Motorcycle tyre performance in the real world

If ever there's a subject guaranteed to raise blood pressure and provoke circular (no pun intended) argument, look no further than tyres!  Anyone incautious enough to ask on a forum "What's a good tyre?" will not only get conflicting results, most of the feedback will contain plenty of hot air and stuff-all in the way of qualitative facts.  Motorcycle magazines are only marginally better - lap times with the same bike using different tyres but how representative is that of the real world either?

In terms of main brand modern motorcycle road tyres, there's probably little difference between them in the performance envelope that most of us operate in, although there's no question that overall, tyre performance has improved markedly over the years.  Good news for all of us given the critical role they play in keeping us safe.

It's that old question about "fitness for purpose" because the term performance means different things to different people. Basically, sports tyres give incredible grip but (relatively) limited life and at the other end of the scale, touring tyres give longer life but a bit less grip. Manufacturers now try to blur these distinctions with additional options and we as consumers have seemingly endless permutations whilst trying to decide what's acceptable for the type of riding we do.

I wonder what others think about the subject of tyres?  Here's some personal experiences over the last few years that have marked the quest for tyres that fit my purpose.

Acquiring the Blackbird in 2001 was the first foray into riding what might be termed "hyperbikes" for want of a better word.  Enormous horsepower, heavy with a forward weight bias and conservative steering geometry that "pushes" the front end - those factors are an extreme test for any tyre.  It came equipped with Michelin 90X radials.  For the first few weeks, it could have had sugar-coated doughnuts on the rims and would have still been safe because I rode like a complete granny whilst getting used to it.  As confidence grew, a bit more power was applied, particularly whilst leaned over driving out of corners and the first limitations became apparent - the rear would spin up with little provocation in all but perfect road conditions.  The Michelins would have lasted forever because they were a pretty hard compound but in terms of grip, they struggled to cope with the new generation of performance bikes.  After 6 months of ownership, the tread depth had hardly dropped at all but they had to go because I'd lost confidence in them.  In wet weather, they were a nightmare.

The replacements were Dunlop D220's.  Better in terms of grip but as confidence grew in them and they were pushed a little harder, another problem manifested itself.  Have a look at the picture, particularly towards the bottom of the tyre:

As distance on them increased, the front tyre developed a terrible profile with big flats (almost concave in fact) from just off the centre line of the tyre running out towards the edge.  An under-inflated tyre could exhibit similar symptoms but it wasn't that as I was anal about pressures. The handling was horrible with it wanting to flop into corners. Fortunately, there was a lot of collected experience on the 2 major Blackbird websites and there was a strong body of opinion that most tyres simply weren't up to supporting the dynamic loads generated by heavy, powerful bikes when cornering and were almost certainly deflecting badly under load.  As already mentioned, the standard Blackbird has fairly conservative steering geometry with a weight forward bias.  To drive it quickly through corners requires a fair bit of countersteering and that exacerbates the problem.

Some manufacturers clearly recognised the problem and Avon brought out the Azaro "B" specification tyre which had additional reinforcing to reduce carcass deflection.  When the Hayabusa was released, Michelin shod it with the HPX, another reinforced tyre, for the same reason.  As soon as the Azaro "B" was released, I put a set on the Blackbird and the alarming front profile wear pattern disappeared.  Overall grip was pretty good too.  Clearly, the weight component and less extreme steering geometry compared with pure sports bikes had created their own particular set of issues.

Avon then released the Storm sport-touring tyre which was a further development of the Azaro "B".  This proved to be a real winner among sport-touring bike owners and is the Blackbird tyre of choice in the UK and NZ as well as with a lot of SV650/1000 and Hayabusa owners world-wide. I've had several of these tyres and whilst the good dry weather grip is probably on par with other major competing brands, the wet weather performance is the best I've ever encountered.  The other thing I like about Storms is that they keep their profile through a large percentage of their life, which means that handling remains uncompromised for longer.  Life was around 7500 km from a rear Storm which mainly consisted of spirited riding rather than touring or they would have lasted longer. Front Storms lasted nearly half as long again.  Overall, not bad for a heavy performance bike being pushed on grippy surfaces. Tyre life comparisons without replicating the exact road and road temperature conditions are pointless.  Where we lived pre-retirement had less-twisty roads with smoother surfaces and lower temperatures.  It is noticeable that the tyres lasted longer than where we live now.  This is a photo of a Storm rear:

Superb tread pattern for clearing water!

