Tires: Pilot Powers of Pilot Roads?

[Cloggy]

Pseudo Cloggy,

I run mainly straight-line interstate to/from work and hit the twisties on the weekend. The Metzelers were pretty well touted for being capable of both but at the end the day it seems to be a compromise; either awesome traction and not much mileage or graet mileage but traction will be less.

Good luck on your choice and let us know what you think of whatever tyres you buy.

P.S. Talked to my in-laws yesterday. They live in Northamptonshire (near Silverstone). My father-in law is a rider also. He's owns an '88 FZ750 since new and says it still runs like a top.

Next time I'm over for a visit I'll see if I can pry him from it and we can go for a ride!

Well I get across to my parents aprox 3 times a year but thats either with plane or Car (up till now), but I can always borrow my mums 125 scooter

 

[HavBlue]

Just a thought here but you may want to look at the Conti Road Attacks. These tires are totally awesome and they warm up quick too, I have had mine for about 3 thousand miles and they're hardly worn at all. They're also about a third less in cost to the Michelin. Just a thought..

 

[Cloggy]

I re-posted the tire test 2007 from the Motorrad at the following location:
http://www.600riders.com/forum/fz6-mods/1907-tires-2.html#post16034

I also ordered the pilot road 2's on Saturday, they will be fitted and balanced on Wednesday.

 

[OneTrack]

That's a wonderful performance comparison chart....thanks for the translation and posting it! :thumbup:
I was a little bit alarmed to see that the Pilot Road 2's only scored 10 out of 20 for 'shimmy', however. I wonder if this would be an issue with the 'relaxed' frame and suspension of the FZ6.

 

[finboz]

a bit late i know but you can translate web pages using this tool


translator

 

[Cloggy]

Thanks for the tip, I must admit it did a better job than I had expected:

Curve stability: Driving stability with fast driving along curves, in change curves and with bumps. In maximum inclination and in the acceleration phase, in which itself some tires know proper up swings, one tests.

But I still love the name babel fish.

 

[finboz]

never did trust the germans

 

[wildboar613]

I've had my PR2's for a few months now. Haven't had a chance to put many miles on them due to health, but I've been impressed with them so far. Handles the curves here in East TN really well. Haven't had any slip issues but been taking it easy for the most part. One of the first to try them in this area so no feedback from anyone else.

 

[Cloggy]

Well I picked up my bike today after having the pilot road 2's fitted (it had been delayed due to delivery problems).
I think they are great tires and sooo much better than the old Dunlops (even when they were new).
I went for a couple of hours ride this afternoon to remove the sheen and the lines. They performed great, so much better at cornering. I didn't go too fast through the tight bends though as it had been raining all morning and there were still a few wet patches on the road.

I'll let you know how far I get on this set, but hopefully that's many miles from now.

 

[OneTrack]

Pseudo Cloggy: Could you give a riding impression update on your PR2's?

 

[HavBlue]

That's a wonderful performance comparison chart....thanks for the translation and posting it! :thumbup:
I was a little bit alarmed to see that the Pilot Road 2's only scored 10 out of 20 for 'shimmy', however. I wonder if this would be an issue with the 'relaxed' frame and suspension of the FZ6.

The tests were done using a GSXR 1000 which may or may not reflect on how that same tire may function on the likes of a GSXR600 or FZ6. Michelin makes a great tire but I will however say many of the folks I know that have used them have complained about their respective ability to last. The Dunlop SportMax 252 I had from the factory were poor at best but they went better than 10,000 miles before being swapped out. Much like underwear, tires for a bike often boil down to what's best for the individual person or rider and what makes them feel good.

 

[reiobard]

Much like underwear, tires for a bike often boil down to what's best for the individual person or rider and what makes them feel good.

great analogy!!!

 

[VEGASRIDER]

Pseudo Cloggy: Could you give a riding impression update on your PR2's?

Yes, I am curious as well. I have almost 12,000 miles on my stock Dunlops, and planning to get a new set of tires in the next month or two. An update would be nice.

Thanks,

 

[OneTrack]

I now have 3000 km's on my stock Dunlop tires and they still look brand new.
I wish they'd hurry up and wear out so that I can justify spending money on some new "better" tires.

 

[HavBlue]

I now have 3000 km's on my stock Dunlop tires and they still look brand new.
I wish they'd hurry up and wear out so that I can justify spending money on some new "better" tires.

