SuzukiSavage.com /cgi-bin/YaBB.pl General Category >> The Cafe >> Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion /cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1476312194 Message started by Oldfeller on 10/12/16 at 15:43:13

Title: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by Oldfeller on 10/12/16 at 15:43:13 MODERATOR NOTE:  I broke this out of badwolf's Shinko Discussion.....just to help keep things a bit more on topic. In the Savage rim there is a central well or depression that the tire bead slips over into during the mounting process.   Filling this well up with stuff to make it tubeless makes all tires VERY hard to get onto the rim (motorcycle tires too). Going Darkside on a Savage has other difficulties I won't waste your time with by saying an electric knife, some axle grease and some patience can still fix them.   I deleted all that sort of pertinent info from all the Darkside threads as I don't think it is safe for normal newbies to be trying to do this sort of stuff AT ALL.     <he rubs his left wrist scar as he types this> My last Darkside rear tire was mounted in the same year Dave went on his first Dragon run, and it has outlived more than several of MM's rear tires (and one of his Savages).   My current Darksider tire is a little older than Dave's Cafe Savage and it is less than half worn out. It may outlive me ....

Title: Re: shinko 230 report Post by Kris01 on 10/12/16 at 18:16:28 I'm not understanding why you used a car tire on a mc. Car tires are not made to roll over on the side like a mc tire.

Title: Re: shinko 230 report Post by badwolf on 10/12/16 at 18:52:26 If you are a guy that loves to corner hard, and wears out the side tread of your tires, a car tire is NOT for you! But if you look at the old "classic" dresser tires, they looked very close to a car tire. Shinko still makes them in 16". http://www.shinkotireusa.com/tires/cruiser/classic Tire sidewalls bend all the time while riding, even when you're straight up, on a old dresser or touring bike that is 95% or more of the time.  Now we have a huge selection of tires to choose from suited for every thinkable task, back in the day it was not so. Car tires can give you long miles on a bike, but if you want to drag your pegs a lot, stick with a tire made for that.

Title: Re: shinko 230 report Post by Oldfeller on 10/12/16 at 23:11:57 Oh my. Do you mean that a car tire on the back of a motorcycle is dangerous because it cannot take a corner safely? And people who would take such a tire up into the mountains to the Dragon would in essence be committing suicide? Oh please tell me this is not so ......  please. :o I would hate to go up to the mountains and wind up spoiling everyone's trip by eating a guard rail or something like that due to the car tire not making a hard turn. I understand the Savage crew ride quite fast sometimes and I wouldn't dare try to keep up with a group like that with a dangerous car tire on the back of my bike ...... I mean I know Dave has a cafe racer that he rides very fast and there are lots of fast Harleys and Ducatis and Triumphs and crotch rockets and these sorts of people actually pass each other in curves and stuff like that. :-/ Mine is just my wife's old granny sickle, it isn't very powerful compared to real bikes like that.

Title: Re: shinko 230 report Post by Dave on 10/13/16 at 03:33:34 Yep, Oldfeller has a car tire on the rear.....and Yep.....it goes really fast around corners, and Yep......I have worn out a Pirelli Sport Demon, and am on my way to wearing out a Bridgestone Battlax BT-45 and will likely be getting a 3rd tire next year, and Yep.....my tires likely cost 2-3 times what Oldfeller spent on his car tire.  There is very little wear on his car tire....and the tire is barely showing a rounding off of the edges of the tread. I won't be mounting a car tire on my motorcycle - but it works really well for Oldfeller, corners really well, and lasts a very, very long time. - and it defies what most folks tell you about having car tires on a motorcycle. I am glad the Shinko 230 has proven to be a very good and long mileage tire that can be purchased at a very affordable price.  I am sure that my "actual mileage may vary" and I would not be able to get the mileage that badwolf did.....as my riding style usually involves taking corners at a brisk pace.

Title: Re: shinko 230 report Post by Oldfeller on 10/13/16 at 03:54:08 Yep, Dave loves to take his corners at speed.   Neatest sweetest lines you ever saw.  So does Mr. Never-brake, alias MM, he loves to take his corners at speed without touching his brakes. I follow along closely, watching the sheer beauty of what they do so well. Until Tea and Crumpet time occurs, or a pork chop calls out to me and I move forward ahead of the group to locate, pursue and slay the newly found prey.   or, sometimes if I get bored enough then I start to hunt our guys ..... MM's nephew was fine game, I gots to play with him a lot as he was young and learned fast and he advanced his riding skills VERY quickly.

