Ok, I have the new hack finally and have been out having some fun on the winter roads here in Wisconsin with it... The only problem is left hand turns... I had selected a Dunlop 616 tire for the front because of the soft sport compound and relatively agressive tread profile (based on their racing rain tire). It works just fine on dry and even cold & wet roads. But when there is snow on the road it slides/plows WAY too easily when trying to turn left, and is not the greatest on right handers either... (but can be helped around to the right with extra throttle... ) D616 tire The rear bike tire is a 175/65-15 Bridgestone Blizzak WS-60 (studless ice & snow auto tire) mounted on an automobile rim conversion. The sidecar is riding on a 155/80-12 Kumho Powerstar 758. But I have been thinking of going to a 145/80-12 to get a slightly narrower profile for less drag through deeper snow. ----- The front wheel is a 3.50x17 inch rim with a 120/70-ZR-17 tire, so that limits my choices somewhat. Stock rubber from the factory for the R1200RT is either a Metzler Z6, or a Bridgestone BT020. Metzler Z6 Bridgestone BT020 These are both sport touring tires, so I don't know that they would be any better on a snow covered surface... One other option would be to try a different pure sport tire for a softer compound, or Avon makes two different SuperMoto tires in this size front tire. Their Distanzia dual-sport tire, and a new model called the Azario-SP Pro-Xtreme RAIN. Distanzia Azario-SP Pro-Xtreme RAIN Other options would include trying to stud or sipe the D616 that I have currently installed, or to try to fit an automotive tire somehow... Does anyone have any opinions or other options??? TIA
These work very well for me. I run them tubeless on the Suzuki. I add a few machine screws for ice and packed, polished snow(be careful of screw length particularly if you run tubeless) Cheng Shin C186 Trials Tire http://www.chaparral-racing.com/ Compound and pattern similar to O.E.M long knob pattern for great self-cleaning action Better acceleration and braking Tube type Avail 4-Ply3.50-17 $26.85 Usually Ships in 2 to 5 Days
Yes, the close block trilas type tires work very well. A few screws make a lot of difference or you can get regualr tire studs. Front tires sometimes get overlooked when studding the rear tires but doing the same to the front makes a rig steer like nioght and day.
Those look like they would be nice, but I am not sure that I could get the equivelant of a 90/90-17 tire to fit on my 3.5"x17" rim in place of a 120/70-17 tire... That would be quite a stretch! :huh I fixed the links to show the treads of the tires that I know fit. I was having a brain-dead moment and clicking the link tab instead of the photo tab for inserting... The Avon Azario is supposed to be a supermoto track/street/rain compound, so that may be nicely sticky for decent traction. But does not look to have much tread depth. The D616 that I have on there now has the deepest tread depth of any of the front tires that I could find, and is supposedly a soft sport compound, but it just does not grip on snow when trying to turn left. Does anyone think that leanout or some other factor could be affecting it? This is a fresh setup...
Try it. They are cheap enuf you won't lose much if they won't fit. I bet they will. Those street oriented dual sport treads wont work worth a damn on snow or ice. You could replace the front wheel with a wide 18" rim and use a rear knob or dirt oriented dualsport tread to good effect. I have a Kenda K270 rear on the front of one of my KLRs and it works fantastic!
