Tires  By  scooter12 (Read 7,467 times)

I'll tell you what. As someone that has had a rear tire, suddenly loose all pressure, I'll gladly replace mine yearly. Its just a cost of maintenance. It's downright scary, and only luck and yes I'll even say, a little skill (more luck then skill), I didn't dump the bike. I'll gladly change those tires and valve stems, yearly. and don't forget the valve stems... those chinese valve stems are simply criminal.

Just my 2 cents worth , I used to restore old bikes and would get the project bikes at this motorcycle junkyard so to speak . They were mostly parked in this huge warehouse so didn't have sun light to beam down on them constantly but anyway . Many of the bikes were old Hondas with there original tires .....1960's to 1970's ....with the tubes still holding air . I rode many of them to test while still restoring them . Of course the rubber had hardened and slicked but still took chances on them until new rubber was put on them when completed . Never had one blow out but then would never sell one for someone to ride with them either . I remember one triumph I had , was a 68 bonneville I think , original grips rubber and still had the teets on the tires ...was like 20 or 30 miles on the odometer . The tire I kept and sold with the bike but with the expretion the tires were not for road use ....and I used to only buy used tires when going on my cars for a while till I had blow outs because of the old tires . Rubber breaks down , tires get old and unpredictable , I would never trust an old tire on a bike for anything other than an emergency to get a new one on later in the week or to the next store. To many memories of ridding those old project bikes and havering the front or back get slippery around a corner with that old rubber lol

howdy mr jarlaxle, i didn't see anyone camparing 30 year old tires to 3-4 year old tires and i dislike your use of the word stupid. maybe you can hold that opinion to yourself?

lotsa miles and smiles to ya
ken

Uhm, I've got to say that I rode bicycles with tires that had to've been close to ten years old minimum. That's just counting while we owned them, not counting however old they were before buying the bikes. And while they didn't carry us to town or anything, they held up under one brother (who probably wasn't too hard on them), second brother (who I seem to recall rode rather like a typical boy), and finally me (who rode rather like her second brother, meaning pretty hard and fierce).

We were awfully fond of locking up our back tires to see how long a black streak we could leave. Mom was NOT fond of that game though.... (X)

>'Kat

I just got a used Kymco 250, with new tires. However, they are the "J" rated (62mph) "in-town" tires. I need to occasionally ride the freeway at 70+mph. So, based on good advice in replies to my posts, I'm going to upgrade to the 92mph tires.

Thinking back to my misspent youth... I recall riding my 1962 "Go Kart Scrambler" TINY 35-lb mini-bike (powered by a 40 hp McCulloch kart motor...) on the Chicago freeways at 100 mph and more... on 5" wheels mounted with tube-type tires made for hand-trucks. Plainly marked "NOT for powered-vehicles. Max speed 8mph". Never had one blow.

Proof positive that God looks out for fools and drunks. At 16, I wasn't a drunk... So... YUP! You got it!

I'm a LOT smarter now at 66...

Leo (still chuckling at what I got away with 50 years ago) in Texas

Pleas provide proof that tire age caused the failure.

howdy, well i'm going to pull the dogs' ear again. i have driven somewhere around three million miles and had blow-outs front , rear, in corners, passing, speeding, etc and it's what the driver does at that moment that sets the tone for the whole incident. an accident is not inevitable. a two wheeled vehicle most certainly has very different potential at that moment. be safe, use the best tires you can find and drive conservativly.

lotsa miles and smiles to ya
ken