Title: Re: shinko 230 report Post by Oldfeller on 10/13/16 at 11:30:06 Now, Kris01 asked (again) how car tires can work on a motorcycle because they are not round. Kris, on your car your front wheels steer the car around corners by flexing the sidewalls,  allowing the car to create cornering forces while keeping the contact patch flat on the ground.   This is how they are constructed to work. This is the exact same mechanism that the Darksider tire uses on any sane form of cornering, the thread stays flat and the sidewalls flex to allow this to happen, as it is designed into the tire for it to do. Now, go up to the Dragon and you do start to go past what this standard car sidewall flex can accommodate and indeed you do indeed tilt the tread on the pavement and it does lift up until about half the tire's tread is up in the air on the most extreme maneuvers.... Disastrous, right ??? Nope, look at how much tread area I've got to engage, even when I have about half of it in the air what remains in road contact is 2-3 times as much contact patch as motorcycle tire ever has, period, ever. Look at the wear pattern on my tire, it is very similar to what you see on the front of your car.   All wear that you see is within the design parameters of the car tire in front wheel drive / steering uses. Next, load capacity.   Me and my bike weigh about 600 pounds so each tire carries ~300~ pounds of loading.   A car weights 1-2 tons and each tire is intended and rated to carry at a minimum around a thousand pounds of load.   I don't think I am going to overstress the Darksider tire no matter what I do.   So far MM and I have each gone through a Darksider tire, mine died because the TUBE wore out due to a rust spot growing on the rim.   This one has preventions over the rust spots to keep that from happening again.

Title: Re: shinko 230 report Post by badwolf on 10/13/16 at 12:21:42 OK, I'm not trying to start anything or step on any ones toes! I'm just trying to say that if you ride like cornering and dragging the pegs is your only world, stick to a m/c tire that is made for that. A car tire will corner fine on a m/c , but not as well as a tire made to stick till the handlebars drag. As Dave says ''I won't be mounting a car tire on my motorcycle'', and I don't think I have seen any in Supermoto racing. If I thought they would kill you when you lean I would not have tried to get one to fit on my bike.

Title: Re: shinko 230 report Post by Oldfeller on 10/13/16 at 12:41:20 Kris asked a sensible question (again) because Kris really can't see how it could possibly work.   It does fly in the face of logic, doesn't it? This Darksider on the 15" rim stuff was "invented" around 1948 or thereabouts when VW beetle tires became cheaply available in the USA and Harley guys realized they would fit their Harley rims. Fast forward to the last decade or so, and the long distance touring guys on Goldwings were complaining voraciously about having to change their rear tire twice a year at over $150 per tire.    Somebody remembered the VW on the Hurley thing, and the modern Darksider movement was born.   I paid $32 for my original Nankang tire, my very first Darksider tire.   This last one cost about $59 if memory serves.  The Goldwing guys paid similar money for theirs, instead of paying $150 each for twice a year tires. Please remember, because the greatest risk to the user is MOUNTING the stupid tire, and that I got bloodied up personally by a bead breaking I don't recommend doing Darkside to anybody. But personally, if I can pick up a $59 tire at Walmart (yep, go on-line and have it sent to your local Wally @ 0 $$ for shipping charges) then you have to trim off the excess "tubeless" rubber with an electric knife and get you say 10+ years of riding service out of that one tire -- with what I would have to say is EXCELLENT rideability characteristics, then I guess I can afford to take the time to answer Kris's question every year or three. (reminds me it is time to check my air pressure again, it does) ...... and about that  " if you ride like cornering and dragging the pegs is your only world"  thing .....

Title: Re: shinko 230 report Post by Kris01 on 10/13/16 at 17:27:53 OF, I'm following your logic but it doesn't seem to me to be as safe as a mc tire. Car tires are not designed to lean in a turn. They are designed to "squirm" in a turn. It would seem that leaning a car tire would break down the square profile of the side of the tread and possibly eat into the sidewall. The construction of the internal belts just ain't the same. Kudos to you if you can get 10 years out of that tire! BTW, what size are you running? That looks huge compared to a 140/90!

