Tyres

[knight2]

Got home from a ride out today to find a screw embedded in the rear trye, hopefully I can get it repaired. They told me that my favourite trye Michelin road pilot4 is no longer available. So I'm asking if any one has any suggestions for a replacement, they are 160 60 14 for the rear of the Burgman 650. I used to be a fan of Bridgestone battlax years ago I don't know if they suit scooters but I don't see why not.

[Leadfarmer]

I’m a big fan of Continental tyres on my bikes, I defected from Michelin, my scooter will be getting Conti scooter when it comes time to change

[knight2]

Thanks I hadn't even thought of Contis I shall have alook at them.

[capitano]

Got home from a ride out today to find a screw embedded in the rear trye, hopefully I can get it repaired. They told me that my favourite trye Michelin road pilot4 is no longer available. So I'm asking if any one has any suggestions for a replacement, they are 160 60 14 for the rear of the Burgman 650. I used to be a fan of Bridgestone battlax years ago I don't know if they suit scooters but I don't see why not.

Bridgestone used to be the preferred choice for many Burgman 650 riders in the USA.

Then again, a vocal minority also went "darkside" on the rear and fitted car tyres.

I have no endorsement for either, it's simply what I recall.

[roadster]

It must be 15 years since I tried Conti tyres on my Piaggios. They had a generous tread depth, but I found they lasted no longer than other makes because they squared off very badly and became scarily unstable over those longitudinal joints on A roads. My preference is for dual compound Michelins ( not the City ones) but I don't know what is currently available. My current ADV350 is in a different league to those old machines, particularly for better high speed stability. I suspect that the all-terrain style of tread pattern gets its grip through softer compounds and some help from traction control but I doubt that I will clock up enough miles to assess the wear.

[MrGrumpy]

Don't know if they do Metzeler FeelFree radials in Burgman sizes, but if so they are worth considering. I have them on my mk3 Tmax and am quite impressed - good feel in dry, damp and wet conditions. Used to like B.stone TH01s which were OE on big Burgers and Tmaxs, but whilst they were great in the full wet, I was never confident with them on roads that were merely damp.

[knight2]

Capitano I can't see "darkside" being a good idea though some on BurgmanUSA sing it's praises, pretty sure it's illegal in the UK. I noticed the Battlax tyres have a sc prefix instead of bt which the bike tyres had so I'm assuming it stands for scooter tyres.

roadster funny you should say that about Conti's while reading it I remembered I had problems with Battlax they brought out a new tyre Bt then a number (can't remember what it was a long time ago) and it wore quickly and very unevenly. From what I do remember I wasn't the only one to complain about them.

My tyre has been repaired so I am off to pick it up, £34 better than the cost of a new one.

Grumpy just noticed your post thanks. Strange how you felt about Bridgestones, not good as damp is a fairly normal condition on UK roads. I'll have a look at Metzeler, I'm trying to remember what tyres I had on my NT700 Deauville got a feeling they were Metzelers if so they were good tyres.

[Bellman]

I’ve had a set of Continental ContiMove tyres on a maxi and the initial wear was quite alarming. Of course the Burgman 650 is a heavy old girl and would have accelerated rear tyre wear even more. In my early years on maxi scooters Bridgestones were OE on all of them and they were fine.

Nowadays I’m a fan of the Michelin City Grip, I had them as replacement tyres on my previous maxi and happily they’re the OE tyres on the new maxi I got last month.

[Waldorf]

Capitano I can't see "darkside" being a good idea though some on BurgmanUSA sing it's praises, pretty sure it's illegal in the UK.

Indeed it is! There are regular 'discussions' about it on Silverwng600, too.

[MrGrumpy]

I noticed the Battlax tyres have a sc prefix instead of bt which the bike tyres had so I'm assuming it stands for scooter tyres.

roadster funny you should say that about Conti's while reading it I remembered I had problems with Battlax they brought out a new tyre Bt then a number (can't remember what it was a long time ago) and it wore quickly and very unevenly. From what I do remember I wasn't the only one to complain about them.

The Burger and Tmax originally had Bridgestone TH01 tyres, but late on they sold SC02 and SC02 Rain tyres for big scoots (haven't looked recently). I remember going off Bridgestones (prob SC02) when I had a pair of tyres that wore very strangely (sort of the opposite of squaring off) which made the Tmax handle very badly. So I had to bin £200 worth of quite new tyres and buy something else! I think that was a one-off though. My 2017 Tmax mk6 had Bridgestones as OE, and they were fine, but I always got through tyres at a ridiculous rate on the Tmax.