Mind you, new tyre development isn't always smooth sailing.  Four of us with Blackbirds fitted the newly-released Storms in readiness for a South Island tour in early 2007.  All of us experienced a low speed front end shimmy, two of them so severe that even rebalancing had no impact whatever.  A bit of networking both in NZ and around the world revealed quite a number of other cases and Blackbirds seemed to be particularly affected.  To cut a long story short, we worked with the NZ importer to gather data as well as with overseas users and Avon were able to identify an intermittent manufacturing issue and addressed it promptly. Far from the fault putting me off Avon tyres, it actually gave me confidence that here was a company that was willing and able to respond quickly to feedback.

Working with the NZ importer had a useful spin-off and I was subsequently approached in 2009 to formally evaluate a new pure sports tyre, the Avon VP2. It was a new generation tyre with a radical carcass construction to increase contact area when leaned over and had an overlay of 3 different types of rubber plus grip additives for wet weather.  I had severe doubts as to whether a pure sport tyre on a heavy bike was a smart idea but was pretty surprised at the outcome.  Firstly, the grip.  The VP2's were still effortlessly holding on long after my nerve had given out, both in wet and dry conditions.  They also had a great "feel", progressively rolling into corners rather than "dropping in" despite the aggressive profile (a high crown).  This was a clear example of just how good modern tyres are.  Most of us will never explore the outer limits of traction during normal riding but it's comforting to know it's there for those occasional "oh shit" moments!  Secondly, life.  The rear VP2 lasted for just over 5000 very hard kilometres which was a real surprise as I wasn't expecting much more than 3000km.  On a lighter pure sportsbike, the life would have been significantly greater.  I subsequently replaced the worn rear with a Storm sport-touring tyre, but kept the front VP2 on and it lasted for around 7500 km all up; a pretty good result considering that the 'bird tends to "push" the front end.  Had I kept the Blackbird, a Storm rear, VP2 front would have been the combination of choice for the type of riding I do.  The photo below shows the rear VP2 at 5000km.  The centre tread is down to the minimum depth indicator, yet there is no real indication of "squaring off" in the centre, a remarkable achievement by the manufacturer.  Carcass construction and the use of different rubber compounds for the centre and sides clearly have a significant influence in keeping a good profile for a big percentage of total tyre life.

VP2 profile has remained excellent over its life

Moving forward to recent times, the Street Triple came equipped with French-made Dunlop Qualifier pure sport tyres and I was prepared not to like them because of my past experience with the Dunlop D220's.  This proved not to be the case as dry weather grip far exceeded my modest abilities although in the wet, I didn't feel as confident with them compared to the Blackbird with Avons.  However, this is akin to comparing apples with oranges because of the differences in the 2 bikes - far too many variables to reach a meaningful conclusion.  At just over 6000 km, the rear tyre  needed replacing.  I was expecting a little more distance given that the Triple only weighs 167kg dry compared with the 230kg of the Blackbird but it's still ok for a pure sport tyre, especially given the type of roads where we live!  The front still had plenty of centre tread but it was developing flats on the sides and whilst the handling was still acceptable, the transition from upright to leaned right over was no longer linear in terms of "feel".  Here's a photo of the front profile and the flats are quite noticeable.

The following photo shows a different view of the front tyre wear.  Despite the high crown of sports front tyres, it also shows how far a bike can be comfortably leaned over in perfect safety.  The rear has no "chicken strips" at all and the high angles of lean weren't noticeable at the time because the bike felt so planted.

So what now?  A set of tyres that would last up to and beyond the forthcoming endurance ride in October were needed so the VP2 sports tyres I'd really like to have fitted might be pushing the boundaries of life until that time.  Besides, there aren't any in the country for a few more weeks and waiting that long wasn't an option. The new Pirelli Angels looked  interesting and early feedback seems very promising, but full-life evaluations over a whole range of conditions don't appear to exist yet.  However, Avon have recently released the Storm 2 Ultra based on the VP2 technology, only with sport-touring compounds so those are the ones I've just had fitted. Ok, so no-one has done a full-life evaluation on these either, but the purchase decision was based on the considerable experience mentioned above with the forerunners of this tyre.

