Joined
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745 Posts
Baby got new shoes last night:
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Initial observations are that the CBR doesn't "hunt" across rain grooves or stripe tape like it did with the IRC tires, and it's more comfortable in turns and on turn-in - Don't know how much of that is the differences between the two tires and how much is just old versus new, so that's entirely subjective.
I definitely like the look of the tires. The 150 rear is a bit wider than the 140 it replaced, but not much - Rossi or Stoner could probably detect a difference in handling, but I can't (negative difference, that is - I easily noticed the positive difference).
Time will tell how they hold up - The PRs have a harder compound in the middle that's supposed to make them wear more evenly.
One interesting side conversation - The mechanic commented that the tire/wheel weight on my bike was excessive -the technical term he used was "heavy as s**t!". He said that most liter bikes have lighter wheels/tires (even though they are running much wider rubber), and allowed that I could save in the neighborhood of 15 lbs by going to magnesium wheels. A 15-lb weight loss would have a serious effect on everything from acceleration to handling, especially since it's all unsprung. Since he doesn't sell an aftermarket wheel for the CBR and does sell the exhaust systems and other tidbits, I'm not seeing a profit motive.
If Marchesini comes out with wheels for this bike, I would be interested - At $1500 (estimated) I bet you would see a bigger performance gain that that much money spent on exhaust and Power Commanders... And yes, I know "that's 40% of the cost of the bike!". However, I like this bike so much that I scrapped plans to upgrade to a F800R or Street Triple after a year, so I could argue that I'm saving $9500
.
As an aside, if you're in the triangle area of NC, check out MotoMax on Old Wake Forest rd in Raleigh. Neat store, sells mostly used sportbikes, and their prices on tires (at least for me) beat all of the local store and came very close to 'Net prices.
Initial observations are that the CBR doesn't "hunt" across rain grooves or stripe tape like it did with the IRC tires, and it's more comfortable in turns and on turn-in - Don't know how much of that is the differences between the two tires and how much is just old versus new, so that's entirely subjective.
I definitely like the look of the tires. The 150 rear is a bit wider than the 140 it replaced, but not much - Rossi or Stoner could probably detect a difference in handling, but I can't (negative difference, that is - I easily noticed the positive difference).
Time will tell how they hold up - The PRs have a harder compound in the middle that's supposed to make them wear more evenly.
One interesting side conversation - The mechanic commented that the tire/wheel weight on my bike was excessive -the technical term he used was "heavy as s**t!". He said that most liter bikes have lighter wheels/tires (even though they are running much wider rubber), and allowed that I could save in the neighborhood of 15 lbs by going to magnesium wheels. A 15-lb weight loss would have a serious effect on everything from acceleration to handling, especially since it's all unsprung. Since he doesn't sell an aftermarket wheel for the CBR and does sell the exhaust systems and other tidbits, I'm not seeing a profit motive.
If Marchesini comes out with wheels for this bike, I would be interested - At $1500 (estimated) I bet you would see a bigger performance gain that that much money spent on exhaust and Power Commanders... And yes, I know "that's 40% of the cost of the bike!". However, I like this bike so much that I scrapped plans to upgrade to a F800R or Street Triple after a year, so I could argue that I'm saving $9500
.As an aside, if you're in the triangle area of NC, check out MotoMax on Old Wake Forest rd in Raleigh. Neat store, sells mostly used sportbikes, and their prices on tires (at least for me) beat all of the local store and came very close to 'Net prices.
