The Rubber Meets The Road
Tires are pretty important, do ya think?
Have you ever watched the tread melt off your tire? I have. Not literally turning to liquid and dripping off, but being worn off in a matter of hours.
What you need to understand is that motorcycle tires are an entirely different critter than car tires. With car tires you have a broad, almost flat tread that the car rides on top off all the time. Motorcycle tires have a round profile because when you turn, you are leaning the bike. The round profile ensures that you always have tread in solid contact with the ground.
With only two tires, and those having very small contact areas, it is extremely important that you have good grip. Car tires have a hard rubber tread that will last 35,000 miles and more. In order to get a good grip, motorcycle tires use a very soft rubber. And guess what? That soft rubber wears away a whole lot quicker than hard rubber, generally not lasting much more than 10,000 miles.
Then there’s the effect of air pressure in the tires. It’s common knowledge that under-inflated tires wear out quicker, on cars as well as bikes. And while under-inflation can ruin a set of car tires in just a few thousand miles, that’s nothing compared to the soft rubber on motorcycle tires.
Which gets me back to my story.
In the early days of the OFMC, John and Bill and I went one year to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. While there I noticed that I was getting a bit thin on tread and mentioned it to the guys, who looked and agreed I would be needing new tires pretty soon after we got back home.
We only rode on to Page, AZ, the next day, which is about 100 miles. While unloading the bike I happened to glance at my rear tire and I was shocked. What little tread it had just a few hours ago was almost completely gone! I called Bill and John over and they gasped in amazement. Somebody had a tire gauge and when I checked my air pressure it was very, very low.
Of course I put air in, and it’s no surprise I was nervous the rest of the trip about the possibility of a blow-out. Realistically, I should have had a new tire put on right there in Page, but ever the optimist and a cheapskate to boot, I didn’t. And it did get me home safely.
But I tell you what, these days I have it on my calendar to check tire pressure on both my bikes and my car at the first of every month. And if I’m getting set to go on a trip I check the pressure before I leave.
This is really all just common sense, but it’s so easy sometimes to ignore common sense. It is far, far harder to ignore your own eyes when you see the tread vanish from a tire that quickly. We all learned a good lesson that day.
Biker Quote for Today
If you think it’s too dangerous, go home and cut your lawn, and leave us to it. — Guy Martin
Tags: motorcycle tires
