Tyres: Tread and damage

Originally Posted by yorkie_chris

Yes and no, some squat at the rear is desirable. Completely crap damping leads to tearing of the tyre.

I noticed a reduction in wear when fitting penske rear. You also have to try a lot harder before the flanks of the tyre start to acquire a grainy pattern.

You'll agree the stock (pointy) shock is relatively crap. My tyre wear was from road riding, adjusting the shock helped marginally. The present ZX6 shock has undoubtedly improved things - even if not yet ideally set up. Less squatting, less squaring of the tyre considering the comparative mileage, less tearing of the middle and more stable (read faster ). So in my experience a poor shock led to more tyre wear.

[yorkie_chris]

Originally Posted by Runako

So in my experience a poor shock led to more tyre wear.

Yep, that's very probable. Not disagreeing with that at all.

And yes the stock pointy shock is naff. Too soft, too short, and a progressive rear link that means you blow through all the travel then it's too stiff with no rebound. Lovely!


Just the squat is a nearly separate issue... say you had a £1000 penske, you could set the length too high and get zero squat... or even way over and get pro anti-squat. That feels really weird and rips the sh*t out of tyres.
Or you can have a short shock... like I believe bibio on here has a really short nitron... so lots of squat on the power but good damping, and your tyre wear may be fine and loads better than stock.