Bad tires

[rapidray]

Cheap tires are like cheap helmets! They are all fine & dandy till you're laying on the pavement BLEEDING, or WORSE!, wondering what the heck just happened! Ray.

[viperg]

Cheng Shin HiMax tires -- the best tire value for the money, in miles per dollar. They perform quite well, and I'm a rather aggressive rider.

I agree, Cheng Shin HiMax are decent tires. Currently, I have over 7K miles on the set on my 1100G. They have performed great in extensive canyon riding, well in wet and dry and I am not particularly gentle on them. Not down to the wear markers yet and I figure I will replace them around the 8k-8.5k mile mark. The HiMax wear evenly unlike BT, Dunlops, Michelin, Contis that I have run in the past. For the money and rounded performance they cannot be beaten.

[JHawkins]

Cheap tires are like cheap helmets! They are all fine & dandy till you're laying on the pavement BLEEDING, or WORSE!, wondering what the heck just happened! Ray.

If you replaced "Cheap" with "Poor Quality" I would be right there with you. But sometimes price is not the deciding factor in quality. That goes for everything you purchase, and not just motorcycle tires and helmets.

[Buffalo Bill]

Cheap tires, never!

I learned your lesson in my 1977 Chevy Monza 305. No accident, but what a surprise! Since then I've allways chosen the best performance tires, irrigardless of personal finances. Until you replace those, you better ride like a pilgrum.

[Grandpa]

Cheap tires are like cheap helmets! They are all fine & dandy till you're laying on the pavement BLEEDING, or WORSE!, wondering what the heck just happened! Ray.

This is a fallacy that will lead you to waste a lot of money needlessly. The Cheng Shin HiMax is inexpensive, and the best, without a doubt, value for the money in street tire.

"Inexpensive" and "cheap" are not synonymous.

The quality of all tires made in the last ten years far exceeds the quality of tires built during the years GS bikes came out -- late 70's and early 80's.

Buying a tire because it's the most expensive is a "feel-good" attitude that results in the throwing out of perfectly good money.

Yet throwing away money is not against the law, so you're allowed to do so if you wish.

Cheap Grandpa

[seuadr]

feel free to throw it my way!

[Nessism]

...I notice a lot of guys run a 100-90 front, the owners manual called for a 110{3.50} 19 front and stock rear was a 4.50-90-17.
Rod

3.50 front tire converts to a 90, not 110.

[Sandy]

There seems to be lot of confusion lately about tire sizes. Here's a handy chart I stole from KZRiders.com

[49er]

This is a fallacy that will lead you to waste a lot of money needlessly. The Cheng Shin HiMax is inexpensive, and the best, without a doubt, value for the money in street tire.

"Inexpensive" and "cheap" are not synonymous.

The quality of all tires made in the last ten years far exceeds the quality of tires built during the years GS bikes came out -- late 70's and early 80's.

Buying a tire because it's the most expensive is a "feel-good" attitude that results in the throwing out of perfectly good money.

Yet throwing away money is not against the law, so you're allowed to do so if you wish.

Cheap Grandpa

"Feel Good Crap"! Ask any race competitor who has made the wrong tyre choice on race day how they felt. In many instances they have compomised their safety because of being cheap minded or lacking the necessary budget, to be out front. Most of the road tyres that are now available have morphed from race bred compounds.

It's not about snobbery or feel good, it's about taking advantage of the latest technology, to improve your performance and safety.

I don't have any experience of Chen Shin HiMax tyres so I won't dispute your claims. It's true that price isn't always a reliable indicator of a products worth, but in my experience, cheap is often CHEAP!

I run the Pirelli's because I received positive feedback from this forum. I knew that they would stick well, with the trade off being faster wear. So be it. I value combining performance and safety in wet or dry!

Good luck with your crusade, you may be on to something!

