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Wish I had not gone with a Vredestien Tire

I heard a lot of encouraging stories about dumping kendas for Vredestein. For those that are on the fence - save time money and frustration and just don't do it.

I ordered 205/60R15, the stock tire I took off was 225/50R15. Immediately I could see the size difference- they weren't even close! The Vredestein is most noticeably much narrower. So maybe I ordered the wrong size??? I got online and searched - nope, I got the right one. So I went to the dealership (with whom I had already made aware that I will be bringing in the tire and wheel for them to mount), and the service writer agreed - it doesn't even look right. I pressed him to mount it anyways and he reluctantly agreed. Well today I got a phone call; they will mount it if I REALLY want them to, but they would again strongly advise against it based on the size difference. At this point I threw in the towel. My own doubts coupled with different technicians opinions tell me not to mess with the tire sizes. Do so if you want, but be prepared some raised eyebrows for mounting a tire that is clearly the wrong size.
"One man's opinion." Your mileage may vary.
 
FWIW I just replaced my rear tire on my F3-T @ 78300 mile. This is 21935 miles since last changed. Not too shabby for an "under sized " tire on the rear! You all do as you chose, but I think that the Vredestein tire is a great and safe replacement tire for the spyders. Thanks Mike for all the investigation into this tire.

Al in Kazoo
 
I’ve been reading this thread and others like it and have been left wondering about hydroplaning in severe downpours on the Spyder. I got caught in the rain twice, once very heavy rain and the other normal rainfall. Both times hydroplaning with the Kenda tires was not the issue, it was my inability to see. No matter what speed I was going my vision was terrible. Hydroplaning was the least of my worries. How do you all manage driving in this weather?
 
I’ve been reading this thread and others like it and have been left wondering about hydroplaning in severe downpours on the Spyder. I got caught in the rain twice, once very heavy rain and the other normal rainfall. Both times hydroplaning with the Kenda tires was not the issue, it was my inability to see. No matter what speed I was going my vision was terrible. Hydroplaning was the least of my worries. How do you all manage driving in this weather?

Riding at anything much over 30 mph in the rain, no matter how heavy the rainfall (and I've been in some Elephant drowning, Toad strangling deluges!! 😣) the air-flow over the front & sides of my 2013 RT creates a 'still air rain free' zone behind the windscreen that extends out to the back of the trunk (helped by the 'whale tail' type rack on the top of the trunk... :sneaky:) and it also causes all the rain that hits the windscreen to bead and run up off the screen and out to the sides (it makes a very interesting/attractive pattern when you're riding into the sun setting on the horizon thru a downpour that's dumping out of the clouds immediately above you, but which are high enough that they're not blocking the setting sun on the horizon! It's almost as good as the pattern seen when riding into the sunrise and the moisture beads formed by the morning mist on the screen all blow out and away from the centre of the screen! :giggle:), and it creates an almost completely 'rain free' zone behind the screen so that both my pillion and I don't have any issues with too much rain on our visors either; even tho my head mostly sticks up above the top of the windscreen - even when the screen is in the fully raised position and my head is above it, it's still in the 'deflected air' zone. We basically just don't get wet unless we slow below 30 mph-ish &/or stop! And what little rain does hit our visors does the same as the rain that hits the windscreen; it's blown up and out, then off into the slipstream behind us! 😊

Maybe something you've added up the front of your Spyder has disturbed the air flow that would otherwise do something like that; or possibly that 'windscreen clearing' air flow is something the newer body style has lost?! :unsure:
 
I had a similar problem with rain vision when I had my Zumo mounted on top of the dash cowl. When I moved it to the handlebars, the airflow greatly improved my vision.
 
I love my 165/60 front set Vredesteins and my rear 205/60 Vredestein. I run 18 PSI cold in all three tires riding two up with a trailer and all is great.
My second set of Vredesteins!
Nice ride with wet traction too!
Can you confirm that it is indeed the Vredestein Quatrac that you are using, as there are several Vredestein models?
 
Sundown, what you are doing is judging a product by it's looks and opinions of those who have never tried one.

First, look at the wear pattern of your OEM rear tire. It is likely going bald in a 3-3.5" center track. Ask yourself, 'Why is this?' It's because that's all the rubber you have in contact with the road surface most of the time. The 225/50R 15 has an average tread width of 8.9". But most of it isn't even touching the ground as you ride. This is why the outside 2" or so on both sides of the OEM tire will be virtually new when the center wears out - they never touch the ground and you get little, if any, benefit from the wider tread.

Now the narrower 205/60R 15 Vredestein tire has a width of 8.1". But the superior construction of this tire makes sure the full 8.1" of rubber in the tread width is on the ground at all times. The tread will wear evenly across the entire width for this reason. Plus, the Vredestein sheds water better than any other tire we've found that fits the Spyder.

