LA on November 07, 2008, 06:58:25 AM
Damn Terry, The wife gets with the program. And I'd say you got your money's worth and then some outa that last tire.
It's weird, though. My wife and I can run the same tires, ride the same roads, go at the same pace, and at the same time, but she butchers her tires a lot more than I do. She rides the GSXR and R1 the hardest, which have 30+ more HP than any of my bikes, but I don't think our riding styles differ enough to have a large noticeable difference in our tire wear. She does sit upright and I will slide off the seat, but it sometimes makes me jealous that her tires shred more than mine. :'(
As for wearing them down to the cords, she's just crazier than I am. I only hit cords if I go on a long ride and leave the house on marginal tires. She purposely leaves the house with intentions of seeing cords by the time she gets home.....it's her little personal goal with her tires....she's even hit cords with the FRONT tire. :o The woman's nuts, I tell ya!
Quote from: Speedbag on November 04, 2008, 03:17:08 PM
FWIW, I'm lucky to get 3500 miles per rear tire. Typically a front will last through two rears. YMMV.
That tire is shot. To hell. Replace and enjoy. :)
+1, with the way that rubber gets harder and more brittle over time, a tire from 03 should have been replaced by 05 at the latest - especially if it's hardly been ridden. It's important to know how the read the "born on" date that's printed on a tire when you do buy a new one so that you get the most out of it. Just because it's new at a retailer doesn't mean that it hasn't been sitting in a warehouse for a year already. Most of the time that's what happens when you see a place blowing out tires at ultra low prices.
As for mileage, if you were to keep a bike long enough to run through a set or two of tires and are concerned about mileage, I run with the Pilot Road tires, even did a track day on them and am hearing 14,000 miles on them - no exageration - and I can corner with the best of them:
(http://a643.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/14/l_450bb3a8657cd5b1b4a1a282df6464ca.jpg)
I have been really impressed with the wear of these tires and how many miles that I've gotten out of them. I'd be hard pressed to change, but for a more agressive tire, look at the Pilot Road 2CT's.
Quote from: Monster Dave on November 07, 2008, 08:42:29 AM
As for mileage, if you were to keep a bike long enough to run through a set or two of tires and are concerned about mileage, I run with the Pilot Road tires, even did a track day on them and am hearing 14,000 miles on them - no exageration
We currently have some 2CTs on the Monster and a set of Roads on the wife's ST2. Neither bike gets ridden too hard, so I'm interested in seeing what kind of mileage we will get out of them. Most of our friends who switched from the Pirelli products now swear by the Michelins and say they get 50% more mileage from the Michelins than the Pirellis, but......there is no way on this green Earth that any of them will ever come close to 14,000 miles. They'd be lucky to see 3500-4000 while riding on a lot of cold and wet pavement. The roads by you must be fairly smooth. The only tires I have ever seen that have gotten more than 10,000 miles have been the hard Dunlop D401 and D402 tires that I run on my Harley.
Quote from: Desmo Demon on November 07, 2008, 09:05:02 AM
We currently have some 2CTs on the Monster and a set of Roads on the wife's ST2. Neither bike gets ridden too hard, so I'm interested in seeing what kind of mileage we will get out of them. Most of our friends who switched from the Pirelli products now swear by the Michelins and say they get 50% more mileage from the Michelins than the Pirellis, but......there is no way on this green Earth that any of them will ever come close to 14,000 miles. They'd be lucky to see 3500-4000 while riding on a lot of cold and wet pavement. The roads by you must be fairly smooth. The only tires I have ever seen that have gotten more than 10,000 miles have been the hard Dunlop D401 and D402 tires that I run on my Harley.
I'm in Arizona, so the temps are usually hot and the roads are not subject to salt and snow. But I ride between Phoenix and Tucson a lot, use my bike daily as my primary vehicle, and do lots of fun runs and twisties on the weekends when time permits, and I swear when I removed my last set of tires I had just 6k miles on my bike, now I have just over 20k and I bought them less than a year ago. I know that it sounds crazy, but even with a track day under my belt on them, I'd estimate given the wear on them, that I've probably got another 3-4 thousand miles left in them.
Wow! It really seems that tire mileage is all over the map.
DesmoDemon, I'm looking at those tires and hearing you say you don't ride that aggressively? :o Yeah...right ;D. Compared to who? ;D You live in a no chicken-strips world I see. [thumbsup]
Anyways....I ride a little ole low-power 800 with Bridgestone Battlax BT-014's. A pretty good mixture of smooth highways, coarser surfaced sideroads and twisties. I figure I ride it like a cruiser guy (well maybe not quite that easy). My rear tire is well into the wear bars in the center and the tread surface is pretty squared off after about 4500 miles so it's a new tire just more than once every riding season for me. The front tire seems to last about twice as long as the rear.
I'm thinking of trying the Metzler sport/touring tires next time as they are supposed to be a good mileage tire but I hope I don't notice a big decrease in grip.
My Diablo looked a lot like that about 50 miles before I started seeing cord (some dyno runs took a SUPRISING amount of rubber off).