In the dealer's workshop for new tyres

Far too early to comment on them other than saying that they feel very predictable and directional changes are rapid.  More performance comment to come in due course but for what it's worth, here's a  photo of the front hoop taken at the end of the delivery trip home.  As previously mentioned, the Storms have a deserved reputation for exceptional wet weather performance and that's a feature I'm particularly keen on!

Avon Storm 2 Ultra front tyre

From personal experience, its clear that all the major manufacturers are heavily investing in continuous improvement and that's great for us as consumers.  It probably doesn't matter at all what major brand you choose as long as it's matched to the type of riding you do and whether it's suitable for the bike in question; particularly whether carcass construction will adequately support the dynamic loads imposed by heavier bikes.  The real test is does it "feel" right and give you the confidence to ride in the conditions that you normally encounter.  For me, as previously mentioned; the decision to stick with Avons at least this time round, is largely based around my historical experience of their performance.  Incidentally, I was so used to the performance of the Avon Storms that it was possible to tell when tyre pressures were as little as 2 psi different from my normal settings!

I also mentioned earlier about being anal with tyre pressures.  This comes from bitter experience of gas station gauges which are notoriously inaccurate and correct pressures have such an impact on both grip and tyre life.  I carried an analogue AccuGage brand on the bike for some years.  These are bourdon tube devices constructed like a barometer and are very accurate.  Sadly, it slid off the seat at a gas station forecourt and that was the end of that!  I now have a reasonably expensive digital gauge which looks a bit more robust!

Whilst on the subject of tyres, some small CO2 cartridges and plugs for emergency repairs are normally carried.  Thankfully, they've never been used yet but I've always fretted about whether the 3 cartridges would be sufficient for a full inflation, especially when you're a long way from home.  They're no good of course for small pressure adjustments on the run either.  What I did recently was modify one of those cheap 12V compressors that you buy in automotive accessory shops.  They have large plastic cases which would be a pain to carry on a bike but the internals are very compact.  The case was removed and the accessory plug replaced with crocodile clips to attach directly to the bike battery.  Stick it in a plastic bag and instant air when needed!  The compressor gauge is ignored as it's just as inaccurate as those at gas stations.  My trusty digital gauge is in the photo too.

Mini-compressor for the bike

Finally, it's worth reiterating a comment from the earlier post on aftermarket suspension.  After the OEM Blackbird rear suspension was swapped for a top of the line Penske unit and the fork internals were replaced with upmarket components from the UK, the average improvement in tyre life was close to 2000km.  This is almost certainly a result of  the tyres having less dynamic stresses due to the suspension doing its job effectively.  Something else to ponder on!

Addendum: For an update on Michelin PR3 performance, click HERE

Night riding - love it or loathe it?

Nightfall, just setting off for a 200 km autumn ride

There have been some superb blog posts recently coming out of Canada and the USA about riding in adverse conditions and their "character building" nature.  Therefore, I thought I'd continue the general theme with some random musings for consideration about  Kiwi night riding experiences.

Night riding is something you don't see much written about in motorcycling magazines, either from the viewpoint of the effectiveness of headlights on various makes of bike or even tips on how you ride safely at a reasonable pace.  This leads me to wonder whether motorcycling is largely regarded as a daytime activity by most manufacturers, the motorcycling press and even a decent percentage of riders.  In the latter case, it's probably something that many people don't do a lot of by choice.

Let's start with a definition of night riding. I'm not talking about riding through town with reasonably high levels of street, office and shop illumination, nor the reduced levels of lighting out in the suburbs.  What I'm referring to is being out in the blackness of the countryside with no lighting at all on two lane twisty roads rather than busy major arterial routes.  If you don't ride a lot in these conditions (and with a few exceptions, I don't), it can be fairly daunting; especially as in rural NZ, wildlife ranging from little furry things, larger woolly things and even through to big horny things all want to share the road with you on the odd occasion after dark!

Despite all the apparent risks, night riding is an incredible means of making you more complete as a rider.  Done properly, it sharpens your situational awareness skills and smooth riding techniques immeasurably which pays off in spades for normal daytime riding too.