'Don't judge a book by its cover' can be good advice. It's important to look at the entire equation, not just the first number you see.
Just an observation, I have no dog in the fight but if these tires are wearing in the center I would think a lower air pressure would correct that. Low pressure wears the edges. High pressure wears the center.
 
Just an observation, I have no dog in the fight but if these tires are wearing in the center I would think a lower air pressure would correct that. Low pressure wears the edges. High pressure wears the center.

There's a LOT of discussion, shared experience, and knowledge here on the Forum about tires, tire pressures, and exactly this point you've raised (again), but if you want to delve into why this doesn't work with OEM Kendas &/or their clones, you really should do some searching and reading about it all. ;)

But briefly, while what you've posted above IS the case for most 'normal' car tires, it's simply NOT the case for the very lightly constructed OEM Kendas & their clones - they NEED about 28 psi of pressure in them to carry the (very light) weight of a Spyder, but because of the lighter construction methods & materials used in both the sidewalls and the tread layers, once the rear tire starts rotating at speeds anything much above about 30 mph, the width of the tread face that you'd hope remained in contact with the road surface gets thrown outwards by the rotational forces, making the middle/centre strip of the tread balloon outwards so that ONLY the centre of the tread touches the road surface, wearing that little 2" wide strip rapidly and significantly compromising the tire's traction, even wear, and more!! 😣 And if you run an OEM tire &/or any of their clones at anything much lower than about 2 psi less than their placard recommended pressure, the construction of the tire is such that you risk the catastrophic failure of those OEM tires, more so at speed than when travelling slowly - so please, DON'T EVER RUN THE OEM TIRES AT LOWER PRESSURES, they aren't up to that, and you will not only be putting yourself at risk, but you'll also be putting all the road users around you at risk when your OEM Kenda fails!! And you probably won't get any significantly better tread life, either! 😖

The better/stronger constructed a/mkt tires that many of us fit to our Spyders are made to carry weights/loads that are UP TO a somewhat higher weight/load than that of a Spyder, which is not to say that they cannot carry a lighter weight and still work effectively, because they can, they just don't need as much air pressure in them to do that! But even when running at those lower pressures which are more suited to the lighter weight of a Spyder, the stronger, better made sidewalls and tread layers of these 'normal' car tires that are capable of carrying loads up to maybe three times the weight of a Spyder, is such that it deforms less and keeps more of the tread surface in contact with the road surface most of the time, giving you, the Spyder Ryder, the better traction, wear, and performance etc from your tires, that those of us who have actually done this have discovered. ;)

Oh, and don't kid yourself that without changing anything else, once the centre of the tread on the OEM tires wears out, you'll start running on the outer bits and can get more wear that way - there's a vast number of worn out OEM Kendas out there that go to show that this simply isn't the case, and they've pretty much all worn thru to the canvas or to the rupturing stage in the middle of the tread!! They don't wear out at the edges, cos that bit's not touching the road surface!! The centre of the tread on a OEM tire will STILL throw out regardless of how worn the tire is in the middle, and that means it's STILL going to be pretty much the only bit of the tire in contact with the road surface and therefore wearing!

That said, once the actual softer tread layer of the tire itself is worn away, the underlying carcass is a tougher and harder wearing material, so once you've worn the centre of the tread down into that harder layer, where it provides waaayyy less traction than the tread material proper did, even once that got worn, and that bald/harder strip has no real 'traction' &/or 'water dispersal properties' at all; but that harder layer of material does tend to wear a little slower than the tread did (until it fails, anyway) helping to fool some into thinking they've finally brought those outer edges of tread into play, when they really haven't, at least not to any appreciable level! Once the middle strip of tread has worn away, your OEM tire is nothing but a 'no longer legal to use' black round excuse for a thing that you might think helps keep the metal bits of your Spyder off the road - but it doesn't!! o_O

Just do the smart thing, and fit a 'normal' car tire and run it at a more suitable pressure for the lighter load of a Spyder vs that of the average car (18 psi has shown to be ideal for about 99% of the Spyder Ryding population so far, if they truly try/run it. ;)) ; choosing a tire that's not only better made and stronger than the OEM tires anyway, but is also a tire that's better suited to YOUR riding needs, loads, ambient conditions, and wants, as well as better suited to the conditions and the surfaces that you generally ride in/on! I've run higher performance car tires and been very impressed with them, but due to my 'less than high performance' riding on a wide variety of surfaces and in a wider range of conditions that really weren't an ideal fit for any of those tires, I now run 'All Season M&S' tires, and they work waaaay better than the OEM black round excuses for things that barely managed to keep the metal bits of my Spyder off the road for less than 4000 miles before failing catastrophically! :mad:
 
Just an observation, I have no dog in the fight but if these tires are wearing in the center I would think a lower air pressure would correct that. Low pressure wears the edges. High pressure wears the center.
When the tread area is as weak as the Kenda, centrifugal force will wear the center out regardless of air pressure.
 
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