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by Dave on 10/13/16 at 18:02:29 There are a lot of folks who ride big sport touring/touring bikes that use car tires on the rear.  One of the big reasons they do on the Goldwing, ST1100 and ST1300 is that the rear tires are very cumbersome to change with all that Tupperware in the way, and some of these fellows go on really long trips.  They can wear out a motorcycle tire in a single trip, and sometimes even 2 of them.....so they mount a car tire and can make the entire trip without changing tires. The Goldwings and ST bikes have tubeless rims that are pretty wide - so the car tires are easier to mount than they are on the relatively narrow Savage rim....especially when you have to wrestle in a tube.  Oldfeller and MMRanch have run car tires, and MMRanch ran a low pressure and did ruin a tire when it overheated and the chords came apart - when he was running a proper pressure he had no problems, and Oldfeller is trying to wear out his second one.  I don't think the car tire flexes anymore on a bike than they do on a car...on a car they not only squirm - they also roll under a bit, and I believe the tire is built to handle those kind of stresses. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZKhoFbL7Fo [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZKhoFbL7Fo[/media]

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by justin_o_guy2 on 10/13/16 at 19:34:33 I ride so much more gently now, I accidentally let a heel touch once, but it was a slow , parking lot, turn.. I WANT to get a car tire on it.. it's not funny dropping $180.00 on a good tire and mount, and only getting 7 thousand or so miles..

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by badwolf on 10/13/16 at 20:19:16 OK, The darkside can of worms is not only open, but they are crawling all over the floor!!Thanks for the vid link Dave, a lot of footage of the sidewalls flexing. The car tires seem to contour to the road better than I thought. I would like to see those guys riding and holding that camera under the bike to get that angle. Maybe their wives  are riding upside down holding the camera?

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by Ruttly on 10/13/16 at 20:45:40 Harley boys been putting car tires on since the fifties , I hear it is a task mounting one. Make sure to use a radial tire , seen them use bias ply Volkswagen bug tires , those are the tough ones to mount , radial is easier to mount cause sidewalls flex ! Will it fit in a stock swingarm ?

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by MMRanch on 10/13/16 at 22:52:10 I had a 145/80-15 Goodyear eagle on mine and it served me well for 3 years and 20,000 something miles --- it might have been halve wore out.   Well as long as it had 30+ psi everything was fine.   One year I got the notion to lower it to 20-22 psi and run the Dragon a time or two.   It stuck like glue !   That was the year we came up behind two big sport bikes flying along.   Well , they speed-up when we cought them and the race  was on !  :)   The one in the rear made the mistake of glancing in his mirror to see if we were gone yet , it made him go wide on the corner he was in.  That was all it took for me to slip past him.   Then the RACE was really on !   >:(    I tried to pass his buddy , I'd catch him going into the corners and haft to break to keep from hitting him but that 100 HP coming out of the corners was hard to overcome on a Savage.   He never did go wide enough to pass but we left his buddy way back there somewhere.   Long story made short is : Don't let anybody tell ya that a car tire on a bike is a handycap.  Like OldFeller already stated - even with half the tire up in the air --- there is still more rubber on the road that bike tires have on their best day. The lower air pressure let the tire flex too much , flexing makes heat , on the way home I hit the supper slab and had picked up a flopping noise about 70 mph so I rode home at 65 and looked for anothe 145/80 tire .   I couldn't find one so I put a Commander II on it and got 20,000 + miles out of it. .   When it wore out I looked again for a 145/80 with no success , so I got a 145/60-15  :)  --- wrong --- the tube wouldn't fit in there  :'(    now I've got a 888 back there and a 145/60 in my shop.  If I ever go tubeless I'll use it  ;).   But That car tire blew up to 30-35lbs. is a mighty good thing !    Good luck on finding one !  :o Now if your willing to do some modifying , 155/80-15 can be had !  ::)

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by Oldfeller on 10/13/16 at 23:54:37 Kris, my tire is a 165/80 R15 which is indeed the "standard VW" tire size, but mine is a Nexxen tire which is built to support the current Japanese sports cars, not old Volkswagens.   The outline form of the tire came that way from the factory, nothing I have ever done to it has "rounded the corners" or even changed them one iota.   Square profile tires really don't exist for much any more, even in the car world. I also have done the needed mods to allow that huge of a tire to live inside my wheel well. MM is correct, a 145 series or 155 series would fit the bike much easier and likely as good or better performance-wise, and yes MM can buy a tube to fit inside the much smaller 145 series tire that he bought, but he just hasn't gone and done that yet.

