Right front tire wearing on inside

[Wrongway]

If those are the OEM tires on his 2011, they are due for replacement simply on time regardless of tread left.

Do yourself a favor and put a new set of Bridgestones on the front and get it aligned. The resulting ride and handling will be much improved. Quit fretting over aged out tires. They are done.

LOL, I think I frett over everything. The tires aren't the original. They were replaced about 9,000 miles ago by the original owner and are the world famous Kenda's.
When I do actually replace the front though, it will be with the original size bridgestones.

 

[SpyderAnn01]

Ann, do you still think that, based on the pics he just posted?

Pete, tires are a pretty inexpensive item so why would someone want to go to the expense of rotating them to find out that they are still junk? In Las Vegas we pay $30 to have a tire mounted, that doesn’t include our labor to remove and reinstall the tires, so you’d spend a minimum of $60 to do it yourself. Just put good tires on the bike and be done with the junk Kendas.

 

[SpyderAnn01]

That actually doesn't look too bad compared to what I was thinking (and what Roger's looked like).

Tire guys - what do you think? I don't see the typical feathering I normally associate with a toe-in / toe-out issue but then again I don't have much experience diagnosing tire wear problems with a Spyder vs a car.

Pete, I think you’re talking about cupping when you say feathering. The Kenda will cup when they are worn out. Wrongway has actual wear on the inside of one tire which is caused by a toed out condition.

Roger had many thousands of miles on his Kendas and they were cupped and were replaced with car tires.

 

[UtahPete]

Pete, I think you’re talking about cupping when you say feathering. The Kenda will cup when they are worn out. Wrongway has actual wear on the inside of one tire which is caused by a toed out condition. Roger had many thousands of miles on his Kendas and they were cupped and were replaced with car tires.

Thanks Ann. I think of cupping as a result of wheel not balanced. Feathering is what I call that effect resulting from alignment issues. We're probably talking about the same thing. I've always wondered what was causing that unusual wear pattern on Roger's tires, so it will be interesting to see how the new ones look after he's ridden them over 5k miles by now.

 

[AeroPilot]

Looks like the inside wear on the right tire on our 11 RT

When we bought our first Spyder in 2012, it was assembled from the crate and with several thousand miles use, had a severe inside of the tire wear develope. We got the Spyder aligned by Lamonster garage in Springfield the next Spyderfest trip, and we did remount the tires on the wheels and got some more useful wear out of them although I did not record the mileage at the time. If your tires are otherwise rolling smooth with no vibrations or other wise uneven wear, Your Choice on how to proceed. Car tires will give you better wear and most likely better/smoother roll, as has been our experience with some Michelin defenders mounted on the 14 " wheels on the 11 RT model. The Michelins were still on the bike when we traded it with 76,000 miles on the odometer. The front tires you can usually count on getting about 20,000 miles if you watch them and at about $100 a tire depending on your choice, It's your call, and hope there are not any other frame or A-arm issues contributing to your wear. How many total miles on the bike?

 

[Wrongway]

When we bought our first Spyder in 2012, it was assembled from the crate and with several thousand miles use, had a severe inside of the tire wear develope. We got the Spyder aligned by Lamonster garage in Springfield the next Spyderfest trip, and we did remount the tires on the wheels and got some more useful wear out of them although I did not record the mileage at the time. If your tires are otherwise rolling smooth with no vibrations or other wise uneven wear, Your Choice on how to proceed. Car tires will give you better wear and most likely better/smoother roll, as has been our experience with some Michelin defenders mounted on the 14 " wheels on the 11 RT model. The Michelins were still on the bike when we traded it with 76,000 miles on the odometer. The front tires you can usually count on getting about 20,000 miles if you watch them and at about $100 a tire depending on your choice, It's your call, and hope there are not any other frame or A-arm issues contributing to your wear. How many total miles on the bike?

24,000 miles on the Spyder. It's thanksgiving here in Canada so the dealer is closed today but I'll take it in tomorrow and have them look at it.
I'm one of the lucky ones. A good dealer 6 miles from home.
Hopefully it's just an alignment issue. Certainly looks like it but we'll see.