How good or poor your lights are clearly has a bearing on both enjoyment and the opposite end of the scale too - the dreaded  "pucker factor"!  Your own skills and mindset are the other critical ingredients.  From a personal perspective, one of the few times I do what might be described as serious night riding is on organised endurance events which start off in daylight, run all through the night and finish sometime the next day.  This is at the extreme end of going out for a night ride but the techniques are really no different from heading off for a shorter run.  When you're comfortable with night riding, there's something very special about travelling in a little bubble of light, eating up the miles.

Lit up like the bridge of the Starship Enterprise

In terms of enjoyable night riding experiences, two come to mind; one riding solo and another with a group of other riders.  Hopefully, the reasons for them being enjoyable will become apparent.  The first was pre-retirement when I used to frequently commute 200 km from home on a Friday evening after work to our beach house that we now live in permanently.  The roads were one lane in each direction with a few straights but mostly sweepers and twisties.  The road was well known so that removed any mental apprehension about what to expect.  The journey itself was also of sufficient length that it was possible to start at twilight and "dial" into the ride and relax -  an important consideration.  The relaxed mental attitude was critical for concentration and heightened situational awareness which included a decent focus on chasing the "vanishing point" for correct corner positioning and entry/exit speeds.  Riding in the dark, you are also able to see small objects in the road, loose road metal etc. much easier than in daylight as the headlights cast shadows off even small items.  Travelling in the relatively small cocoon of light cast by the headlight seemed to remove extraneous distractions and focusing on the task at hand felt almost automated.  In fact, the fastest commute to the beach was done entirely in the dark.  I wasn't hitting the highest momentary speeds of a normal daylight run, yet through what I'd like to think was a smoother ride overall, a minute or two was shaved off the elapsed time, despite traffic densities being comparable.

The second example was on a 1000 miles (1600km) in 24 hours endurance ride in 2003. There were 4 of us riding together, with a high degree of trust in each other's abilities.  That takes a lot of stress out of any ride for starters, particularly in terms of having company if any problems are encountered.  Having already covered about 900km and well in the groove at somewhere past midnight, we found ourselves in volcano country in the central north island at an altitude of close to 3000 ft.  It was a clear night and the starlight alone was sufficient to brightly illuminate the snow on the upper reaches of the volcanoes.  Just 4 bikes and nothing else on the road with the sky and snow ablaze with light. As close to a mystical experience as one is likely to get without the ingestion of chemical supplements.  Again, being in the groove and the ability to relax with trusted friends in close proximity made good riding habits completely subconscious, allowing time to thoroughly appreciate the surroundings. "Zen-state" riding at its best!

Our first ever 1000 miles in 24 hours ride, early a.m, 1996.  Yellow blob in corner is a mate cat-napping (or possibly unconscious)!

One of the least enjoyable night rides was on an early 1000 miler where we were a long way from home in unfamiliar territory.  The road was narrow, no centre markings and there were continuous bends but it had plenty of grip. We were warm, there was no great risk yet I was rigid with tension which was causing fatigue; my thought processes had appreciably slowed up and I was riding with poor anticipation (gun-shy is a better description).  In hindsight, I'd almost certainly let myself get overwhelmed with apprehension about the narrow, twisty road we were travelling on rather than relaxing and simply sticking to the basics of riding smoothly.  In any event, it was all to do with my mental approach on that part of the ride rather than the conditions themselves.  I'd simply talked myself into not enjoying it.  Not that it applies in the case of "normal" night riding but I've noticed that on endurance rides at around 2-4 a.m, I don't really get tired, but I do get quite anxious and wonder whether the body clock trying to shut down releases chemicals that cause anxiety when you are forced to remain awake.  Maybe a physiologist would know.

So in trying to summarise personal thoughts about the skill sets for good night riding, it seems to be no different for those required in daylight riding BUT needs to be applied with a little more concentration than maybe we tend to in the day.  Heightened situational awareness, scanning all around and out to the limits of the headlight, attention to the vanishing point on corners and relaxing are just some of  the things which make a huge difference to enjoyment and safety. Relaxing is probably an easier proposition on a longer ride or if you set off in daylight so there is time to gradually adjust or dial in to the conditions. The other thing which undoubtedly aids the mental state is being adequately dressed in terms of warmth.

