I’ve practically seen my tires “melting” away!

Long story short:
I took the bike for a spin this Saturday. I have Pirelli Diablo Corsa 3 (double compound) on it with just a little bit over 4k miles - 90% of them are canyon riding.
Great tires btw for dry pavement, they are soft, sticky & very predictable in turns, exactly what I wanted for my FZ.
They are now pretty worn out, I thought is time to start thinking of a new pair, but I still had time, sometimes in the summer, etc.

I took a canyon down to the ocean before lunch and when I stopped to rest a bit I took a couple of pictures of the rear tire - that's when I saw I also have a nail in there.

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Then I told myself that I should start to look for tires sooner, like now.

So I headed back home - here is a video of my after-lunch ride:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNuB-aSOxPo]YouTube - Latigo - 2010 JAN 30 .avi[/ame]

15-20 miles & an hour later, I pulled into the garage at home, and my tires are done (see pics).

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I was shocked. The Diablos handled perfect until their last breath. The only thing I didn't like about them is that they suddenly gave up on me in a couple of weeks, that's it. Maybe I'm not used with this sudden wear signs, but that's the way they go.

I liked them so much, I just reordered another pair of Corsa 3 (They were on sale 40%, they cost me $384 including tax & delivery).
Not too cheap for 6 months, but great tires.

WOW thats extreme but... From what i have found out in the last 3 days whilst talking to my tyre tech , it's not an uncommon occurrence with multi compound tyres... All you need to do is wear through a tiny patch of the harder compound and it literally shreds away to the softer part as your pic's indicate... Hence my tyre tech not being a huge fan of multi compound tyres :thumbup:

Humperdinkel said:

All you need to do is wear through a tiny patch of the harder compound and it literally shreds away to the softer part as your pic's indicate... Hence my tyre tech not being a huge fan of multi compound tyres :thumbup:

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Interesting. I was going to spring for dual compound tires and didn't go for them. My last set was on my bike PR2s for only 500 miles before I crashed my FZ6, so I'm hesitant to put a ton of money into certain things. It was also about money being really short and also a tire sale for Christmas, so Pilot Powers are coming soon.

knightrider said:

Interesting. I was going to spring for dual compound tires and didn't go for them. My last set was on my bike PR2s for only 500 miles before I crashed my FZ6, so I'm hesitant to put a ton of money into certain things. It was also about money being really short and also a tire sale for Christmas, so Pilot Powers are coming soon.

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I was looking at buying the triple compound Dunlop Roadsmarts and thats how the topic came up with my Tyre Tech , now im riding on a set of single compound Metzeler Z6 Interact's :thumbup:

razteo said:

Long story short:

I liked them so much, I just reordered another pair of Corsa 3 (They were on sale 40%, they cost me $384 including tax & delivery).
Not too cheap for 6 months, but great tires.

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I hope you mean $284... Sporttour.com has them for $276 + $20 s/h as the regular price.

That tyre looks pretty worn even prior to your trip, I certainly wouldn't fancy riding hard on it.
Please don't push your luck on a baldy especially one with a nail in it. I don't mean to disrespect you but IMO that was a very daft thing to do.

Did you actually ride home on that tyre? If so you are one lucky fella.

Was you tyre over inflated?
I had new tyres fitted on an ER-5 when I was a courier. I didn't check the pressures and The rear wore through in 1200 miles. If the weather was very hot and you were really nailing it normal tyre pressure will also increase the wear.



Nelly:thumbup:

Pirelli's wear fast.

But once they are worn beyond the wear markers, get new tires!
The tire will melt away and the grip will be a lot less.

I'm not the most carefull rider out there, but my tires are always in good condition with the right pressure.

Ps: dual compound tires are fine ... "all" the new models are dual compound now.

your before pictures show tires that are already past worn out according to the wear strips. your tire was already telling you its worn out and you shouldnt ride out.

thats in the BEFORE pic.

not very surprising they were completely gone after railing on them even a little bit. they were already completely worn out before you went out.

when my tires hit the wear indicators if i cant get tires for a lil bit i only make local runs @ casual speeds. i consider them toasted.

be safe with ur tires man. it all seems good and well until one ruptures. then youre doing X miles per hour on one tire. and running through the rubber completely isnt the only thing that can cause it to rupture i think.

im pretty sure a big bump in the road like a pothole would be enough to rupture an extremely depleted tire.

(none) said:

I hope you mean $284... Sporttour.com has them for $276 + $20 s/h as the regular price.

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nope.
$384 both tires at CycleGear on sale now:

Cycle Gear - PIRELLI: Diablo Corsa 3 Street Motorcycle Tires, FRONT

Nelly said:

That tyre looks pretty worn even prior to your trip, I certainly wouldn't fancy riding hard on it.
Please don't push your luck on a baldy especially one with a nail in it. I don't mean to disrespect you but IMO that was a very daft thing to do.

Did you actually ride home on that tyre? If so you are one lucky fella.

Was you tyre over inflated?
I had new tyres fitted on an ER-5 when I was a courier. I didn't check the pressures and The rear wore through in 1200 miles. If the weather was very hot and you were really nailing it normal tyre pressure will also increase the wear.



Nelly:thumbup:

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well, they were worn, but they still had perfect grip.
As I said, I noticed the nail right before lunch that day & I decided to get new tires. I rode back home (not to hard, see my video, there were a lot of rocks & gravel on the road) and when I got home I saw the tires completely gone - then I was scared!
That whole thing happened in less than 1 hour of riding.

