Tyres for heavier bikes?

[Oblivion]

I've used the search function, but none of the threads really touched on this.

So its come up to that time where I have to replace the tyres on the GPz. And since this has been the first time that I have had to replace the tyres (GN had crappy plasticy ones that lasted forever) I have no idea what I'm doing suffice to say.

Now the rear has a Shinko 712 on it, and its at the WL, and some sort of crappy chinese tyre on the front which is not that inspiring in the wet. So for the benefit of the doubt, both are going to be replaced.

I have no idea how far these tyres have travelled, so I'm looking to shop around to see what fits my style. Now being a bit of a porker at 205kgs, what would people recommend as a medium compound ST tyre? I really don't want overly sticky tyres, as being a student, and a regular weekend rider, I cant afford to have to replace tyres every 5000k's. Especially at 450-600$ a pop, it won't fit into a student budget.

I've had a wee look around at reviews of some of them, Michelin Pilot Actives, Sport Demons, and Avon Roadriders (Cracked Sidewalls seem to be a recurring thing with these)+ a few more, and they all seem to be good tyres, but I couldn't find anything about them on the heavier bikes.

Any suggestions and or experience with these on the heavier bikes?, even recommendations would be helpful.

Oh, and before I forget, the sizes are 100-90-19, and 120-80-18.

Cheers

PS; Forgive me if this has been done before and oversight has been made

[Akzle]

bridgy bt45s are the sticky ones that you'll chew out.
michellen 2cts probably best bet
pilots, roads, powers etc all OK, but similar (?) short lifespan.
-gsx750.

[budda]

I've used the search function, but none of the threads really touched on this.

So its come up to that time where I have to replace the tyres on the GPz. And since this has been the first time that I have had to replace the tyres (GN had crappy plasticy ones that lasted forever) I have no idea what I'm doing suffice to say.

Now the rear has a Shinko 712 on it, and its at the WL, and some sort of crappy chinese tyre on the front which is not that inspiring in the wet. So for the benefit of the doubt, both are going to be replaced.

I have no idea how far these tyres have travelled, so I'm looking to shop around to see what fits my style. Now being a bit of a porker at 205kgs, what would people recommend as a medium compound ST tyre? I really don't want overly sticky tyres, as being a student, and a regular weekend rider, I cant afford to have to replace tyres every 5000k's. Especially at 450-600$ a pop, it won't fit into a student budget.

I've had a wee look around at reviews of some of them, Michelin Pilot Actives, Sport Demons, and Avon Roadriders (Cracked Sidewalls seem to be a recurring thing with these)+ a few more, and they all seem to be good tyres, but I couldn't find anything about them on the heavier bikes.

Any suggestions and or experience with these on the heavier bikes?, even recommendations would be helpful.

Oh, and before I forget, the sizes are 100-90-19, and 120-80-18.

Cheers

PS; Forgive me if this has been done before and oversight has been made

Take a good look at Bridgestone BT45's - very good all round rubber. Your favourite Local Shop should be able to help ........

[FJRider]

GPz550's are hardly "heavy" bikes. (Compare it with an FJ1200 )

Talk to a bike shop about the type of riding you do ... or WANT to do. (Tour in all weathers or Sunday scratcher)

[Haggis2]

205kg's, can you afford tyres while eating that many pies?

[george formby]

Take a good look at Bridgestone BT45's - very good all round rubber. Your favourite Local Shop should be able to help ........

+1 A mate does huuuge miles on his 650 Revere wid dese on. And I used them on my GT750 back in the day.

[GrayWolf]

I've used the search function, but none of the threads really touched on this.

So its come up to that time where I have to replace the tyres on the GPz. And since this has been the first time that I have had to replace the tyres (GN had crappy plasticy ones that lasted forever) I have no idea what I'm doing suffice to say.

Now the rear has a Shinko 712 on it, and its at the WL, and some sort of crappy chinese tyre on the front which is not that inspiring in the wet. So for the benefit of the doubt, both are going to be replaced.

I have no idea how far these tyres have travelled, so I'm looking to shop around to see what fits my style. Now being a bit of a porker at 205kgs, what would people recommend as a medium compound ST tyre? I really don't want overly sticky tyres, as being a student, and a regular weekend rider, I cant afford to have to replace tyres every 5000k's. Especially at 450-600$ a pop, it won't fit into a student budget.

I've had a wee look around at reviews of some of them, Michelin Pilot Actives, Sport Demons, and Avon Roadriders (Cracked Sidewalls seem to be a recurring thing with these)+ a few more, and they all seem to be good tyres, but I couldn't find anything about them on the heavier bikes.

Any suggestions and or experience with these on the heavier bikes?, even recommendations would be helpful.

Oh, and before I forget, the sizes are 100-90-19, and 120-80-18.

Cheers

PS; Forgive me if this has been done before and oversight has been made

As FJRIDER points out, compared to an FJ, the 550 is a lightweight, From experience of 3 porkers, all 240kg plus, 1000cc+ bikes... and a 107kg ridfer, here is what I would suggest....

FJ1200/GPz550 = 1980's. Firstly the forks (suspension) is 'outdated'... I tried several tyres on the front of the FJ and it's sheer weight and how the suspension worked was extremely hard on any soft compound tyre.. Diablo's were demolished in under 6k.