 

[BLUEKNIGHT911]

TIRE WEAR

:gaah:.....Some people put BANDAIDS on things thinking it fixes the Problem ---- IT DOESN'T ....it only masks the issue for another Day .... Like swapping tires L to R etc. ... it's fine if you can get this done for FREE .... because it's a band-aid, you have to deal with it ...again ...& again ...& again ... etc ..... Mike :thumbup:

 

[Wrongway]

:gaah:.....Some people put BANDAIDS on things thinking it fixes the Problem ---- IT DOESN'T ....it only masks the issue for another Day .... Like swapping tires L to R etc. ... it's fine if you can get this done for FREE .... because it's a band-aid, you have to deal with it ...again ...& again ...& again ... etc ..... Mike :thumbup:

Yep, I agree about the bandaid thing. I have no intention of rotating the tires. I'll let the dealer tell me what they think is causing the tire wear but I think most of us agree that it looks like an alignment should cure the cause.
As far as replacing the tires, I'll wait and see how it goes since I'll probably need a new rear tire in about 4,000 miles.
Thanks again for all the help. It's really appreciated.

Greg

 

[Poody]

I have also had an issue with my right tire wearing unevenly on the inside and pulling to the left.
Had the alignment checked twice by our local dealer and it was correct.

I am from and engineering tinkering background and could not leave it at that as it was. I set up a laser based system to check the camber and found the right wheel was way out.
BRP say there is no adjustment for camber. WRONG. I have made shims to put between the suspension junction at the top where it bolts together and working out the geometry added 1.05mm pushing the top of the wheel out curing my issue.
New alignment and it was still fine.
The BRP tech was gobb smacked but it now drives straight and tire wear is even.
We call it Kiwi ingenuity.

 

[UtahPete]

I have also had an issue with my right tire wearing unevenly on the inside and pulling to the left. Had the alignment checked twice by our local dealer and it was correct. I am from an engineering tinkering background and could not leave it at that as it was. I set up a laser based system to check the camber and found the right wheel was way out. BRP say there is no adjustment for camber. WRONG. I have made shims to put between the suspension junction at the top where it bolts together and working out the geometry added 1.05mm pushing the top of the wheel out curing my issue. New alignment and it was still fine. The BRP tech was gobb-smacked but it now drives straight and tire wear is even. We call it Kiwi ingenuity.

THANK YOU! I believe some Spyders DO have an off-camber issue and there has to be a way to fix that short of replacing components. I really appreciate your taking the initiative to get to the heart of the uneven tire wear problem rather than just accept the conventional wisdom.

NOW, since there don't seem to be systems commercially available to detect and fix camber issues, can you please explain / describe / show us how you did it?

Thanks again. I feel vindicated.nojoke

 

[RinconRyder]

BRP say there is no adjustment for camber. WRONG.

It might just be semantics Poody.

Here in the States (and I assume in Canada) we usually say there is no adjustment if you can't move something with available adjusters (wheels, dials, wrenches etc.). Shims used to be the accepted way of adjusting camber in vehicles but it was so time consuming that it gradually fell out of favor and now usually exists only in vehicles like race cars. Most cars today do not have adjusters to control camber the way they used to in the old days.

 

[Wrongway]

Update on front tire wear

So I took bike into the dealer on Wednesday.
Visually they agreed that it looked like an alignment issue without me offering an opinion.
They also agreed to just leave the front tires where they are and not rotating them.
Just picked up bike from the dealer. Alignment was off 1/4" but is now laser aligned.
Not sure if it's my imagination but I took the long way home and the bike seemed less twitchy when going straight.

Also had rear brakes done while it was there.
They tried to talk me into replacing the rear tire (kenda) as it's nearly at the wear bars.
They wanted $200.00 just for the tire (kenda). I told them "NO KENDA FOR ME".
We're heading to Florida in November so I'll buy a car tire there, much less expensive than here in Canada.

 

[SpyderAnn01]

So I took bike into the dealer on Wednesday.
Visually they agreed that it looked like an alignment issue without me offering an opinion.
They also agreed to just leave the front tires where they are and not rotating them.
Just picked up bike from the dealer. Alignment was off 1/4" but is now laser aligned.
Not sure if it's my imagination but I took the long way home and the bike seemed less twitchy when going straight.

Also had rear brakes done while it was there.
They tried to talk me into replacing the rear tire (kenda) as it's nearly at the wear bars.
They wanted $200.00 just for the tire (kenda). I told them "NO KENDA FOR ME".
We're heading to Florida in November so I'll buy a car tire there, much less expensive than here in Canada.

Not your imagination, if your bike was out of alignment and now it’s aligned it will feel less twitchy. Good call on waiting for a car tire.