Unsurprisingly, the biggest bar to enjoying a night ride is a poor headlight.  What is surprising, however; is just how poor the standard headlights are on some modern bikes, particularly those with sporting pretensions.  Perhaps the manufacturers don't expect them to be ridden very far in complete dark.  My old BMW K100RS with its large oblong headlight (photo above) wasn't bad but was improved immeasurably by fitting a relay and a 100w halogen bulb.  The same modification was performed on the Blackbird and whilst it was fantastic on straights and sweepers, the physical shape of the headlight gave a sharp sideways cut-off which was quite unsettling when leaned well over in pitch blackness on tight corners.  Form over function by the designers methinks and probably a common occurrence on a lot of modern bikes.

The Street Triple twin round headlights give an excellent spread of light, but intensity in standard form is barely adequate.  They are also set too low during assembly. The relatively small volume of the lamp housings makes fitting higher temperature/wattage bulbs (i.e 100w) a possibly risky proposition.  As an intermediate step, the standard bulbs have been replaced with Osram Nightbreaker bulbs of the same wattage and what a difference!  The illumination is SIGNIFICANTLY better - why oh why can't the manufacturer fit better quality bulbs as standard?  The photo below shows the difference between the standard bulb and the Nightbreaker in daylight.  In the dark, it's even more pronounced.  The standard bulb on the left  is quite soft and yellow.  The Nightbreaker on the right is much whiter and more intense.

Standard bulb left, Nightbreaker right

As an aside, I tried 100w blue-white xenon bulbs on the Blackbird.  They didn't seem to illuminate greenery at the roadside as well as the 100w halogens.  Where they did score appreciably however was in daylight.  It was really noticeable how much earlier car drivers detected your presence and moved over if you were closing on them from behind.  That has to be a significant safety consideration given that most collisions or near-misses occur as a result of the "I didn't see you mate" excuse of cage drivers.

Fitting HID lights is another option but as I only do seriously long night rides about once a year, the upgrade to Nightbreakers is probably sufficient for now (we hope).

Actually, I'm not entirely sure what the purpose of this post has been, other than to ramble on more than a bit to help clarify in my own mind why I should get out more for decent length night rides in a range of different weather conditions, particularly in preparation for the big ride in October.  There's little doubt as already mentioned that  it sharpens your awareness, road positioning and makes you ride smoothly.  That's got to be a good thing, hasn't it?  Hope it all makes sense.

Aftermarket suspension - value for the average rider?

For most of my riding years, I've stuck with stock suspension, and probably much of it was with tired units because as young 'un with not much money to throw about, most of the early bikes were second hand or worse.  Still, you don't know what you don't know so you ride to the best of your ability and if it wallows like a pig on corners, produces the odd tankslapper or bottoms out on savage bumps in the road; it's all part of riding a motorcycle eh?  If there was any surplus cash to throw about, it always seemed to be spent on bling, farkles - call them what you will.  OK for "pose" value but probably with little impact on performance!

Owning a Honda Blackbird was where I started to really wonder about a suspension upgrade. A fantastic bike in virtually every respect. Trouble is, some of my mates had pure sports bikes and once we got into the tight stuff with uneven surfaces, trying to stay in touch on a fast ride required so much physical work wrestling the heavy old girl through the bends that it was like doing a full aerobics workout at the same time, not to mention the odd fright from pushing the boundaries.  Raising the rear ride height to sharpen the steering helped quite a bit but by 50,000-odd km, the standard shock was definitely past its best.

It was more or less at this time when I read an article on checking sag and found that both the standard front and rear suspension had significantly greater sag than the recommended values.  This wasn't really a surprise given comments I'd seen on various Blackbird websites about the relatively budget standard suspension.  I did think about replacing the rear shock with a new standard unit but one of the American 'bird sites was organising a group buy of Penske units through Cogent Dynamics Motosport in North Carolina.  From a bit of research, it appeared that the Penske brand was pretty much on par performance-wise with Ohlins albeit less expensive; particularly with the group buy discount. The owners of Cogent, Rick and Joyce Tannenbaum; were a joy to deal with and very exacting in getting details of my weight, riding habits and road types so that they could spring and valve it to my specific needs.  Most impressed with the specification but still some reservations at this stage as to whether an average rider like me would really notice much difference in improved damping control and  a custom spring.

