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How Do You " Read " Tire Wear?


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I'll chime in about Roberts bike. It's a 2014 S1000RR that is set up for his weight and adjusted for him.

Now that his pace and riding style are improving he may soon need to revisit his suspension settings. Maybe a quick trip back to the shop (in the trailer) before the street wears off all the hard work and fun from last weekend.

 

 

Hey That's an awesome idea Jeff!

 

The other "problem" is I'm running completely stock suspension and I have yet to start tinkering with tire pressures. The Asphalt got to 140 degrees both days and I set the pressure in the morning and never revisited it. As the day progressed I could "feel" a lot of unhappy behavior in the back especially over the bumpy bits. I'm going to start reading up on the whole hot/cold tire pressure adjustment stuff soon. There's too many schools of thought in regard to that and it gets confusing FAST.

 

Robert,

 

There is a great thread in the topic on Tires from Steve Brubaker (Dunlop RTS) on tire pressures that may be relevant to you.

 

"I am going 15 seconds off the track record. I am running the recommended PSI that is on the dunlopracing.com website. but I think I should be able to go MUCH FASTER if I change my tire pressure. Should I lower the pressure to get more traction and faster lap times? NO, NO, NO! At those lap times, varying from the recommended will not gain you what you are looking for. Stick with the recommended till you get within 5 seconds of the track record, then start making small 1 psi changes. Only make more changes if you can feel the difference in 2 psi up or down. if you can't feel that change, then that change is not helping you, go back to the recommended."

 

The full thread is on page 3 (currently) of the Tires section and it's called "What is the right pressure?" It's full of great info. One of these days I'll figure out how to put a link to other threads in here.

 

Cheers,

Benny

 

 

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Robert, what were your cold pressures?

 

I was running 31 front 30 rear. These pressures were set in the morning when it was a "cool" 80 degrees out. The ambient temp rose to 101 degrees and the track temp itself was 140 degrees with the hot Georgia sun beating down on it. I really should have revisited the pressures once the temp rose but I was caught up in the moment and I also had no idea how to set a hot pressure.

 

Benny. Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not one of those tire pressure nuts who want to tinker around with pressures all day. I would rather "set it and forget it" as it's one less thing to deal with. The riding is much more interesting to me. I'll check out that thread and see if it's a better resource. The big problem I have had in the past is most of the tire pressure discussions I have seen online have been "do this do that" rather than fully explaining end to end the underlying science. I'm hard headed and need to understand the "why". :)

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BOTH front tires, if you have them - I'd like to see the pro tire, too. :)

 

The front on the pro bike is going to be a challenge. I only snapped a photo of the rear because it was so deformed. :/

 

I can get a photo of my bike shortly. It's still in the trailer in a front wheel chock. I have not unloaded a thing. :)

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Robert, what were your cold pressures?

Benny. Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not one of those tire pressure nuts who want to tinker around with pressures all day. I would rather "set it and forget it" as it's one less thing to deal with. The riding is much more interesting to me. I'll check out that thread and see if it's a better resource. The big problem I have had in the past is most of the tire pressure discussions I have seen online have been "do this do that" rather than fully explaining end to end the underlying science. I'm hard headed and need to understand the "why". :)

 

There was no accusation there... just thought it would help keep things from getting overly complicated. There's some other really great stuff in that thread too. I'm very much a "why" guy myself.

 

Benny

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There was no accusation there... just thought it would help keep things from getting overly complicated. There's some other really great stuff in that thread too. I'm very much a "why" guy myself.

 

Benny

 

 

Ah. I kinda missed those quotation marks. That's what I get for reading the reply via e-mail rather than on the forum. :)

 

I really appreciate the reference though. I think it's about time I started thinking about tire pressure a bit more. Reading that will be helpful and perhaps answer a lot of questions.

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  • 6 months later...

I ain't no guru....

 

Here are a couple of observations:

First, the tire is a Dunlop tire.

 

Secondly, it doesn't seem to be worn very much. Maybe you're not riding hard enough to cause a lot of wear, but at least the lack of tearing etc (only a very fine graining) suggests that the suspension is well set up for your speed, the track and the temperature.

 

Thirdly, I noticed the raised back lip on the sipes at the edge of the tire, but when I look at the sipe in the center of the tire, the back lip seems lowered. If I recall Dave Moss right, this is seen when the rebound valving (the shim stack) needs adjustment (pls check with Mr Moss for the details, I don't remember how you should modify the shim stack.