ZZR1100.... still 'older school' suspension, but a big improvement over the FJ, still farkin hard on front tyres.........

MT-01.. ( has the R1 forks, also tweaked by 'now' KSS) and Ohlins rear,,,, still heavy on front tyres, but a lot 'kinder' than the other two bikes.

Cartridge, upside down forks etc will have a bearing on how suspension works. Style of bike has an effect, a sprotty 100cc and rider is likely to only weigh as much as the FJ, ZZR, MT with no rider aboard.......

Rear Tyre's
The GPz is not a sprotbike, it has old style suspension and I would suggest looking for tyres suited to it, rather than just going out to buy 'flypaper sticky' ones. Sure it's handling at the 'limit' may be SLIGHTLY improved by sticky compound tyres, at the expense of rapid wear. The original FJ1200 tyres were a Dunlop 'semi radial'... the sidewall is old school and quite deep, whereas modern tyres tend to have little to negligible sidewall. I tried several modern tyres (I travel a min of 20k a year) some wore out quickly, especially 2 up... I had quite a lengthy discussion or two with my local parts guy, and we came to the conclusion by watching wear rate, the way the tyre wore (diablo's looked like the rubber was being almost 'chewed' off the front tyre under braking, the rear just wore the centre out at a high rate) that the original OEM dunlops were just a lot stiffer carcass, hence the 'heavyweight' HD style Dunlop on the rear and 'heavy' sport tourer on the front.
When I ended up with the Dunlop rear that is produced for heavyweight bikes (yup Hardley's), The FJ's rear end immediately felt more 'planted' and stable on the road. The tyre carcass was so rigid you could hardly bend it with your hands, the FJ is an ABS model, and weighs in at 275 wet.

The ZZR (240kg wet), I tried Diablo's, lovely tyre wore out fast. I ended up with the dual compound Bridgestone BT23sport/tourer tyres.

The MT? Same 'combination' BT23 (heavy carcass) on the rear, and the slightly grippier sport/tour compound on the front, the MT-01 is 264kg wet.
The MT has sports suspension, but being a Big V twin, the power pulses and 'torque' will annihilate rear lids with aplomb. So the combination of weight and effect? a heavy carcass tyre works well...
BUT then I dont ride at 10/10th's everywhere I go......

[Disco Dan]

Stay away from all those sports bike tires like pilot powers etc... will last you 10 minutes... unless you got a gixxer sproks bike you wont get the benefits of them.

Your bike is a light weight by the way too....

For commuting and the odd twisty weekend trips look for dual compounds (so they don't square off so easily). If your just weekend riding twisties (mmm twisties...) then you may want to look at the touring tire ranges.

I'm running the new Metzeler Z8's on my ZZR1100 - fantastic but already the front is taking a pounding. Excellent feel but my gosh I was shocked at the high pressure they need! 40 psi according to the shop. They are a new type of "dual compound" instead of having hard compound in the middle and softer sticker rubber along the edges they are the same rubber throughout - they just have really tight inside threads in the middle and looser along the edges to give a much better ride and are suited to 'big bikes'.

Some people argue Shinko tires are so much better now than they used to be but I'm not convinced yet - heck I would need to try them for myself and I'm not forking out $$$$ for shinko's to find out they are rubbish...


Good luck... oh and remember everyone rides different... everyone will think X Y Z tires are better etc etc. Try them for yourself - some shops even let you swap them after a few k's if you don't like them...

[MarkW]

Your motorcycle was built long before radial tyres were available for motorcycles and the suspension system is no where near as flash as what is available these days.

I would stick to bias belt tyres (cross ply in car terms). The mileage available may not be quite as flash as a modern radial will do but the price of the bias belt tyre is way less than a radial.

Your tyre sizes are not unusual for the 1980's but are less common now so the first step will need to be finding who has available tyres of the correct size. Go onto the Cycletreads website and have a look. They have a good range of manufacturers listed.

Your bike is not heavy and doesn't have huge horsepower. As George Formby above says, I run the Bridgestone BT45 and get more than 10,000km out of them on my 240kg 52 horsepower D'eauville. I've used these tyres for many years and they suit me, my riding style (sports touring on back country sealed roads) and my motorcycle. Michelin Pilot Activs also work as do Pirelli Sport Demons.

Hope this helps.

Mark W

[katben]

I'm pretty sure MICHELIN Pilot Activ will be what you're looking for

but the MICHELIN Commander II comes in 100/90 B19 for the front and is for heavier bikes, I have one on the front of mine, and it warms up and works well, and is probably the answer to the question you actually asked

people (not me I haven't used any recently) also swear by metzeler lasertec, I'm pretty sure I've riden a GPZ550 with those on back in the day

http://www.metzeler.com/site/uk/prod.../Lasertec.html

but I'm pretty sure they are very popular on similar Kawasakis

[Hobbyhorse]

My Yamaha xv400 has Shinko 712s on both wheels and thus far (3000ks) they have performed well. My BMW R80RT has a Continental on the rear (4000ks) and all good but the front tyre was a Taiwanese Kenda which was really poor and delaminated after 2500ks..... it threw pieces of rubber off as you were riding ....nasty!! Fitted a Metzler and loving it.

[Flip]

I curretly use Conti Milestones. Great tyres for my "light weight" cruiser 350kg + 100kg for fat old me.