Dunlop 209GPA

[Trent1098S]

Jim,

Thanks. On my tire there was no tread left on the right side. I'll try to get my camera out tonight after work to snap a couple of pics.

Turn 9 at Autobahn North is not a fun place to highside. It's a long sweeping right hander that opens up on to the front straight. I'm unbelievably happy that I was lucky enough to save it and get stopped. There's no tires or no airfence there.. just a whole lot of guardrail..

Just wanted to give a heads up to everyone to keep an eye on these as they wear down. Wish there was a way to measure the rubber thickness on the sides! Everyone's tire will certainly wear at different rates.. so it could last a long time for some, and not so long for others.

 

[Motofun352]

Ditto the strange wear on the right side after 2 days at Summit main. Had Chris Moon check it out....took a half turn of comression out mid day on Sunday but it had no affect. Ran 33 front and 23 rear (all hot, straight off the track). The tire now has a slight lip where it runs off the hard middle onto the soft side with about 1" of tearing. I really need to get more out of a tire than this. I'll probably flip it for Beaver next month as that track is also hard on the right side. Handling/feel/traction were great at Summit, by the way.

 

[barry38]

Motofun352;86981 wrote: Ditto the strange wear on the right side after 2 days at Summit main. Had Chris Moon check it out....took a half turn of comression out mid day on Sunday but it had no affect. Ran 33 front and 23 rear (all hot, straight off the track). The tire now has a slight lip where it runs off the hard middle onto the soft side with about 1" of tearing. I really need to get more out of a tire than this. I'll probably flip it for Beaver next month as that track is also hard on the right side. Handling/feel/traction were great at Summit, by the way.

I'd drop the pressure a pound or two in the rear and see what happens.

 

[machdw69]

Trent1098S;86968 wrote: Jim,

Thanks. On my tire there was no tread left on the right side. I'll try to get my camera out tonight after work to snap a couple of pics.

Turn 9 at Autobahn North is not a fun place to highside. It's a long sweeping right hander that opens up on to the front straight. I'm unbelievably happy that I was lucky enough to save it and get stopped. There's no tires or no airfence there.. just a whole lot of guardrail..

Just wanted to give a heads up to everyone to keep an eye on these as they wear down. Wish there was a way to measure the rubber thickness on the sides! Everyone's tire will certainly wear at different rates.. so it could last a long time for some, and not so long for others.

by the sound of the track your describing with guardrails and such i'm surprised nesba even rides there. kind of sounds like the N.Y. Monticello track here with excessive armco and whatnot and nesba hasn't approved that track yet, which by the way i totally agree with. staying safe is paramount.

are there any wear bars on the 209's to tell how far down your getting? the link below may give you some insight into your tire wear issues.

http://www.feelthetrack.com/tire-wear.html

 

[NoBull]

machdw69;87039 wrote:

are there any wear bars on the 209's to tell how far down your getting? the link below may give you some insight into your tire wear issues.

http://www.feelthetrack.com/tire-wear.html

If these guys are correct with their explanations and pictures, the D209 problems I have seen, and also have myself, are rebound tears. Unfortunately they don't go on to explain which way to go on the rebound.

 

[Katie785]

Motofun352;86981 wrote: Ditto the strange wear on the right side after 2 days at Summit main. Had Chris Moon check it out....took a half turn of comression out mid day on Sunday but it had no affect. Ran 33 front and 23 rear (all hot, straight off the track). The tire now has a slight lip where it runs off the hard middle onto the soft side with about 1" of tearing. I really need to get more out of a tire than this. I'll probably flip it for Beaver next month as that track is also hard on the right side. Handling/feel/traction were great at Summit, by the way.

I played with these tires at VIR - ended up lowering pressures to 18 hot per the advice of some of the AMA guys and notice some improved traction and no wear issues

 

[Trent1098S]

machdw69;87039 wrote: by the sound of the track your describing with guardrails and such i'm surprised nesba even rides there. kind of sounds like the N.Y. Monticello track here with excessive armco and whatnot and nesba hasn't approved that track yet, which by the way i totally agree with. staying safe is paramount.

are there any wear bars on the 209's to tell how far down your getting? the link below may give you some insight into your tire wear issues.

http://www.feelthetrack.com/tire-wear.html

There's quite a lot of runoff there on turn 9 on the north track, but where I highsided at was about the worst possible spot. When I recovered it was just in time to hit the grass, where the track and the armco start to come together. If it was any earlier, I'd have tons of room, if it was any later I'd be going straight and there's little chance of it.

There's a couple of bad spots on the North track where there's tire wall or guardrails on the exit. Turn 6 is really bad.. if you highsided coming out of 6, there's tirewall straight ahead of you. If you tucked it there's quite a lot of runoff though, but the wall tightens to the track right about the exit point.

On South course, there's a double apex right hander coming on to the front straight where you're pointed directly at the guardrail, wide open throttle, leaned over.. but they DO put airfence up there so it's not quite as bad.

I think the worst corner we've got anywhere is the last turn at Putnam coming on to the front straight. That corner scares me. The rest of the track is awesome though.

 

[Trent1098S]

Here's pics of my 209GPA wear. Ran it at 23 psi rear taken hot. I noticed a drop in wear when I took 4 clicks of rebound and 2 clicks of compression out, but that also caused me other problems on corner exit (wheelies, headshake, light front end..).

To be fair, I *did* get 2 and a half days out of the 209GPA which is two and a half times what I got out of the Pirelli slick. I should have flipped them both though earlier. The left side on each is still great, but there useless now because the right sides went too far down.

