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Dunlop Road Smart 3 tires AKA tire thread #2372-106A

nickrides

Nick Kennedy
Well Well Well
I see these Dunlop Road Smart 3 Ads Claiming 12,000 + miles, Ha!
What a load of you know what.
I did a 420 mile Western Colorado loop Wed and when I got home the rear was worn past the tread layer into a lower layer and the front was worn to where the wear bars are flush.
Mileage on this set?
5600.
These are not cheap tires.
But they handled great , just not anywhere near the life I was looking for.
signed
Back to the tire machine.
 
My experience has convinced me that trying to predict tire life without considering the riding surface is about as useful as trying to calibrate the dB level of a pixie fart.

There are folks who can and do get upwards of 10,000 miles on a tire set. I got about 5,000 miles on the Bridgestones on my FJR and had the Michelin PR4s on my RT down to the wear bars at 4,000 miles. Why? I ride almost exclusively on chip seal pavement. Chip seal is apparently about as tire friendly as a wood rasp or cheese grater. I'm sure I would get better tire life if I confined myself to droning up and down the smooth asphalt super-slab but where's the fun in that?

The lovely country roads through the farm and wine country of western Oregon are all chip seal. I'd rather spend my time communing with the vineyards, forests, farms, horses, cows, pigs, sheep, goats, llamas, alpacas, deer (ulp!), and camels (!) on the back roads than with the SUVs, Peterbilts, and Freightliners on the interstate. If the result is that I have to buy more tires then so be it.

I'm guessing that the experience of riding through western Colorado more than compensates for a lower tire life.

Enjoy!
 
My experience has convinced me that trying to predict tire life without considering the riding surface is about as useful as trying to calibrate the dB level of a pixie fart.

Well put. I had very good results with my Dunlop Roadsmart 3s - as I have with every other premium tire I've tried.

The aconym YMMV was never more accurate. :laugh
 
Road Smart 3

I put a set on before a 6k mile trip last year. I have over 10k on the rear and about 13k on the front. To be sure they are wore out. Still some tread left but badly squared off especially the rear. I am ordering another set because I like they way they handled the first half of their life.
 
I’ve never run Road Smarts on our bikes, but I’ve mounted a couple of sets for friends. They are undoubtedly the most difficult tires to mount that I have ever encountered. They are the seed of Satan.
 
I’ve never run Road Smarts on our bikes, but I’ve mounted a couple of sets for friends. They are undoubtedly the most difficult tires to mount that I have ever encountered. They are the seed of Satan.

Are you using tire irons, a couple of flat blade screwdrivers or just your bare hands? :)
 
Joe
Now you tell me...

After having a less-than-satisfying experience (mileage-wise) with my first set of Dunlops, I spoke with a rep at the Billings MOA Rally. Their first question was "What tire pressures were you running?". I admitted that, because I'm so smart, I ran about 4 pounds less than factory-recommended on the front and 4 pounds less on the rear. The rep said that it was important to run factory pressures. So I bought another set and whaddya know - she was right. I got about 30% more mileage out of the second set. Totally changed my opinion on the longevity of these tires.

YMMV
 
My experience has convinced me that trying to predict tire life without considering the riding surface is about as useful as trying to calibrate the dB level of a pixie fart.

There are folks who can and do get upwards of 10,000 miles on a tire set. I got about 5,000 miles on the Bridgestones on my FJR and had the Michelin PR4s on my RT down to the wear bars at 4,000 miles. Why? I ride almost exclusively on chip seal pavement. Chip seal is apparently about as tire friendly as a wood rasp or cheese grater. I'm sure I would get better tire life if I confined myself to droning up and down the smooth asphalt super-slab but where's the fun in that?


^Couldn’t agree more.
I’ve run numerous high end tires on my RT & I always seem to get ~7/8K miles a set. The RS3 I’m running now have been a pleasant surprise. Stickey as the Pirelli Angels GT, same good feedback & quieter. Very smooth. I’m planning on a second set on this summer @ ~8K miles.
And, Here in Pennslavania everything (B&C roads) is going over to chip seal. I hated it at first but there are two upsides to this:
1) much better grip in the wet than shiny asphalt.
2) chip sealed roads do not develop pot holes! With our wild temp swings that’s a big deal.
 
My experience has convinced me that trying to predict tire life without considering the riding surface is about as useful as trying to calibrate the dB level of a pixie fart.

I wrote a Benchwrenching column on this topic and have posted this on the Forum before but this thread is a perfect place to post it again. Voni's R1100RS came with Bridgetone BT54 tires from the factory. They worked well so we continued using them for the bike's first 250,000 miles or so. The average mileage for the tires was right at 8,500 miles per tire, front and rear, not counting any early take-offs due to a puncture.

But for the rear tires she got as much as 14,200 miles on one tire and as little as 6,100 on another. Same rider, same bike, same brand and model tire. The variable was road type and weather. The high mileage tire was used riding to and from her job as a teacher in the fall and spring on smooth machine laid asphalt country roads. The low mileage tire was used riding mostly chip seal roads in New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah in the middle of the summer. Road surface and temperature were the two key variables.
 
Tires that I’ve mounted for the past dozen or so years have had the manufacturer’s maximum allowable inflation pressure printed on the sidewall, as required by the DOT. The max safe pressure is almost always 42 PSI although I’ve seen a Shinko that was marked 41 PSI. I do not work with tires for light weight/dirt bikes, so I do not know the typical max pressure for those. Interesting that Kawasaki would recommend pressures that exceed the tire manufacturer’s safe limit. I think I would have stuck with what the tire manufacturer specified.
 
Tires that I’ve mounted for the past dozen or so years have had the manufacturer’s maximum allowable inflation pressure printed on the sidewall, as required by the DOT. The max safe pressure is almost always 42 PSI although I’ve seen a Shinko that was marked 41 PSI. I do not work with tires for light weight/dirt bikes, so I do not know the typical max pressure for those. Interesting that Kawasaki would recommend pressures that exceed the tire manufacturer’s safe limit. I think I would have stuck with what the tire manufacturer specified.

Kevin, I did a search using Google and found at least a half dozen references in COG and other Forums that explicitly state that Kawasaki recommends 42F, 42R.
 
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Ya know I checked and you guys are right about the C-14
42 F/R
Whoops
don't know how that 44 number got stuck in my head..
Thanks for that.
I ordered some Dunlop RS2's
Way cheaper, going to see how long those go this spring.
I would be willing to bet they go about the same.
Ride safe in 2020
 
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