RaWarrior
Well-Known Member
Wondering if anybody here has tried "darksiding", or putting a car tire on the back of your bike. I've heard a fair amount about it in touring circles, and most everybody that does it has nothing but glowing reviews about it.
There's a fairly lengthy article about it here , and from what I can tell by reading the author's books, he really knows how to ride, with hundreds of thousands of miles experience. He makes a convincing argument, and addresses the common "that can't possibly work" theories. He claims that durability and reliability is substantially higher, cost is lower, and handling "confidence" actually improved- as in you can nail it coming out of a corner with no wiggle or burnout.
The big kicker for me was the picture of the tire at 23k miles, and how the center is most worn, not the sides, and that the little nubs along the edge are still there.
This guy isn't a straight-line-at-55 kind of tourer either.....he rides as aggressively as possible on a Valkyrie. High speeds, peg-dragger turns, ect.
He also mentions how sucky Avon Venom tires were on the Valk, and I can certainly attest to that. Mine just spin spin spin, and are downright scary in the rain.
While the Max doesn't have the size or weight of a Valk, it does have the power(and then some if I remember right). Being able to better put that power to the ground I think would make a tremendous difference for both riding confidence and overall performance.
There's a fairly lengthy article about it here , and from what I can tell by reading the author's books, he really knows how to ride, with hundreds of thousands of miles experience. He makes a convincing argument, and addresses the common "that can't possibly work" theories. He claims that durability and reliability is substantially higher, cost is lower, and handling "confidence" actually improved- as in you can nail it coming out of a corner with no wiggle or burnout.
The big kicker for me was the picture of the tire at 23k miles, and how the center is most worn, not the sides, and that the little nubs along the edge are still there.
This guy isn't a straight-line-at-55 kind of tourer either.....he rides as aggressively as possible on a Valkyrie. High speeds, peg-dragger turns, ect.
He also mentions how sucky Avon Venom tires were on the Valk, and I can certainly attest to that. Mine just spin spin spin, and are downright scary in the rain.
While the Max doesn't have the size or weight of a Valk, it does have the power(and then some if I remember right). Being able to better put that power to the ground I think would make a tremendous difference for both riding confidence and overall performance.