This is the pirelli supercorsa rear I wasted after 8 sessions in I group along with the Dunlop in natural light (no flash). It's flipped over to show the shadows on the right side better.

Kinda sucks spending $500 in tires in two weekends...

 

[ronhix]

Trent1098S;87848 wrote: I noticed a drop in wear when I took 4 clicks of rebound and 2 clicks of compression out, but that also caused me other problems on corner exit (wheelies, headshake, light front end..).

That sounds more like increased rear tire grip and traction with the drive off the corner than "other problems on corner exit".

 

[Trent1098S]

Well, that's a good solid theory I didn't think of before now.

I'm not sure what to run at Barber. The 209 front is still good to go. Any suggestions on the rear? More of the same, or try a slick?

 

[Motofun352]

Katie785;87099 wrote: I played with these tires at VIR - ended up lowering pressures to 18 hot per the advice of some of the AMA guys and notice some improved traction and no wear issues

WOW...,18 psi hot...who wouda thunk! Pretty soon we'll be running these things under vacuum.

 

[robfromga]

I would run another rear 209. I'd suggest running that tire a little softer, like 22-21 psi. The wear shows that your pinning the throttle in that one spot, not rolling the gas on. Carry corner speed, don't point and shoot. So many riders brake way too much on entry than crank it on the apex. On a 1098s if you crank the gas I'd imagine that its gunna go light in front.

 

[Trent1098S]

Yeah I'm usually WOT before it's straight up. If I enter a corner too slow by setting my entry speed wrong (still working on that), I'll add a little gas before the apex of the corner. I know this is dead wrong in technique but I'm still hesistant about pushing my brake markers up further. When I do, I almost always turn in way late because it changes the rythm of body/brake/downshift/turn in.

Brakes are my big weak spot that I'm trying to work out. For me, it's easier to control the slide and feel of the rear than it is the font, so entering a corner too fast is still a scary thing. I'm still working on the feeling of "speed" and gauging how fast I'm going, or how fast I can take a corner, is tough to do. I don't have nearly as much confidence as I need to on the front.

So I'm riding the 1098 in more of a point & shoot mode. It's hard for me not to do this, since the majority of my track time is at a tight point & shoot track (blackhawk).

Enough excuses. I'm working on it.

 

[dmb367]

Hey Trent - Have you had your suspension setup by anybody (Turn One)? What suspension do you have on that 1098? Something just doesn't seem right there, those tires just look terrible. Are the spring rates right for your weight? Sag dialed in?

I think the Southeast tire vendor will have some good deals on the 209s at Barber. I think I saw $300 a set from Dunlop Racing. That way you can get more depreciation out of that front.

See you at Barber!

 

[JRA]

I think you definitely have a shock issue for the Pirelli to look like that; from the pictures the Dunlop's look pretty good to me. There a lot of things that could be causing your problems and I think you should look into some professional help with your set up. I've worn the 209 rear down a lot farther than that without much loss in rear traction so I think your big moment could also be traced to a shock issue (of course you could have just whacked the throttle open too). You could pay for a lot of suspension work with what you'll save on tires once it's set up correctly.

 

[Trent1098S]

dmb367;87943 wrote: Hey Trent - Have you had your suspension setup by anybody (Turn One)? What suspension do you have on that 1098? Something just doesn't seem right there, those tires just look terrible. Are the spring rates right for your weight? Sag dialed in?

I think the Southeast tire vendor will have some good deals on the 209s at Barber. I think I saw $300 a set from Dunlop Racing. That way you can get more depreciation out of that front.

See you at Barber!
Yes, it's been set up by Turn One. I never had problems with wear until I started getting faster this year.. got 8 days out of my last set of Pirelli Diablo DOT's. (4 days at BHF, 3 days at Joliet, 1 day at Putnam). Then I got one day out of the Pirelli Diablo SC2 slick. Ran it at 25psi hot.

Looking forward to Barber!!!

JRA;87945 wrote: I think you definitely have a shock issue for the Pirelli to look like that; from the pictures the Dunlop's look pretty good to me. There a lot of things that could be causing your problems and I think you should look into some professional help with your set up. I've worn the 209 rear down a lot farther than that without much loss in rear traction so I think your big moment could also be traced to a shock issue (of course you could have just whacked the throttle open too). You could pay for a lot of suspension work with what you'll save on tires once it's set up correctly.

Running Ohlins TTX rear shock, springs are good for my weight. If you look at the right side of the 209, you should be able to see how it went "concave". So I had two smaller contact patches on the side - one on the edge, one on the line where the compound changes, instead of one larger contact patch. Spun it up very easily...

 

[JRA]

Ran it at 25psi hot

That's your problem unless something has changed drastically since last year. I've run a bunch of Pirrelli slicks. Always at 28-29 psi hot. I always found that all the Pirrelli tires tore unless you really kept an eye on your pressure. I've never run one that low.

 

[gixxercurt]

Trent1098S;87882 wrote: Well, that's a good solid theory I didn't think of before now.

I'm not sure what to run at Barber. The 209 front is still good to go. Any suggestions on the rear? More of the same, or try a slick?

get some of my gpa take offs :doh:

 

[Cyclepath]

Trent, The DOT is a softer carcass than the Slick with the Pirelli. Quite often we find when folks switch fom a DOT to a slick they get tear. Sometimes is it just a matter of softening rebound to offset for the stiffer tire but other times we will find that the rear shock is bottoming out which requires some other adjustments. You would probobly find that if you went back to the DOT your problems would go away. I am not selling anything here just offering free information. Feel free to give me a call if you would like some more advice to get the Pirelli's to last a long time. On average guys are getting about 400 track miles out of the tires..