The Dark Side!

[BillR]

Have you ever heard the term "The Dark Side" associated with motorcycling? No it has nothing to do with the Force. It's a reference to fitting car tires to road motorcycles. Many folks do it to to get additional traction and or wear out of a rear tire. There was a white Gold Wing at the State Rally this year fitted with a car tire. I never did figure out whose bike it was.

Have any of you had any experience with The Dark Side?

Bill

[BillR]

I'm needing a new rear tire on my Valk so I spent some time researching the darkside. I eventually found this post by Mark T over at the VRCC forum. Mark is the owner of http://horseapple.com. For some reason I was unable to simply link to the post he made so I copied and pasted it here.

Mark's Post:

First off, no offense if the Darkside is your baby. This is my honest, impartial report. If you like the Darkside, I'm happy for you. However, I would admonish you (if I was king of the world) not to mislead others when seeking new members to your flock. I shouldn't say I was mislead - but I will say, after seeing reports of "no difference" - which I was skeptical of - I said, I'm going to find out for myself. So I did.
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Yeah I watched the video.
He wonders why the tire wears in the middle. Because he mostly rides on the flats / slab. He brags he bought it on ebay for $20. Doesn't mention the last guy got rid of it.

I saw all - OK most of the posts praising the virtues of the darkside. Here on the VRCC, and on Lamont's other boards, and on the VOA. Saw many posts of riders claiming they "couldn't tell the difference between the darkside and a MC tire". That was suspicious to me, because I can sure tell if a worn bike tire has a 2" wide flat spot in the middle - nevermind a 7" wide flat spot.

So I said, OK I'm going to see for myself, and keep an open mind. Bought the most popular tire - Goodyear Triple Tred in 205/60/16. Ran it for 1381 miles with all pressures in 2lb increments between 20 and 40. I had seen posts saying, there is definitely differences in handling with different pressures. "Not bad, just different degrees of good". I ride all kinds of roads, and even non-roads, from trails that should be for dual sports only, through tight twisties in the mountians, to fast sweepers, to the slab. I have almost a quarter million miles of experience over the last decade on large cruisers and tourers.

My conclusion? The bike is back on a MC tire. A Cobra 200/60-16. And now a Dunlop K491 rear, on the front. And the bike handles like a bike again. And I am SO happy to have good handling again. The darkside is outta here forever.

Darkside benefits?
1) The ride is soft, really cushy - of course this varies with the pressure.

2) Rear braking is much more effective - so is traction in non-dry non clean road conditions.

3) Cost benefit - tire lasts several times longer and costs less to begin with.

4) Attracts comments, conversation, criticism, maybe respect as you truly are a Maverick - not another Harley lemming.

Drawbacks?
1) VERY poor handling. Extreme countersteer pressure required to turn and to maintain the bike in a lean. I didn't measure it, and now I can't, but I guesstimate countersteer pressure gets up to 20 lbs. The bike does NOT want to turn. Ever have a back tire go flat slowly? When it gets down to about 7 lbs - that's what this tire feels like. Only worse. If you ride only on the slab, this tire is for you.

2) Bump steer. The bike got crossed up from this several times. If I hadn't been expecting it, I might have gone down.

3) Unstable when starting a turn sometimes. Bike swerves unexpectedly - I experienced this several times but it would take more time and use for me to nail down where this is coming from. That's not gonna happen because the other factors were sufficient for me to have a verdicty on the tire. Most upsetting when first initiating a turn after riding straight.

4) Bike wants to follow every road anomoly it hits. Grade seperations, ruts, everything. More pronounced at low speeds, but happens at high speed too. Be careful entering slanted driveways, try to avoid rutted roads. Stay the hell off bad dirt roads and trails.

5) Don't look away from the road - you might go in the ditch. The bike needs constant steering corrections. Does not track accurately. Stay away from close formation riding.

6) Fitment issues - though this is minor for me, for some it may matter more.

I kept an open mind. Yet I wanted this to work, I'd love to save money, have a (more) cushy ride, better traction in the slop. But I also turn the bike. Especially in the twisties. And I EXPECT my bike to have neutral handling, and not bad handling idiosyncracies that I have to compensate for. Just like flying an airplane, I don't fly with the aircraft out of trim and have to hold yoke pressure constantly. Turning the darkside is like flying a plane out of trim.

I saw lots of reports from folks praising the darkside, I'm referring now to the ones who reported "no difference". I have an opinion about them, but I'll tone it down here. Take such reports with a "grain of salt". They were partly the reason I tried this myself. THEY ARE WRONG. There is MOST DEFINITELY A DIFFERENCE. I would characterize those who post such reports as either 1. having an agenda, "spin-doctoring" their report accordingly, or 2. Inexperienced riders, or 3. Ride the tire almost exclusively on the flat and turn so infrequently and rarely get on grade seperations or ruts, so as to forgive the bad side, or 4. Maybe the Darkside tire they chose behaves completely different from my Triple Tread 205/60-16 (right) or 5)Liars. Take your pick - 1-4 is more charitable but 5 is possible.

If you ride connected twisties - like the Dragon, like Deer Creek Canyon SW. of Denver, and you like your bike to handle with neutral handling - you will HATE the darkside.

If you ride mostly the slab, never care if your bike handles badly, especially in turns and uneven surfaces, and want to save money - the Darkside may be your tire. "

End of Mark's Post

One weakness of the Valkyrie is that it tends to pick up steering inputs from grooves and ruts in the road. When I read that a car tire accentuates this habit I decided to stick with a Dunlop Elite 3.

[BillR]

I did find a good site that maintains a database of cartires that will fit various bikes.

Check out:
http://darkside.nwff.info/index.php

They even have a recommendation for a squarish front tire for a GoldWing trike.

Regards

Bill R