The Darkside.......

Newhoco

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My last long ride , from Toronto to Deal's gap and back , destroyed a new E07 Dakar rear . we did several days of high speed slab ( Ugh - never again ! ) .

I have another long pavement ride , 2-up , which would be the perfect opportunity to try this tire , but it doesn't seem to be available in Canada - not even on the Bridgestone.ca website . Am I missing something , or are we canucks just too safety conscious ?
 

Clawdog60

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Re: Car Tires - What people think are the negatives or want to debate


("Y"s added for 2112)
Two reasons. Largely, it's because a car tyre will not meet what is a normal key vehicle design goal. When you roll into a curve with a round tyre profile, your input force is relatively constant and a CT doesn't do that. Instead, a CT takes more effort to initially displace from vertical, and then you need to change your input to keep it away from vertical. As you yourself noted from the one CT you said that you tried, the response is very similar to that of a cruiser, and if the rear tire of the cruiser was wide-aspect then we have something to agree on.

But then, you said you found cruisers to be poor handling too, so by extension it sounds like you are arguing to say that all cruisers should be banished. Right?
>:D
The other reason is legal, having to do with design standards. The bead of a car tyre and the bead area of a motorcycle rim have different design standards. Until the manufacturers themselves test and present results showing the use of the two together, it doesn't matter how many people have done it successfully. Conservative legal department guidance will always be that something is not endorsed and potentially dangerous until the company proves otherwise.
Looking at the height of the motorcycle rim bead it would hold better than a car rim.
 

EricV

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I have another long pavement ride , 2-up , which would be the perfect opportunity to try this tire , but it doesn't seem to be available in Canada - not even on the Bridgestone.ca website . Am I missing something , or are we canucks just too safety conscious ?
Try Ebay.canada
 

RCinNC

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Yes, I liked it. He does a good job at presenting things like this. Though I'd disagree on the "non opinionated" assessment. Handling=Shit is pretty much an opinion, as I don't think there's a scientifically calibrated scale for handling that includes "shit" as a reading.
 

Sierra1

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Pretty much what I already figured. If I had a big bagger carrying big loads, or pulling a trailer, and travelled huge distances, especially at higher speeds, or on a VMax....seems like the way to go. As far as handling=shit....it is an opinion....that I tend to share. But, the opinion part comes from what each person expects a bike to handle like. I, like many others I'm sure, have ran a tire to the laaaast little bit of center tread. Which sort of mimics the shape of a car tire. And, my opinion, when you lean....and go from your flat center, to the side walls....there's that transition....that is not smooth....that feels like shit. But, I will remain a bike tire for a bike person....and bitch about how much the tires cost.
 

Clawdog60

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I’ve found no ill handling effects from varying road surfaces so far, but that’s only a 150 miles worth. My only concern is the tire coming off the bead
 

RCinNC

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That would be my primary concern too, Clawdog, after reading Checkswreck's post some pages back, but I don't know that it would worry me to an extreme degree. As far as I know, there are zero reliable statistics to show if there's been a recorded failure of the bead to rim contact on a darkside tire. I actually wouldn't expect there to be, since this is such a niche subject within the motorcycle community, and accident investigators almost certainly aren't keeping any stats on it. However, with as polarizing as this topic is on motorcycle forums, I would think that any anecdotal reports of a failure would be blasted all over the darkside threads, and I've yet to see that happen. Even if it was reported on the Goldwing forum, I'm sure it would still make its way to all the other forums, especially if someone wanted to wallow in victory of "see, I told you so!". I'm not saying with any authority that it's never happened, but I sure can't recall in all the years I've been on forums of anyone reporting a catastrophic failure of a darkside tire. Or even a regular failure. It seems that I recall someone once posting that they had a perpetual slow leak in a darkside tire, but that's a sketchy memory and I couldn't even say where I may have read it. I don't know how many guys out there actually do this, but the ones that do seem to log an awful lot of miles without a failure occurring.

I doubt there will ever be any kind of actual study done on this; there's no benefit for any manufacturer to do so. Guys that do it will have to rely on anecdotal evidence about its potential risk vs actual risk, and decide accordingly. I'm not likely to do it, but I don't think the anecdotal evidence demonstrates that it's inherently risky.
 

Tombstone

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Going off memory here, but I think I'm getting close to 200,000 miles on DS tires (edit - its closer to 150,000).....no problems. Actually doing it counts more than some guy making money off his opinions IMHO.
The funny thing is, I never go up to someone, or get on a forum and say; "you're crazy if you don't try the darkside".
But soooo many haters (without ANY practical experience) talk crap about darksiding... Maybe they don't ride.
 
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Madscrapper85

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Trying to wrap my head around handling=shit when he said himself that after 10 mins he forgot it was there. Shit handling doesn't seem to be something one would forget...no? Or am I just crazy. It's hilarious because I've written that same thing numerous times in different darkside threads.
 

Clawdog60

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That would be my primary concern too, Clawdog, after reading Checkswreck's post some pages back, but I don't know that it would worry me to an extreme degree. As far as I know, there are zero reliable statistics to show if there's been a recorded failure of the bead to rim contact on a darkside tire. I actually wouldn't expect there to be, since this is such a niche subject within the motorcycle community, and accident investigators almost certainly aren't keeping any stats on it. However, with as polarizing as this topic is on motorcycle forums, I would think that any anecdotal reports of a failure would be blasted all over the darkside threads, and I've yet to see that happen. Even if it was reported on the Goldwing forum, I'm sure it would still make its way to all the other forums, especially if someone wanted to wallow in victory of "see, I told you so!". I'm not saying with any authority that it's never happened, but I sure can't recall in all the years I've been on forums of anyone reporting a catastrophic failure of a darkside tire. Or even a regular failure. It seems that I recall someone once posting that they had a perpetual slow leak in a darkside tire, but that's a sketchy memory and I couldn't even say where I may have read it. I don't know how many guys out there actually do this, but the ones that do seem to log an awful lot of miles without a failure occurring.

I doubt there will ever be any kind of actual study done on this; there's no benefit for any manufacturer to do so. Guys that do it will have to rely on anecdotal evidence about its potential risk vs actual risk, and decide accordingly. I'm not likely to do it, but I don't think the anecdotal evidence demonstrates that it's inherently risky.
I would like to see how easily the bead is to break after the tire is near the end of its life. For me this would be a good indicator of an on road failure. I’ll find out in about 30k miles.
 

Clawdog60

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Trying to wrap my head around handling=shit when he said himself that after 10 mins he forgot it was there. Shit handling doesn't seem to be something one would forget...no? Or am I just crazy. It's hilarious because I've written that same thing numerous times in different darkside threads.
Your not! He minced words.
 

RCinNC

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I would like to see how easily the bead is to break after the tire is near the end of its life. For me this would be a good indicator of an on road failure. I’ll find out in about 30k miles.
I would think someone on this forum could answer that already. There's a few darksiders in the thread who must have changed their tires at some point, and could describe what it was like when they removed the old tire. Any of you darkside riders care to weigh in on what that experience was like when you broke the bead on your car tire?
 

Checkswrecks

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Trying to wrap my head around handling=shit when he said himself that after 10 mins he forgot it was there. Shit handling doesn't seem to be something one would forget...no? Or am I just crazy. It's hilarious because I've written that same thing numerous times in different darkside threads.
Usual FortNine good job. I caught that "I could hardly feel the difference" too and liked his summary about it being up to the individual to judge his/her trade-offs.

His talk about lack of redundancy is what I was talking about in Post #145 of this thread and elsewhere. Keep the pressure up.
 
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