Installed: 55,750km
Removed: 59,865km
Remaining life: Both have plenty of life, but pulled early because of upcoming riding requirements.
I fitted these hoping to find the holy grail of dual purpose tyres – good road and gravel performance and good life. To a certain extent, I found this, but, as you would probably expect, there were downsides.
There is now a solid centre strip on the new Scout version of the K60. The previous model didn’t have this, but the tyre had to be removed from production due to a law change in the mixture used to manufacture tyres. The rear Scout has 3-4 different tread patterns, depending on tyre size, with only the 150/70/17 sporting the centre strip. This is to improve the longevity, but the trade off in clay and mud is that you struggle for grip unless the bike is leant over a bit, as the strip keeps the tyre from biting down, and instead sits on top of the surface. Lean it over however (like through corners) and anyone following you is rewarded with a shower of stones and rocks!
The other downside was a very dubious performance on wet roads, to the point of being scary. I had multiple moments of slides, even on reasonably nice roads, where the tyre simply didn’t grip as much you would expect. Even reducing the pace to account for this, slides were experienced, so your confidence in the wet was non-existent. As bizarre as this comment might sound, in very heavy rain, like pounding down on the motorway, the K60 was less likely to aquaplane due to the massive grooves. On other road tyres I would have had moments of aquaplaning, but never on the K60. Just don’t try that around corners.
On the gravel, bar the problem with the centre strip, I found the tyres quite enjoyable, offering far more grip than road orientated tyres, and I found myself chuckling at the other 1200 GSs struggling on more road biased tyres. The difference was noticeable. Certain forestry roads with clay on the surface the others couldn’t go down as they might not get up, whereas I was OK. On the other hand, riding solo near New Plymouth I almost didn’t get up a road I wandered down, and ended up having to remove all the luggage and my gear, and still barely made it up a steep slippery bit.
As many other people have reported on the likes of AdvRider, I also had pressure issues with the front tyre. Throughout the time it was fitted the front tyre would lose pressure. The worst I experienced was about 5 PSI in a single day. The carcass of the K60 is extremely stiff, so many struggle to fit the tyre (shops are useful like that) and this is also suspected of being the pressure loss issue, where a slight imperfection in the GSA rim around the join weld allows air to escape. Still, the GSA has pressure monitoring so I can easily keep an eye on it, and I also carry a compressor anyway.
The stiff carcass also meant running lower pressures were quite possible with little detriment. On the day the front lost 5 PSI we were doing Waikaremoana and I just kept going. The front was under 30 PSI, probably about 28 and steering and grip was still good, if not perhaps better than before.
Would I use again: Cautiously, yes. Currently, the K60 is the only tyre offering a middle ground between TKC and Tourance/Anakee. If there was another option, I would try it (and there will be in 2013). For long adventure riding trips, it’s very typical to do lots of seal and also gravel roads that challenge the road biased tyres. When you’re on a 250kg pig, you want any advantage when the going gets rough (and it makes the ride more fun as well).
Many doing lots of off road will run a TKC front and K60 rear, getting great traction up front but tyre life on the rear. Normally my road riding is too demanding to consider a TKC front.
Picture is when they were brand new
Originally Posted by Jane Omorogbe from UK MSN on the KTM990SM
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