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by justin_o_guy2 on 10/14/16 at 06:24:30 As I said, I would really, REALLY, appreciate having a rear tire that I couldn't just Watch the tread diminish with each tank of gas. I'm also not wanting to get Up under yonna and move stuff , BUT, for the savings and general peace of mind, I Would.. So, since the tread is almost on the wear bars, winter approaching, I don't see a better time to take a run at it. So, I Want a taller tire, but not so wide as to increase the pain of getting it in there. And, I have an electric knife,, in the shop, it's a foam rubber shaping machine. I also have a die grinder and one of those Tire Shop abrasive wheels. It will literally sculpt rubber. And I did body work, I'm pretty good at shaping things. So, what tire do I get, and what kinda mayhem do I commit upon its innocent carcass? I'm sorry, that's assuming you Know off the top of your head.. I guess the question is Without any swing arm mods, and the fewest others, which tire would I wanna research, first? A shrug is acceptable. In the FWIW department, the 05 ran the Dunlop , dang if I can remember the exact numbers, wanna say 140/90.. I'm on the Stock rear, soft shock setting, got the bags and brackets, no sign of rubbing,, I had enough room to get the brackets on without jacking up the bike or anything..

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by Dave on 10/14/16 at 07:01:56 I believe the 145sr-15 is one to try and find.  (This early type tire does not have an aspect ratio listed in the sizing- but it is something like an 82 series). You most likely will have to get one ordered, unless you go to a specialty shop that deals with vintage VW's or similar cars. Oldfeller got his pretty cheaply....the eBay search doesn't show anything cheap!  It appears that this size which was once common and used on the "economy" cars - is now a specialized size and hard to find (and hard to pay for). http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=145r15+tires The issue with the bead is, that the car tire bead is very wide, and it has a lot of rubber on the inside that functions as a sealing lip.  This makes the tire incredibly difficult to get on the narrow 3.25" wide rim and also have room for the tube valve stem during the mounting process. You can trim a lot of that sealing rubber away, as you will not be using the tire without a tube. It is important to start spooning the tire on opposite the valve stem, so that the tire bead won't be doubled up where the valve stem is while you are mounting the tire.....the bead has to drop down into the groove in the middle of the rim, and it cannot do that at the valve stem location.   It could be that you should try a Shinko 230 before going darkside......as it is easy to get, fits, and is affordable.  Bike Bandit currently shows the 130/90-15 size to be $ 77.95 (plus shipping).

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by justin_o_guy2 on 10/14/16 at 14:00:58 Thanks Dave, and the How to mount strategery is appreciated. I guess I'll just get a tire, and See if I can get it on. If it's a huge pain, then I probably couldn't even get a Darkside on. And, if I can save the mounting service charge, then I won't feel so bad.

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by Oldfeller on 10/14/16 at 19:32:15 http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?board=tech;action=display;num=1181496112 and http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1342402435/0#0 have all the useful information I ever generated about Darksider tires that was worthy of keeping.   I blew a LOT of stuff away in an attempt to keep unskilled newbies away from doing this as the enthusiasm was there but THEY HAD NO SKILL LEVELS enough to tell them when they were getting into danger zones. AND PLEASE DO NOT USE THE GOODRICH RADIAL T/A TIRE -- IT HAS AN ACTUAL PROVEN TRACK HISTORY OF BEAD BREAKAGE DURING MOUNTING INFLATION.

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by Oldfeller on 10/14/16 at 19:49:47 And I found that old tire performance calculation spreadsheet and how to get to it so I may update it with my current information. http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1342402435/75 Here is the address for the thread, and below is a screenshot of the instructions on how to get there on Dropbox.

Title: Re: Oldfeller's Darkside Discussion Post by Oldfeller on 10/14/16 at 20:14:46 OK, I updated the spreadsheet.   Verslagen wore out and changed out his tire so his data is done at this point in time.   Youzguys kept on changing his story (saying he mounted his own tire, etc when he paid to have it done) but we recorded his very best story and ran the calculations on it as a base-line.   Since he can't remember his installation costs, taxes, etc he can't win the beer, but he can act as a come on for the other players. When I started trailering my bike up to the mountains multiple times a year, I actually began feeding my rear tire a steady diet of "worst case tire abuse" that counted coup on my Darksider's tread depth, which then began predicting results that were about as bad as Verslagen actually got with his Metzler V series tire. To my surprise, over the years my tire has actually held in there better than the first predictions ever said it would do with it eating Dragon after Dragon after Dragon.   My cost of ownership is still the lowest at a half cent a mile, even with me including all the bits and pieces that the other players wanted me burdened with (but that they thought they shouldn't be burdened with). Since my REAL tire is the only one really still going in reality, I guess you could say that I won on "long life durability" too.   But not mileage, I can never win on mileage when trailering back & forth to the Dragon (where I go tear up on the tread life something terrible). I have honestly won on cost per mile though ...... :)   take a copy of the spreadsheet over to your desktop so you can scroll over all the players and check out the formulae used to get the reported predictions. Spreadsheet is updated, remember to save a new copy of the changed sheet to the public drive before you exit it if you choose to update your stuff.

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