[loosebruce]

Anybody tried these?

http://www.dunloptyres.com.au/TyreDetailAction.do?website=DUN&mtpcode=80116&from=nPerPage

New tread compounds sound interesting.

[DanTheMan]

I still prefer my Pirelli Scorpion S/T's. It's a high mileage tire (got 15k mi. on the rear last year, and 20k on the front), it's rated at 95% on road and 5% off road (great for our gravel roads around here), corners well, handles the occasional sleet, snow or hail as well as rain quite admirably, and I've ridden from coast to coast on them. One fellow rider said it looked like I was riding on snow tires because of the aggressive tread design. Oh well, they've done the job for me, I really don't like having to replace a rear tire every 4k miles.

[Nessism]

There seems to be lot of confusion lately about tire sizes. Here's a handy chart I stole from KZRiders.com

That chart seems about right but keep in mind, 1 inch = 25.4 mm so that is the REAL conversion.

In the real world of manufactured tires things are slightly different though; tires rarely measure the way the stated dimensions indicate they should.

I still say the stock Suzuki front tires are closer to a 90 width than a 110. Most GSR members run a 100 which is slightly wider and taller than stock - helps correct the optimistic speedometer calibration. Using a 110 front can cause fender clearance issues so this is a clear indication that the tire is not even close to the stock size.

[Grandpa]

"Feel Good Crap"! Ask any race competitor who has made the wrong tyre choice on race day how they felt. In many instances they have compomised their safety because of being cheap minded or lacking the necessary budget, to be out front. Most of the road tyres that are now available have morphed from race bred compounds.

It's not about snobbery or feel good, it's about taking advantage of the latest technology, to improve your performance and safety.

I don't have any experience of Chen Shin HiMax tyres so I won't dispute your claims. It's true that price isn't always a reliable indicator of a products worth, but in my experience, cheap is often CHEAP!

I run the Pirelli's because I received positive feedback from this forum. I knew that they would stick well, with the trade off being faster wear. So be it. I value combining performance and safety in wet or dry!

Good luck with your crusade, you may be on to something!

Thank you, 49er. I only had 23 years and 250,000 miles on GS bikes, so I'm just a novice at this. Feel free to waste your money as you wish.

[Nessism]

"Feel Good Crap"! Ask any race competitor who has made the wrong tyre choice on race day how they felt. In many instances they have compomised their safety because of being cheap minded or lacking the necessary budget, to be out front. Most of the road tyres that are now available have morphed from race bred compounds.

It's not about snobbery or feel good, it's about taking advantage of the latest technology, to improve your performance and safety.

I don't have any experience of Chen Shin HiMax tyres so I won't dispute your claims. It's true that price isn't always a reliable indicator of a products worth, but in my experience, cheap is often CHEAP!

I run the Pirelli's because I received positive feedback from this forum. I knew that they would stick well, with the trade off being faster wear. So be it. I value combining performance and safety in wet or dry!

Good luck with your crusade, you may be on to something!

Word of mouth support for the Hi Max line of tires is almost universally positive; there have been LOTS of positive comments among the GSR faithful and elsewhere as well.

Pirelli’s also have positive word of mouth in regards to their grip, but their durability is less than stellar.

For the majority of GSR users, I think the Hi Max tires are perfectly adequate. Using references to racers cheaping out is irrelevant.

To me the big criticism against the Hi Max tires is not the performance, it’s the fact that they are clearly a knock-off design, stolen from Metzler. At least they did a good copy job, something that can be said of all Cheng Shin's tires.

[49er]

Thank you, 49er. I only had 23 years and 250,000 miles on GS bikes, so I'm just a novice at this. Feel free to waste your money as you wish.

Grandpa, so I'm trying to teach my grandmother "how to suck eggs"!
Yes, you should know a good performing tyre by now. How many times did you drop your GS's over that 250,000 miles?

Nessism, thanks for the history on the Hi Max line. If there is credible support for these tyres, they certainly would be worth a try.