Trying to gauge how "bad" anything other than pure road tires are on pavement

[autoteach]

What's that old saying about glass houses, Auto

fast typing, late at night. sighting.. gotcha, and go back and read in my other post about the Norwegian, I was being sarcastic in making fun of the "outrage" that people were taking up on the "too slow for my use" bike that we all ride.

 

[barkingllizard]

I run the michelin anakee 3, last year and this, awesome wet, dry, twisties, interstate, gravel, fire road, packed dirt.....

 

[Dirt_Dad]

When I got this bike with the stock Bridgestones it was flat out scary to be off road.

Recently I did put a brand new rear OEM Battle Wing on my wife's bike. For the kind of riding she's going to do, I thought it was a good tire.

Fast forward to today and I'm riding her bike. TCS off and I go to do a power slide around a left hander. Holy crap, the rear end comes around so fast to try to catch up with the front that all I can do laugh and back it down. There is zero traction in a slide with that Bridgestone. Somehow...and I don't know how, even the Anakee 3 has more traction in a slide than that OEM tire. Still think it's good for her, but goofy bad for me.

 

[NoMorBills]

I am always amazed at how much grip a set of knobbies have. On Dry road. Now I am not a big leaner but I do get around the corner hard and never fear loss of grip. I ran Anekee 3, K60, TKCs, Torance next and now am on a Big Block rear and TKC front.

No I won't keep up with a sport bike but they would never carry a full campground on their back.

 

[terryth]

Sure, you can push the K60's hard on the pavement and they will do it ok, just be prepared to completely ignore how bad and flighty they feel doing it. They are very good off the pavement on Arkansas fire roads. After a couple long twisty and off road rides with putting about 4500 miles on the K60's I was mostly commuting 70 miles a day I got real sick very quickly of the noise, vibes, and shit feel of the K60's and pulled them off and put on PR3 trails. So much nicer to be on decent tires for 95% of my riding The PR3 were excellent street tires, the trail part only means you can get one in a 19 inch front, otherwise it is a pure street tire and was ok on dirt roads as long as the dirt was hard pack and not a layer of soft stuff and the gravel layer not very deep. I am currently running Dunlop TR91 Trailmax's, very decent on the pavement and a lot better than the PR3's off the pavement. I rather liked the stock Battlewings actually, and if I wasn't a tire whore and like trying different tires I would buy them again.

Some real off road riding today with a real dirt bike

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPQSJtglYpY&feature=youtu.be

 

[low drag]

So, I'm still rolling on the stock Battlewings which are great for road, and aired down aren't too bad on well maintained fire roads. I read all these articles/posts that say things like the heidenaus suck on wet pavement, and the TKC80s are horrible on wet pavement, etc…

What I'm trying to determine is; What does that mean? Does that mean 75 on the freeway (if thats what the traffic is going) and its wet and raining, thats too fast? Does that mean in a straight-line its fine, but don't' lean it over much when its raining?

I get that everything is a compromise and tire choice depends on what you will primarily ride on.

Living here in CO, there are many great "off-road" routes (so I've read as I've not gone on any yet). But to get there and back you've got to get on the highway. And we get afternoon thunderstorms that just dump buckets sometimes…. So trying to figure out what to do…

I've got years of road-riding and road-racing so I probably put more trust in my tires than I should… I tend to ride my bikes pretty hard through the corners. As an example, when I got my ST and took it on its first ride through the mountains, there were no more "chicken strips" or the molding nubs on the edges of the tire after only a couple hours. I don't try, but leaning a bike way over into a corner is very comfortable to me.. on the dry or on dedicated rain tires….

Any advice would be appreciated

Drop 14kmtnman a note. He and I go on rides all the time out of Denver, he's still running the stock tires, I have K60 Scouts. Full disclaimer, he has been riding much longer than me and is quite proficient. Thus far he has had no issues on the various 4 wheel drive trails.

In fact, I'm thinking of getting a tire that's smoother on pavement when these are shot. Don't get me wrong the K60 Scouts are nice but I do most of my riding in pavement (to get to the trails and commuting) and I think the width of the tires as well as the weight of the bike (maybe geometry??) make this big girl handle really well on trails. Most of the stuff we ride is rocky, no deep sand and not much mud to deal with.