Ducati Monster Forum

for an 01 900. a lot of long distance riding so the tire life is by far the most important factor for me. figured i would ask rather than sifting through more pages of tire reviews trying to find out something this specific. thanks

A lot of companies make tires for the 'Sport Tour' segment of the market.  Pirelli makes the Diablo Strada for instance.  Look into that sort of tire if you're looking for longer life.  OF course this means they won't be *as* grippy... but for the most part none of us ever see the max grip on our sporty tires anyway

Same question for me  8)
My 2000 750 had a "new" Metzler Sport tec M1 on the rear and it's only lasted 6000 miles.
That seems alittle "short lived" to me......  All the miles are mostly straight so I'm Looking
for long life.  I'll be watching for the replies.....and looking for answers as well  [thumbsup]

See, there's your problem - you're supposed to wear the tire evenly by turning  ;D

Just looked on their site and Pirelli offers 4 different sport tour tires.  2 each of Radial and X-ply.  The Diablo Strada is the higer end of the two Radial choices.

They even have a commuter line

http://www.pirellityre.com/web/catalog/moto/moto_catalogoDett.page?categoria=/catalog/moto/street/sport_tou_radial&vehicleType=MOTO

after going through lots of dunlop qualifiers, i finally wised up and my last tire change i pickup a set of the diable strada's.  they r nice and i dont think i would ever push this tire to its limits, i know i wasnt even close to pushing the qualifiers.

I have pirelli Stradas on the bandit and they are a very nice tire with great performance and wear.  Check out maximum-suzuki.com the guys there do a shit load of miles and are more oriented to touring.

i had a set of metzler roadtec z6's on a bmw R1150R and got about 6k mi out of them but they're designed to get 8k mi or so metzler says...

i must be an aggressive rider 'cause i had M1's on my R11S and i only got 3500 mi out of them unlike "aced" who said he got 6k out of his. it all depends on conditions, where you ride and how hard you twist the wrist i guess...

i would say the best choices for sport touring tires would be the strada's or the Z6's, IMHO.

I had a Diablo Strada on the back of my S4, it lasted longer than the regular Diablo, but not a huge amount.
No issues with the grip on the street.

There's probably longer lasting tires with adequate grip, but I've got no FHE on what they are.

The answer is to fit the Metzler MEZ6 ,long life and great grip and handling..

Wear on motorcycle tires can be due to how the bike is ridden as well. I have seen full on sport tires last 10,000 miles and sport touring tires last 3000.
Try to keep air pressures up and be very smooth on the throttle. sudden acceleration,wheelies  and engine braking all accelerate the wear of our tires.

 

Have the same tires on mine right now and you're right,they don't have good mileage.I heard that bridegestones has better mileage.

of the brands we deal with (michelin, metzeler, pirelli) i'd expect the metzeler ME880 radials to be the longest lasting radial available.  you might be able to get some of the older tyres over there that we can't get here - michelin macadams 90 or 100, metzeler MEZ2, pirelli GTR03/04 (i think?) - that sort of thing, but the 880 is the hardest radial as far as i have come across.  you can still get dunlop 205 i think too - they tend to last a lot longer than the 220 dunlop tried to replace them with and we can still get them.  personally i really like the 205.

maybe go to a big tyre store and have a look at tread depth across various tyres.  i remember the MEZ4 had noticeably more tread depth in the centre than the MEZ3 (sports) for example, even though the Z4 was the old compK compound, so quite soft in comparison to the MEZ2 for example.  MEZ2 are quite hard, but i think the ME880 radial will have taken over from them.

generally the harder ones will grip well when hot, but they need a bit longer to get there.

keep the pressure up too - that'll help.

 [beer] To those that spewed out the info I was lookin for  [thumbsup]

Looks like I also have to find more roads with twists and turns  ;D

No FHE, but Pilot Road2.