In fact, perhaps a Kenda K270 rear up front would be a better choice. You can get 17" in 4.60 and 5.10 Under $50 from Chaparral
The Bridgestone Blizzak range is a very good lamelled winter-type tire. (You have noticed that allready) . So is for example the Pirelli Snowcontrol range. (Very nice) Or the Continental Wintercontact range.(No specific installation needed). Really appreciated by winterriders over here. You need car rims, thats understood, I think. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comfficeffice" /><o></o> <o></o> Personnally, I like the narrow tires. They just give more pressure in the snow. (Comparison from wide 165 or 175 wide tires to 145 or even better 135 car tires). I can run them all, both front, rear and sidecar, but incline to use the narrower ones. Dont look that cool, work better. <o></o> <o></o> Studs are generally not allowed in <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comffice:smarttags" /><st1lace>Europe</st1lace>, only in <st1:country-region><st1lace>Austria</st1lace></st1:country-region>, <st1:country-region><st1lace>Sweden</st1lace></st1:country-region>, <st1:country-region><st1lace>Norway</st1lace></st1:country-region>. So that works only if youre able to change easily, when going abroad.<o></o> <o></o> The best thing, changing front to car rims and the lot, but if not................................... then... <o></o> <o></o> for your specific size front wheel, there are no wintertires.... yet, but.... Heidenau is thinking about making one... they allready have them in smaller sizes. They are supposed to run great. <o></o> <o></o> Lamelled tires, thats what you want in winter... Richard-NL <o></o>
Yes, I have found that narrower tires are generally better in snow as well. ESPECIALLY the undriven sidecar wheel!!! The old HitchHiker sidecar that I ran in the winer had a 90/90-18 bike tire/wheel and when I switched to the Champion Escort on the same tug with the 145/80-13 car tire there was a DEFINITE increase in plowing to the right when getting into snow. The new sidecar has a 12" rim installed with a 155/80-12 tire installed, and I am seriously considering trying to fit a 12" scooter tire onto it to get a narrower profile and smaller contact patch for cutting through snow. I certainly do not need the car tire's 908lb load rating... ----- For the front wheel that Heidenau looks like JUST the ticket!!! Hunting down their website finds that they do offer the K66 Snowtex tire in a 110/70-17 size or 130/70-17 which I could probably get to fit on my rim instead of the stock 120 wide tire. You can generally go one size up or down in width as long as you have enough fender clearance for the one size wider... Going narrower will give a flatter tread profile, which will not be bad for sidecar use in general. Going wider will make the tire bulge and give a rounder profile. Now if I could just find anyone in the USA that sells them... ----- In the meantime, I am going to take my utility knife out to the garage with a fresh blade and do my own tire siping on the center and first row out from center tread blocks on the D616 that is currently installed. Nothing too radical to start with, I think maybe 1/2" block spacing to start with. If I want I can always add additional cuts at 1/4" later to add extra gripping edges... I did some test cuts and the compound seems to cut easily enough without the need for a hot knife or any other fancy tools. I will report back if I notice any difference in traction on snow/slush/ice with the sipes cut in the tread.
If the siping does not improve things enough and/or I cannot find a way to import one of those Heidenau Snowtex tires, I probably will give this route a try. Thinking back, I did try a Distanzi on the rear of the R100 sidecar rig one winter and was NOT impressed... Replacing the front wheel would be a nightmare with the ABS, Telelever, and tight fender clearnaces. There is very little fender clearance right now... The best bet there would be to go with a complete leading link setup with a car wheel conversion and real snow tires. Which may be an option if the stock market funds ever recover enough... I used to use a TrailWing on the front on the R100 rig and was pretty happy with it. Had thought about trying a trials tire, but had never gotten around to it... Thanks for the link to Chapparal. They have some very good prices!
Wisconsin does not like studded tires on the street. And actually, most of the winter they do a good job of keeping the streets clear, so the studs would be interfering with rubber contact rather than helping... ----- One thing that I have noticed is that the front wheel tends to plow more on left handers when I am under power. So to make a left turn on a slick intersection I give it some juice to get rolling into the intersection, then pull the clutch in so that I am coasting before I turn left to coast through the turn. Odd, but effective... On right handers I just give it more juice to slide the back end around to the direction I want to go...
BMWZenrider wrote: >>One thing that I have noticed is that the front wheel tends to plow more on left handers when I am under power. So to make a left turn on a slick intersection I give it some juice to get rolling into the intersection, then pull the clutch in so that I am coasting before I turn left to coast through the turn. Odd, but effective... On right handers I just give it more juice to slide the back end around to the direction I want to go... <<< The understeer (plowing) of a rig on slick surfaces like snow is common. Left handers can be pretty annoying. Coasting through a turn is one method that can work. You can, however, do left turns similar to what you are doing for right handers if you get the back end broke loose early on. This takes some practice and if the back end does hook up the plowing of the front will take place pretty quickly. 'Steering with the throttle' is pretty much the key and it takes some practice but can be fun. There are gremlins out there to look out for though. Inconsistant surfaces are rough to deal with if you have any speed up. 'Losing the front end' or having it unhook on you when in a turn can be a huge pucker moment for anyone. If the road surface is inconsistant speed needs to stay down IMHO. Slush can be a trap as can icy spots that may be hidden on what looks like just wet pavement. Oh one other gremlin is that police officers just do not seem to understand that backing a sidecar rig into a turn by hanging the rear end out is good technique. Be careful and have fun.
