suspension talk (or why are my tires worn so funny?)

[Slide Panda]

Lighting is key. So if you can find a strong light and perhaps a helper to hold it at an angle that will help show the issue it might help.

[Dirty Duc]

I think these might better illustrate the wear.

[Slide Panda]

Ok, that second one seems to capture some of whats going on. Looks like you could do with a bit of rebound adjustment - but that really worn point has me a bit stumped. What I've learned of this skill has been on road biased (like the MT90s) or road tires. The more off road we go with tires, the further we get from the knowledge I have.

You running sufficient air pressures on the pavement?

[Dirty Duc]

Air pressure is good.  I run them pretty high for street use, but not more than max for the tire and maybe only a little more than recommended for the bike... and they haven't been off-road nearly as much as I anticipated.

These are billed as 75% on road.  I'll say they significantly improved my confidence in dirt, mud, and most recently heavily sanded ice.  They seem to be wearing sufficiently long for my tastes (although even if the front didn't look so weird I would probably change it anyway due to the light cracking at the base of the blocks).

[Slide Panda]

YOu on ADV Rider? They might have more insights for those flavor of tires

[Dirty Duc]

Yeah, I'm over there too. 

It's just hard to find info that isn't buried in 40 pages of "Hey, I'd like to know that too" or "I'd never trust my bike to anything but Heidies or TKCs" or something else.  Most of the posters over there seem to be pretty conservative, and last I checked there was no solid info about these tires (other than dire warnings about the bias ply version).

[Dirty Duc]

Alright, after further research:

It appears racetech recommends changing the rebound valve in the forks and the shock, bumping the front spring rate from .8kg/m to 1.0, and bumping the rear spring rate from 7.0 to 14.4 

[Slide Panda]

Call RaceTech - their online thing is TERRIBLE for shocks. Forks, it's ok to iffy. But shocks are totally FUBAR. Or call Traxxion Dynamics - but speak to someone. Don't just go by web calcs.

A 14.4 shock spring would be for something like a 800 pound dresser, not a Strom. You'd basically end up with a hard tail.

I figured you had some rebound problem in the front there.. but wasn't sure enough to put it out. That wear patter is still a head scratcher for me.