I just picked up a new Michelin Road 2, rear only - been running pilot powers and hope this will go beyond the 4k I'm getting now. I'll report on it in 2 months (when I get in another 4k...) and see if I'm gonna get more miles.

I have 5k on my stock 00' 750. but I was starting to loose confidence in them. That is the important thing. If you ride hard, you rubbers will fade quickly. But 5K is really not too bad for bike tires.

thanks for all the replies. im gonna go with either a bridgestone battlax bt-021 or a michelin pilot road. still deciding whether or not to go witha 170 or a 180.  theres a 180 on there now but i can save some $ going with a 170. now i just need to find a good place to get it mounted cheap in nyc

I recently put  a set of Continental Road Attacks on my S2R 1000, and I have to say that I am very immpressed with these tires. Very good grip wet or dry, very good feedback and general road feel, and I've got about 2000 miles on them, and they are wearing much better than the original BT-014's which were gone in 2500 miles(rear), and the Pilot Powers which I got about 3300 miles out of.

Seriously though, even if I don't get that much more milage, I will still buy another set stricktly on performance and feel. I can honestly say that these are the best road tires I have ridden on by far, and I have turned a few buddies on to them as well. They were sceptical, but in the end they all are praising them too.

My bike already had a feathery feel to it, but I swear it feels like I shed thirty or forty pounds off the bike on turn in. The bike falls into corners so effortlesly now it is unbelievable, but they have a very progressive feel while leaned over that inspires crazy lean angles, and makes what once felt very sketchy to me, feel effortless and very routine.

The tires also makes the somewhat average S2R 1000 suspension feel alot plusher. Alot of the roads around here are pretty crappy, and there are alot of tar and chipped roads as well. Both the BT's and the Pilots had a very harsh feel and alot of road noise compared to the Contis. They also make highway rain groove, and also the oil grooves on tar and chips all but disappear.

As you can tell, I am verry pleased with these tires, and I am supprised more people have'nt tried them. I think I paid $225.00 for the set, and at that price, they are hard to beat IMHO. 

Well, I can tell ya it AIN'T the Diable Corsa III's!!  [puke] I'll be lucky to get 3K out of the rear. Oh well, it was fun gettin what I got! Back to my M3's...

I want to further emphasize what ducvet and brad black said about keeping tire pressures up with my own personal example so here goes

I bought a brand new dunlup qualifier for my rear. Unfortunately, i got a finishing nail through it in the first 250 miles. It was such a small leak I didnt notice it. The tire actually held pressure for a couple of days. The be specific I didnt notice it for about 2 1/2 months or approximately 1500 - 1700 miles of riding. I went to a wrench day at DarkStar's and noticed a significant profile difference and significant wear.  I checked the pressure and I was at 19 psi. Filled it up and 2 days later it was back down.

Running tires at 19psi can wear tires out in about 1800 miles.

My previous set of dunlop qualifiers lasted 3800 miles. pressure was about 32-33 which is factory spec.

I switched to a pilot power (standard, not dual compound) and ramped up the PSI to 38 COLD. Max PSI is rated at 42 COLD for this tire. HUGE DIFFERENCE IN WEAR

I got them right after my 7500 tuneup (Approximately 8000 miles) I have 12k on the bike right now and they look like they easily have another 3000 left on them.

Summary

19 psi - 1800 miles
32 psi - 4000 miles
38 psi - probably 7000 miles

You can see that this curve is not linear - If you want significant improvement in tire wear, you dont need necessarily need to go to road tires and such, you just need to make sure your tire pressure is accurate

And BTW, I ride relatively hard, I dont flog them at that track or do burnouts but I ride at a "spirited" pace that would be considered at least average to above average. Please bear in mind that though I do hill riding, I also commute on the bike. About a third of the hill riding is spent on the freeway just getting to the hills.

Bottom line - Check your tire pressure. It is the MOST significant thing you can do to extend the life of your tire. I disregard all tire recommendations; pirelli's, dunlops, michelin's, bridgestones unless you get a pressure rating in the review.