I used to be able to "power steer" the old rig in either direction pretty easily, but this one just doesn't want to do it to the left... This is the first one that I have had with a car tire on the drive wheel, and I installed a winter snow & ice tire on it. It just really hooks up...
You might need to consider weight bias too. In a right turn(towards the sidecar), weight transfers towards the left and you have more traction on the front wheel. Left turns(away from the sidecar)unweight both the bike tires. With your big(heavier?) rear car wheel conversion, the rear tire has more traction in left turns than the front tire. Throttle will accentuate this if the rear tire is getting bite because it lifts the front end. On my bikes I stand up and lean on the bars going into left turns and stay off the throttle until the front end comes around and is pointed where I need to go. On a big rig like yours I am not sure how much influence shifting your weight will have. What you carry in your trunk, saddlebags and tail rack will make a difference, though. Try to get that stuff forward of the rear tip over line if you can. Not in the nose of the sidecar, but towards the front of the bike if at all possible. Just a thought, YMMV
I really don't carry anything on the bike right now, and I have removed the saddlebags for better aerodynamics. I tested it on the ride home after having the new chair installed. There is actually up to a 5mpg difference in fuel economy at a steady 65-70mph cruise between having the side cases mounted or tossed into the sidecar... ----- As far as doing weight shifting with my body, I may have to give that a try. I had already theorized that weight shift was part of the reason that getting off of the throttle on a left turn is why the tire would start to bite. The Hannigan LT sidecar looks big, but really is not all that heavy at 275lbs. {A standard Ural sidecar weighs in at around 230lbs without TILT, extra racks, spare wheel, etc, etc...} I weigh 220lbs (add more for the weight of my riding gear...) so I weigh a fair percentage of what the chair does, and the bike is only 570lbs with a full tank and the bags installed (which are now absent). So my mass is 25% of the entire vehicle weight. That should be enough to influence balance/dynamics if I start moving it around... ----- This afternoon I spent an hour with a blade siping the D616 that is currently installed. I went with a narrower cut pattern than my original plan. Looking at the Blizzak on the rear, they have sipes at about 3/8" intervals with actual gaps between the tread blocks. So I used about the same spacing for making my cuts. I figure that the blocks on the front tire will be supporting each other because there will not be any gaps between the cuts that I made. But it will add at least 10-12 extra potential gripping edges per tread block. Hopefully there will still be some snow on the road when I get out tomorrow to be able to give it a good trial...
That's new to me. Didn't know they allready had the 17 inch snowtex k66 on the market. I thought it would take a year. I'll check that again, but some suppliers offer them, I see. Have to verify that. Would be something for my XT 600 Yamaha solo and for worst-case-scenario the Staudacher chains on top of that. Only have these short chains at the moment. Bet (wish) they are better (softer compound) than the Michelins Siracs I have now. Which have to be changed anyhow, pretty soon (up to 2.400 Km a month, last a year.....well allmost ). Richard-NL
If you have a local supplier for the 110/70-17 K66 Snowtex, do they have a website, and do they ship to the states??? I cannot find a stateside supplier... ----- I was out for a while today on the home-siped D616 front tire. It seemed to offer a little bit better grip when going through snowy intersections, but nothing really dramatically better. Part of the lack of significant improvement may just be that the cuts are so smooth and tight that they just cannot open up to offer extra gripping edges. I have heard of others using hot knives to sipe tires with. Wondering if that would leave a small gap from the burned rubber and work better??? I know that the sipes on the snow tire on the rear have a small gap...
Karl wrote: >>>I have heard of others using hot knives to sipe tires with. Wondering if that would leave a small gap from the burned rubber and work better???<< Karl, Google ' Speedway motors '. The old style grooving arons are still avaiable and are nto expensive. You can groove the tires or siope them by simply turning the blade over. I am talking about the pistol looking groovong irons..simple and effective. Used them more than I want to rememebr when we were still running the sprint cars. Note that sipes allow the tread to 'squirm' a little more than it would otherwise. This allows the grooves in the tires to open and close more and can help to keep them cleaner. Also on the smooth parts of the tread dependant upon the siping pattern and how the tire was siped the 'tread' created by the sipes will roll and creat a sharp edge as it does so. This is minute but it does allow the tire to act as if it had a softer rubber compound. I think that maybe some actual grooving with a few sipes may work best for you. Hard to say. All disclaimers apply