 

What do I win? ☺

 

Kai

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First, Correct it is a Dunlop Q3 B)

 

Second: its actually wearing quite a bit, and I was riding as aggressivly as I could muster for the conditions, for reference, Will was on track that day and his tires looked almost identical to mine though he was going a bit faster than I was.

 

Third: the rear shock is the stock unit that's well beyond its service interval and has never been opened up, so the rear suspension just kinda is what it is.

 

Prize: All the cold beer in your fridge

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T,

 

I finally got to view the tire picture on the laptop (previously only saw on the phone, and a 5" screen isn't ideal for scrutinizing such a picture).

 

So it's a street tire, not a track/race tire. I wonder if the wear pattern (the very fine graining of the surface) is due to the compound (designed for longevity, not max traction), which can is designed to accept a lot of wear without tearing. Regardless, the very even wear pattern (no bands of tearing) indicates a good throttle control and nice progressive roll-on as you stand up the bike.

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Though more people might have been interested but oh well,

 

the wear pattern is a result of the new pavement at LVMS which is very, lets call it, Unique ... Everyone on Slicks, DOT Slicks, SuperSport tires, fast or slow had pretty much the exact same smooth wear pattern on their tires, in person it looks like its been polished with fine sandpaper. As the rubber wears off it end's up looking like brake dust all over the back rim, just a fine powder.

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Very odd way of wearing the tires. Does anyone have knowledge about if a new track surface (with no/little rubber in it) in general wears tires like that?

I'm wondering how this way of "powder" wear would impacts the grip, for better or worse.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Large picture warning :)

 

Anyone want to take a crack at mine? These are 150 mile old Q3s that I'm trying to read, all street miles. Both are pretty close, but I've been trying to get it better. The rear shock is stock, soon to be upgraded, and the forks are standard with Race-Tech gold valves for both compression and rebound. I'd love to get it dialed in before my April 19th class.

 

Do Q3s wear this way and I'm just chasing my tail? Should I wait until it's on the track? From what I've seen on the internet, maybe a touch more (slower) rebound damping on both with a little harder on compression in the rear? Why does only on the edge exhibit the pattern...?

 

 

 

niikdHB.jpg

 

ader32r.jpg

 

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My Q3's had that exact same raised edge before I switched to Supercorsa SP's. My suspension was completely stock though but it was setup by Traxxion Dynamics.

 

Personally I would be really happy with tire wear like that. If you scroll up in this thread you can see photos my my Q3's not looking quite as clean as those.

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Imho, the q3's are very touchy to the effects of rebound, more so than others I think. And to make matters worse, it changes per track and rider's skills. It's just an opinion and I could be way off. I have been running q2'a q3's for 4yrs now and still don't have a perfect setup despite doing my own suspension, getting help from the semi-pros and pros alike. Once I feel I got it nailed, I go to a different track and my tires look just like yours eric_f. My advice is to figger out what kind of rider you are. Hard on the brakes? Hard on the gas? Something in between and set your bike up as such. Take the small things as the cost of doing business and move on. Nothing in life is perfect 100% of the time.

 

Good luck!

.

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Eric, it might be simpler just to wait for class. The tire wear doesn't look bad at all, and the mechanic at the school can give you feedback on your suspension settings. Most likely your riding will change a lot over the course of the day, so it may be a waste of effort to try to dial in your suspension now - your riding pace and style might be quite different after school and require different settings anyway.

 

Check in with the mechanic early in the morning, find out when would be a good time to check the bike, and he can look at what your settings are and make recommendations.

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Hi Eric,

 

I'll give you my academic speculation here - The rebound on the rear is too fast and the compression looks slow.There might also be a preload issue. The rebound on the front is slow and compression is fast.Again, might be a preload issue.

 

The wear pattern on the rear looks ok...good throttle habits.The very edge looks a little ragged to me.Perhaps you got on the gas a little hard when leaned over?

 

You have not used the front tire fully, and the area that served as the " Edge " with respect to the amount you used looks ragged. If i am correct, the slow rebound meant the suspension collapsed early but did not recover in time, leading to punishment on the front tire. Was the bike understeering?

 

Tyler, to be honest the tire wear looked great....maybe like you ran it on concrete. That's the kinda powdery residue i got on my tires when i ran them on concrete. Would have never guessed it was on a new surface.

 

If anyone else has pictures of their tires, do post them.

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I will post a front of mine tomorrow and an easy to diag rear. It will be fun for ya'lls to see. I just rode the bike on track for the first time in Feb. and has been in my garage ever since while I try to figger out what to do next aside of ask some questions and get another set of eyes on it at VIR.

 

Stay tuned!

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