Hey OT, just help them out a bit with a few nice burnouts. That should speed up the justification factor....:thumbup:

 

[OneTrack]

If I tried to do a burnout, they'd be picking pieces of me and my bike up for days.
I guess I'm looking for validation to replace (what are to me) perfectly good tires. They're British, after all....what could possibly go wrong?

 

[Scott C]

Well I went with the pilot road 2's. Happy I did so far. Changed from the stock bald dunlop's at 5369 miles. I now have about 6800+ miles on the bike. The new tires have only seen the 1500 freeway miles on them so far. I'm hoping to get into the mountains soon now that its warming up here.

Turn in is considerably better than the stock tires. Minor High speed wobble in the front tire is present sooner than the stock dunlops were but is only present once in a while at speeds around 120-125mph. Its kinda weird sometimes it picks up the wobble and sometimes it doesnt. When it doesnt the bike is still capible of 140+mph and feel like its on a rail. The tire shows no wear at the 1500 mile mark as you can still see the mold marking on the center of the rear tire. Hope to hit the mountains in a couple weeks.

 

[Cloggy]

Pseudo Cloggy: Could you give a riding impression update on your PR2's?

Yeah sorry I took so long one track I must admit I was holding off to get a better feel of the tires, especially a couple of characteristics, but when I heard you may have some issues with a leaky tire I thought I would quickly get my impressions down in case you do choose to change tire.
As I have previously said the Pilot roads are so much better than the stock Dunlops. I have now put aprox 2400 miles on them since I changed over, most of this was winter riding. There is no noticable wear at the moment, but I really don't know how many miles I will get from them.
They definately turn in much quicker than the stock tires.
They stick nicely In the corners (at speed) with a much smoother and solid feel than the stock dunlops, it gives me lots of confidence in the twisties.
The strangest thing I noticed is when slightly leaning into a slow (under 20Km/h) turn it has a slight tendancy to pull the handlebars toward the direction you are turning, the first few times this happened I immediately went to check my tire pressure but they were perfect. It's not extreme in any way but definately noticable.
Another strange thing was the "wobble" that Scott C also mentioned, it has only happened to me twice and in both cases I opened it up, reving quite high, and all of a sudden the front wheel started oscillating (wobbling) at a high frequency (at about 150Km/h), it seems to keep doing this until you bring it back under the 100Km/h when it stops. This is very rare but definately a bit wierd.
In general I am very pleased with the tire, and apart from the 2 mentioned bad characteristics, I think it's a great tire, although I cannot yet comment on one of the most important factors, the durability.

 

[rsw81]

Awakening a month old thread...

I put a Pilot Road on the back, but still run the stock Dunlop on the front. My rear Dunlop ran out of tread at about 8k, but the front had plenty left on it. I now have 11k on the bike and have been really happy with the Michelin on the back. Turn in is much better, rear stopping traction is much better (I used to lock up in the back with very little pressure on the rear brakes), and there is plenty of grip in the twisties. I didn't do the two compound version knowing that I still had the crappy Dunlop up front. Next time around when I replace both, I'll be doing the 2CT Pilot Roads.:rockon:

 

[Cloggy]

Well here goes, I've been putting this off for a couple of weeks now, mainly because I didn't know how to say it without looking a total idiot, so I'll say it anyway .

My previous review of the Pilot road 2's was not correct, the reason for this was simply my tyre pressures were down (especially the front one) , even though I did check them when I noticed this happening (I am not too sure what went wrong).

Anyway this all came about whilst talking to three bikers at my work about these tyres. In the coffee break they had all been discussing this problem and basically couldn't believe it, the reason for this was that 2 of these guys had the same tyres (pilot power 2's) on their bikes and they were crazy about them. These guys have been riding for years and they have all owned different supersport bikes (one guy still has 4).
Anyway they just didn't believe there would be such a big difference, between their experience and mine, so they checked the tyres with a guage from the mechanical section (recently calibrated). And yes they were right the pressures were down about 8 PSI front and about 4 PSI back (compared to the unloaded pressures).

Straight after work I filled my tyres at a local garage that always has a perfectly working guage/pump (recommended by the same guys). Since having the correct pressures it has been such an enormous improvement, turn ins are sharp, excellent grip, no wobble and uptil now still no sign of wear.

Anyway as you can guess there have been many jokes about it since, but I still don't understand how this happened especially after I thought I had checked the pressures correctly.

BTW I have checked the tyre pressures since but I'm not loosing any air.

I obviously do understand the importance of tyre pressures, so I don't need a lecture at this stage, but I just wanted to set the record straight about the Pilot road 2's, they are awesome tyres :thumbup:.