And the pressure was fine, I allways check it.

I am not riding the bike anymore with this tires, the new set op Pirellis are on the way.

Speedygonzales said:

Pirelli's wear fast.

But once they are worn beyond the wear markers, get new tires!
The tire will melt away and the grip will be a lot less.

I'm not the most carefull rider out there, but my tires are always in good condition with the right pressure.

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This Pirelli are soft & with great grip - perfect for canyons and dry weather as is here.
That's why they wear fast.
I never commute on them, but if you do, they last long time.
As you said, I was just surprised about how fast the wear at the end of their lifetime, I wasn't ready for this. Now I learn my lesson.

I love those Pirellis, except for the price, is a great soft predictable tire.

razteo said:

well, they were worn, but they still had perfect grip.

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Is your life really worth so little? Lots of people giving good advice here that your apparently oblivious too it.
You should learn a lesson from this or you may not be so lucky next time.

Hmmm. Maybe the lesson to be learned from this is that:
the rate of wear on a tire increases towards the end of the tire's life.

So, if you look at your tire tread depth and think:
"well, I've got about 500 miles left before I can consider riding unsafe"
you may be basing this estimate on the rate of wear from early on in the tire's life, and since the tire is towards the end of its life, the rate of wear has increased and you may only have 200 miles left before it is unsafe to ride.

^^that was a long sentence. Did it make any sense??

Hmm, maybe I wasn't to clear, I don't know. The story goes like this:

1. I consider my life very important.

2. I had noticed how worn my tires were Saturday before lunch time, that's when I took the BEFORE pictures. I also noticed a nail in rear, so I decided to change the tires.
That's why I went straight home, but without believing the tires are so close to their end - see BEFORE pictures, they are worn, but nothing as close to what they looked when I got home.
I don't think anyone who seen the BEFORE pictures will tow its bike home.

3. I got home and I was in shock seeing how the tires wear in 1 hour (which is I think unusual, at least for me, that's why I'm posting this for others to be aware of this popular Pirelli tire wear behaviour).
I will be aware of this next time & I will change the tires way before reaching this point.

4. The whole story has nothing to do with wrongfully evaluating my life and safety - I was aware since I saw the tires BEFORE lunch time that I need a new pair, but I wasn't ready to see them in such bad shape after I got home 1 hour later.

Cheers!

Thanks for the pics. Nice to see them worn on the sides!

$384....ouch. There are lots of competing tires our there for significantly less.

DefyInertia said:

Thanks for the pics. Nice to see them worn on the sides!

$384....ouch. There are lots of competing tires our there for significantly less.

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That's right, but you know, after I did some research online, I still prefer this ones for the soft compound & good grip.

I narrowed down the others in the same category, they were Michelin Pilots & some Dunlops, just a bit cheaper, but from specialty reviews & people comments they're not as good as this Pirellis at cornering & grip.
Maybe I could get more miles out of them, or they perform better in wet (BTW Corsa 3 are not great on wet), which are all issues that I'm not interested in.

razteo said:

That's right, but you know, after I did some research online, I still prefer this ones for the soft compound & good grip.

I narrowed down the others in the same category, they were Michelin Pilots & some Dunlops, just a bit cheaper, but from specialty reviews & people comments they're not as good as this Pirellis at cornering & grip.
Maybe I could get more miles out of them, or they perform better in wet (BTW Corsa 3 are not great on wet), which are all issues that I'm not interested in.

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If that's the tire you want, that's the tire you want. But we're not talking about "just a bit cheaper", it's more like $100 to $150 cheaper per set. Just passing on the info...do as you please. :thumbup:

What about the BT-016 or BT-003? They go for $230 to $260 shipped including taxes if you buy them from an out of state vendor that does not have sales tax nexus in CA.

There is also the new version of the dunlop qualifier that is supposed to be an excellent tire....not sure on the price.

DefyInertia said:

If that's the tire you want, that's the tire you want. But we're not talking about "just a bit cheaper", it's more like $100 to $150 cheaper per set. Just passing on the info...do as you please. :thumbup:

What about the BT-016 or BT-003? They go for $230 to $260 shipped including taxes if you buy them from an out of state vendor that does not have sales tax nexus in CA.

There is also the new version of the dunlop qualifier that is supposed to be an excellent tire....not sure on the price.

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Thanks you for the info.
I had already order them; they suppose to arrive tomorrow.
I didn't liked the OEM BT very much. As soon as I replaced them with the Pirelli, I was like wow! a different bike on the canyons, then I realise how much better the Corsa 3 are.
I like how "predictable " they are, I am more confident in turns, etc.
I wanted to actually try a different tire now, but like I said, after some research I did & for my needs, seems like Corsa 3 are the ones for me.
But of course, they are expensive & because they are soft they don't last long.
(That's another thing - with my riding habits I didn't took much advantage of the harder compound in the middle - I wish they were all soft one compound & cheaper )

Dang, that picture shows the cord completely exposed. Geesh, I have over 17K miles on my stock single compound BT020's and they look a lot better (even though some cord is showing at one spot now). I can hardly believe how little mileage some tires (or is it riders?) get! But, I guess this is good, good news (and profits) for tire manufacturers.