At least it took care of my birthday present from Jennie and she even had the grace not to ask how much it was going to cost - phew!

The 8983 Penske rear shock duly arrived what a beauty!  Rose joints top and bottom to reduce friction and alignment issues, with a remote compression damping reservoir for easy adjustment.  Also a comprehensive manual for set-up and maintenance.  All I did prior to fitting it was to increase the length by 8mm to match the ride height spacer previously used with the OEM shock and fitting took less than 2 hours.

Before heading out on the first test ride, sag was checked and it sat right in the recommended range, so the temptation to fiddle was resisted!  I know every bump and corner on my favourite racetrack (errr... sorry, favourite public highway) and the new shock was an absolute revelation.  There are bad truck ripples on one of the bends which threw the 'bird badly off line at speed with the old suspension and with the new rear shock, it just about completely evened them out with the superior damping - incredible!  What this also meant was that corner entry and exit speeds could be higher with no greater effort and with better levels of control.  Similar advantages were apparent on straight roads with poor surfaces - bumps and other annoyances were hardly noticeable.

However, the downside of having a top drawer rear shock was that it exposed the stock Blackbird front end for what it was - grossly under-sprung and probably under-damped. Wasn't game to push my luck with my Chief Financial Manager for a full rebuild so settled for some longer, heavier rate springs and shorter spacers from the UK. A piece of cake to install and what a difference!  No excessive diving or bottoming out under hard braking or road shocks being transmitted through the bars over rough surfaces.  As well as having precision steering, I was now less fatigued on journeys - an additional safety bonus!

So would I recommend a suspension upgrade for an average rider?  The answer is unequivocally YES and buy it well before bling like aftermarket mufflers and so on - you'll be faster where it counts anyway!  I'm probably a slow learner and you'll be rolling your eyes and saying that I'm stating the bleeding obvious, but it really was a revelation with respect to just how big the difference was despite having ridden bikes for so long.

I think that my Street Triple will also benefit from having better damping.  Although the handling is superb, its light weight means that it tends to dance about a bit at speed on uneven surfaces, albeit not in a really unsettling way.  However, as it's only 7 months old, there might be a Disturbance in the Force if the matter is raised in the immediate future!

Oh yes, and a final benefit if you're of a mind to approach your infinitely Better Half for permission to spend money on a suspension upgrade....  I reckon that conservatively, tyre life on the Blackbird increased by at least 2000 km due to lower stresses.  In other words, the tyres weren't trying to compensate for inadequate suspension any longer.  So there you are - go and discuss the saving on tyres with a straight face and (almost) clear conscience!

Some days are better than others!

The northern part of the north island of NZ is currently in the grip of a drought but on the positive side, it's meant calm, warm days which are perfect for outdoor activities.  Having been retired for almost exactly 2 years, we have time to use these days more or less how we want!  All days are pretty good but yesterday was a bit special!

It started with jumping on the Street Triple first thing in the morning and riding 50 kilometres over some hills and down the coast to a nearby town to pick up some electronic goodies.  Warm, sunny, virtually nothing on the road in either direction.  In short, it was one of those spiritually uplifting rides that makes you at one with the universe.  Not fizzing with excitement, just perfect harmony if you get my drift.  The first picture shows the road I travelled on so you can see why I love it so much.  The photo of me was taken by a friend last year when I still had the Blackbird but the scenery hasn't changed!

 

In the afternoon, the tides were favourable and Jennie was keen to go fishing so we launched just down the road from our house and anchored in the commercial mussel farm just offshore.  The conditions were so magnificent that it wouldn't have mattered if we didn't catch anything but catch we did!  Both Jennie and I had our 20 lb lines broken early on in the expedition so there were clearly some big fish around!  We ended up with Jennie out-fishing me 8 snapper to 4 but at least I salvaged some honour with the heaviest fish of the day. I publicly apologise for my appalling dress sense  in the final photo but it's my lucky fishing gear!

After riding in the morning, fishing in the afternoon followed by filleting and a very pleasant dinner, sleep came easily; as it does when you've had a fulfilling and carefree day.  Days like this are good for the soul!