Posts
39
Joined
9/1/2013
Location
AU
Edited Date/Time
5/28/2014 6:27pm
Rear tyres obviously lose their sharpness and occasionally knobs are torn off fairly quickly. The performance drop can be felt, even by this mid pack vet rider, after a couple of race days.
Even after swapping out 2 or 3 rear tyres, the front tyre usually looks decent, with relatively sharp knobs and only very occasional knob chunking. The performance drop is also slower and therefore (for me) harder to detect.
Does anyone have a good rule of thumb for when you should bin your fronts???
Obviously the correct answer would be a matching set for every race day, but I am a fun for $$ type of competitor and my pace does not warrant a fresh set each race day.
Even after swapping out 2 or 3 rear tyres, the front tyre usually looks decent, with relatively sharp knobs and only very occasional knob chunking. The performance drop is also slower and therefore (for me) harder to detect.
Does anyone have a good rule of thumb for when you should bin your fronts???
Obviously the correct answer would be a matching set for every race day, but I am a fun for $$ type of competitor and my pace does not warrant a fresh set each race day.
"... dunno mate, must be the front tyre..."
The Shop
I actually remember being a tyke on a 125, Pretty sure i'd cut the inner wall edge of about 60% the left hand side knobs... and for whatever reason I was practicing starts and just kept hammering through the first left turn on our track, lower and lower, trying to see when it would rip em off.
Weird how when you're a kid and fearless you just go whatever, now, if I feel like my front tyre is half a psi off, I think of my Wife and Daughter and go EVEN slower. haha.
1. When the sharpness of the knobs get rounded off.
2. After hours of use the side walls have been flexed so much that they become weak. If this happens and you are still using the tire run 2 more pounds of air. Otherwise you have a recipe for a pinched tube.
Its actually very easy to see the "rounding" happen. And its nice to have a NEW tire around to compare to. One thing that I believe is that it is MORE important to keep the front sharp vs the rear....meaning that only a little bit of dullness on the knobbies edge is a lot more loss of grip than is felt on the rear.
Though they might still look "OK" after a season.........I still chuck em because I think after all the beating they take that they start to get gooey and weather the knobs are sharp or not , its junk!
and neither has my brother and I used to buy his bikes after he rode them for a season haha
in fact I came 8th overall at a Queensland title meeting on his old bike with a 2 year old front in 1996
yes I am super weird I would just blame myself if I ever tucked the front.. A good test rider I wasn't haha
(so many haha's)
actually he's a tightarse so maybe it did have something to do with money haha
When I used to race every weekend in the 90's, I would change my back tire around to get a sharp edge. Not sure if it helped or not, but I didn't have any extra money back then...
I used to never care about my front, but after putting a new one on this last time, I realized why my zook wasn't cornering worth a shit. So now I'm gonna be anal about my front.
I flip the front after the first rear and change it when I change the second rear.
Not tire related, but to what crush said:
I used to hit this big double over & over when I was 16 trying to perfect better style while in the air.
I recently went to that same track now 16 years later staring at that double while saying to myself "my wife's gonna kill me if I wad this one up." Lol
So of course....... I went for it and damn near did a flying "w" upon landing. It was about that moment when I realized I'm not 16 anymore,lol
Post a reply to: How do you guys determine when your front tyre needs changing?