[sqwert]

I agree about the importance of the construction of the tire body. I never drop air, not on an adventure bike, especially when loaded for a real adventure. Hey, let the air out of the tires to get more traction, pinch a tube, walk home. I run hairier knobs instead. Air down, too many risks. Run bigger tires with more aggressive treads. Size matters.

So does stiffness. (Don't go there!) 6 ply ratings suite me fine. Dunlop 606 is a toughy. I don't have to air down, gets traction in most anything, and never worry about pinched tubes. I don't mind stiff sidewalls. I have 3 tire tools, one is cut short, bent on the end opposite the spoon, and a deep notch is ground in at an angle to anchor on a spoke. Nice third hand when riding alone. Also, the bent end can be beaten with a log or rock to break a bead.


Anywho, my 53 years of motorcycling experience reveals lots of ways to do things. Motocross tires and tire sizes suck for anything else. Motocross bikes need to be light so tires need to be as light as possible, which means soft and weak. Run low air for max traction, tire life beyond the checkered flag does not matter. Motocross bikes HAVE to have berms to make time around corners or they have to be power slid. (I'm not admitting that when the berms were not to my liking or crowded with bikes I used other bike's tires and riders' feet for berms.) As much as conditions change during a race, no two power slides are alike. Very, very few riders can pull off 45 minutes of power sliding intentionally without crashing. Again. And again. Except on an especially prepped, mostly level (sometimes slightly banked), flat track. Also, 45 minutes of power sliding will usually wear the soft knobs right off a brand new MX tire. No, MX rubber is exactly wrong for most any other type of motorcycle.

You are not racing. If you crash you ruin my ride because I now have to take care of your pansy crack. My ride for the day is O-V-E-R. You suck. Sometimes, things happen. Most of the time, things happen to the same pansy cracks over and over. I don't ride with them any more. Neither do my friends when someone proves him or her self a pansy crack. Today, I'm typing about tires. Other times I can type other chapters in the Pansy Crack Prediction Book, because the vast majority have tell-tale introductory features.

To corner consistently without berms one needs STABILITY and TRACTION. In no particular order, stability is easy, run an aggressive tread and air it up to about 20 pounds off road. Use a stiffer tire body in the biggest size you can fit. Run more air if you have plenty of traction. The more air you run, to a point, the stronger and more stable the tire. If necessary, gear down to get the power band at the speeds you like. Might need to run thicker fork/shock oil and better brake pads/shoes to perform well with heavier tires.

Here is a true, extreme example. TWs have monster tires. Other than an inch of rear rim diameter, Harley used the exact same tire sizes on Electra Glides for quite some time. These days Electra Glides run the same width tires as TWs, 180 rear, 130 front. Way too much tire for a 200cc bike with 12.7 horsepower? Nope, just about perfect.

If I had a dollar for every time someone came up to me and expressed amazement that my big fat butt on a 12.7hp 200cc lumper could keep up with their KTM/KLR/BMW/Husky/etc. with 2.5 to 6 times the displacement on curvy loose muddy dirt and gravel roads I would treat us all to a nice steak dinner. Twice. You see, most of these bikes have MX-styled wheels and tires, and they just don't work without berms. Some have thinly disguised street tires (anybody else see adventure tires and think cheater slicks?) and they don't work, either.

Next requirement is tread. Gnarly, aggressive off road tread. Go look at the tire on the back of a TW. The originals had MX type knobs across the tread. Not anymore. Now, TWs come with a Bridgestone TW34. Look at the two center rows of knobs. They are wide, zig and zag, and are closely spaced. This provides a quiet, smooth ride, long wear, and tons of traction on pavement for the 99.7% of the time the bike is rolling. The tire's round cross section provides a gentle transition to the next row, pretty much conventional knobs spaced further apart. If these knobs squiggle under cornering loads the edges of the center knobs take up the slack. However, if the surface is softer than asphalt, the third and fourth rows of knobs dig in and drive, and corner, and brake. MX style knobs would just slide right out without the stiffness provided by the two center rows of "street knobs". Only the first 1/3 or so of the 5th row of knobs ever touch pavement--too many hard parts dragging--but when the surface is soft and the tire sinks in, the 5th and sixth rows come into play. You just can't spin this tire even in soft sand and mud unless you really try, and most riders need a bike with a lot more displacement. This is by far the BEST tire I've ever owned for dualsport/adventure/street and no berms. It will stop up with mud if you let it, but even the puny 12.7hp of the 200 will spin it clean without a strain. Plus, these tires have lasted 15,000+ miles under my fat butt.

So, bigger is better. MORE! MORE! Sure MX knobbies only have 5 rows of tread. The TW tire has 10. More is better, too.

On the other hand, the stock TW front tire sucks. Unless it is brand new. Then it wears out in about 6000 miles. The long, skinny center knobs closely spaced in two rows wear off kilter terribly fast, causing all manner of vibration and noise. The middle rows themselves seem to squiggle cornering on pavement, not support at all for the adjacent rows, two on each side. Too bad Bridgestone didn't do a smaller version of the rear tire for the front. That's okay, though, there are all manner of tires from cheater slick to 5/3 MX style that will fit. Most are intended for the rears of bigger bikes, so tough and aggressive tires can be had.

I wish my RX3 could fit the 180/80-14 TW tire on the back, with something like the Dunlop D908RR in 140/80-18 for the front. STIFF enough tires for STABILITY when dragging pegs, tons of TRACTION on any surface short of glare ice or spilled oil, TOUGH enough punctures will be very rare (nothing a little RideOn wouldn't fix), probably LAST 15-20,000 miles per set, STRONG enough to carry any load an RX3 will pull. Not cheap, but nothing better. That's the way to go.