OTHER than Sumitoto tires

Hi All, Just wondering.

Does any one know of any OTHER tire (brand) manufactures that could be used as a rear (darkside) tire on the SilverWing Scooter.

I'm sure the Sumitoto is a great tire, but is there any others?

Bridgestone has one listed in their catalog -- a Potenza RF92, Pirelli has a snow tire listed; both in 165/65 R 13.

My question is: are there any that are a better fit for the Swing rear wheel size? Something with a smaller cross section, but with the same 22.8" diameter?

DennisB wrote:

Does any one know of any OTHER tire (brand) manufactures that could be used as a rear (darkside) tire on the SilverWing Scooter.

I'm sure the Sumitoto is a great tire, but is there any others?

The Sumitomo ( http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tires.jsp?tireMake=Sumitomo&tireModel=HTR+T4&partnum=67TR3HTRT4&vehicleSearch=false&fromCompare1=yes ) has a rating of
UTQG:
Treadwear: 560
Traction: A
Temperature: B

When I checked there were other tires but with a lot less treadwear, traction and temperature characteristics.

Per the "Darkside tire" forums, different darkside tire can have different behaviors. I am not saying it would not work ... just saying it may have different characteristics (maybe worse) than the Sumitomo. So if you go with a different darkside tire for the SWing ... let us know so we can track your results.

OK!

This is for information only for our many forum members.

Any others?

I have read other posts before about the darkside tire but I think it was on the www.silverwing.org site or the Yahoo silverwing site. I just can't remember. I may try it one day but I did ask a shop and they said they wouldn't do it. I just am resigned to replacing my tires since they last me 10,000 miles, which is once a year.

Darkside tires on scooters or motorcycles can really cause some heated posts. I don't know why darksiders feel so defensive. Personally I believe that motorcycle and scooter tires are designed differently than auto tires for a reason, not just to sell short lived tires to make mroe money for the manufacturer. I think auto tires are most likely superior on the rear end of trikes and sidecar bikes. I used to run darkside tires, more or less on both ends of my Cushman scooter back in 1959. Those bikes were designed to use 4.80x8 boat trailer tires. I couldn't say much either way about the effect of those tires on a scooter because the Cushman's handling wasn't much to brag about anyway.