Yeah tire mileage really all depends on what type of riding you do. I recently got about 5000 miles out of a pair of Metzeler Z6s which I thought was impressive. But the performance was just mediocre when doing more sport oriented riding. I just spooned on a pair of BStone BT021s and they feel so much better than the Z6s did their entire life. Maybe when these wear out I'll check out the Michelin Pilot Powers. I've heard lots of good things about them too.
If your tires lasted you 5 years (dunno how many miles you put on them) then it's more than likely any tire you put on there will be more than adequate for your riding needs.
5 years???? Good grief!
I do a pair of Pilot Powers in a year, about 4000 miles and they knackered
Quote from: Pedro on November 09, 2008, 06:14:37 AM
5 years???? Good grief!
I do a pair of Pilot Powers in a year, about 4000 miles and they knackered
Then I consider myself
really fortunate to be upwards of 14,000 miles on my Pilot Roads.
I rode 10,000 miles (including 3 track days) on the stock tires before changing them out for Pilot Road 2CTs (5000 miles on them so far, plenty to go).
Still had plenty of tread left, but they were starting to square off a bit from the freeway riding, plus I was getting a bit tired of everyone being horrified at me riding on the stockers. ;)
Quote from: msincredible on November 10, 2008, 07:24:54 AM
Still had plenty of tread left, but they were starting to square off a bit from the freeway riding, plus I was getting a bit tired of everyone being horrified at me riding on the stockers. ;)
There's no doubt that the profile on my Roads is square....lol...but they get the job done amzingly well. I think that the next ones I'll get will be the 2CT's, but I do so much distance riding that the Roads seem to fit the majority of my riding habits and have given me the chance to still play hard on the track and in the twisties while not compromising mileage...so it's a hard decision to make.
Quote from: msincredible on November 10, 2008, 07:24:54 AM
(including 3 track days)
I always love to hear people state that they do "track days", especially when talking about their tire wear. The difference in a trackday session between two people and different courses can be extreme. It's like, in this area, Carolina Motorsports Park will chew the heck out of the right side of your tires, and in a heatbeat, whereas Barber won't eat through a tire at the same rate. Then, you've got the guy's who are within five seconds of the track record and the others who are 30+ seconds a lap slower and can be lapped at least once in a 20 minute session.
It's like the guy that I bought two sets of tires off of in the spring. He kept telling me that each set of tires had seven trackdays on them, but by the pictures, I couldn't believe him. The reason I say I didn't believe him was that he said he did them on the same track that I've been on, and I couldn't imagine getting two full track days out of a set of tires before they won't pass tech inspection, and I'm probably a middle-of-the-pack intermediate group rider. This guy said he did track days all the time, so I was assuming he was probably faster than I am (with only two track days under my belt). I went and looked at the tires and had to keep from jumping up and down at the excellent condition of the tires. Two of them looked like they were brand new and still had small chicken strips, and the other two didn't look a whole lot worse. I talked him down to $37 a tire and went about my merry way. The tires had such little wear that they lasted nearly the same amount of miles on the street as brand new tires.
You know what I'm starting to wonder from these posts?
Does rider weight have as much to do with tire wear as the brand of tire or riding style? I'm hearing some "lightweights" like Msincredible getting amazing mileage even with track usage and "heavyweights" (like me) getting much less.
Just a thought......
Quote from: PizzaMonster on November 14, 2008, 10:14:17 AM
You know what I'm starting to wonder from these posts?
Does rider weight have as much to do with tire wear as the brand of tire or riding style? I'm hearing some "lightweights" like Msincredible getting amazing mileage even with track usage and "heavyweights" (like me) getting much less.
Just a thought......
I'm sure that certainly influcences the wear and tear on the tires. I'm running the Pilot Roads with 14,000 miles on them so far and weigh in at 160lbs.
Try riding the twisties oce in a while to get an even wear on the tires.
I haven´t read all 3 pages of posts but, after seeing the pics of your tires... 5 years!!! That is a very long time to keep riding on the same rubber. I´d stretch the tire life to 1-2 years max and change tires as it´s a hell of a lot cheaper than rebuilding a bike due to a wreck.
If you don´t ride very hard and want a decent compound on your tires try Pirelli Diablo or Diablo Rosso. They seem to keep well and are great for all year riding in all temperatures.. they grip very well. On my old GSXR750WX they lasted 2500km on the rear and that was hard use.
Don´t wait 5 years until your next change!
Quote from: LA on November 05, 2008, 04:37:50 PM
Is this a trick question?
My bike EATS tires. I go through 5 rears and at least 2 fronts per year. If I'm careful I get barely over 2000 mi. on a rear tire. From my experience, if Ducati had designed the S4R/RS to destroy tires, they couldn't have done any better.
Thank goodness [bow_down] [bow_down], my local bike shop gives me very good deals and mounts on the rim for $20.00, because I use so many tires per year.
LA
LA, you won't believe this but the last set of tires I had put on the " R " about 6 weeks ago cost me $180 just for the mounting. !
The shop charges 1/2 hour @ $95 an hour per tire change. 2 Pirelli Dragon Supercorsa Pros ( which are a step below the OEM tires that came on the bike ) cost me $ 688. $190 plus the cost of the tires.
I put 2000 miles on the OEM tires and they were ready for the trash. I only ride the " R " on the street.
I can't imagine riding around on tires that are 3-5 years old and popping wheelies.
Tires are the only thing between your bike and the Asphalt !