Tour’s ridiculous tyre test and their questionable findings.

[wineguy]

Interesting comments from everybody regarding the wet weather traction of the Pro3Race. In the past, I've never found the Michelins particularly confidence inspiring in the wet conditions. Generally I prefer the force/attack combo and sometimes use the GP4000 which I really don't notice a lot of difference between them on the back. Could be the road surface conditions here in NZ though?

I'll have to try the Pro3Race's next. What does everyone think of the mileage on the Pro3's?

[fdegrove]

Hi,

I'm not sure that I have seen any test where a single brand that produced both treaded and smooth tire with the same casing and compound has been tested? Maybe a link would help.

http://www.rouesartisanales.com/article-1503651.html

Scroll to the bottom of the page and click on the thumbnail.
It shows the Vittoria KS to exhibit higher RR than the CX.
This is surprising as to the best of my knowledge both tyres are otherwise identical.

P.S. I was only pulling your leg regarding the "pushing" of the KS variant.

Ciao,

[Taz]

I will not discuss the Tour test here but I would like to make an observation.
As you can see I live in Greece.
Anyone who has visited and driven/ridden in Greece will have noticed one thing: our roads are extremely slippery.
This fact plays havoc with tyre grip. It is easy to hit the deck at speeds as low as 5km/h. What makes it interesting is that tyres (car/motorcycle/bicycle) that are highly regarded in magazines outside Greece simply cannot perform that way here.
Rubbers that tend to be a little hard and in a usual European road would exhibit very good grip here feel like soap.
On the other hand some very soft compound that in a rough grippy tarmac would start to lose grip because they would disintigrate here would give the best grip.

So what I am trying to say is that the fact that a tyre test seems to disagree with your findings does not mean that it is necessarily flawed but also conducted under different conditions.

[sawyer]

Interesting comments from everybody regarding the wet weather traction of the Pro3Race. In the past, I've never found the Michelins particularly confidence inspiring in the wet conditions. Generally I prefer the force/attack combo and sometimes use the GP4000 which I really don't notice a lot of difference between them on the back. Could be the road surface conditions here in NZ though?

I'll have to try the Pro3Race's next. What does everyone think of the mileage on the Pro3's?

I put my first set on in March and have done about 3000 miles on them since then. No cuts ... they seem very resistant to cuts ... more so than PR2s. And no punctures. That said, about 1000 of those miles have been on French roads.

Grip in the wet seems absolutely fine to me ... can't say i notice it's any better than PR2s but I am probably not pushing either to the limit. Felt fine going down soaking wet and foggy Tourmalet and Hautacam in teh Etape!

I have heard from one clubmate that the sidewalls on his PR3s blew ... and he was a long-time PR2 user ... so has gone back to them. I've not not had any trouble though they do feel more fragile than PR2s.

[GrahamB]

In addition to the former test they added a kind of highly ridiculous “kick scooter” test.
This test was performed on a wet road to check cornering capacity under wet conditions. The corner they tested had a small radius of only 12,5 meters. (not realistic).

I presume the reason was that the tester was less likely to get hurt when he found the limit of adhesion?

I understand the objections you make, but if both the scooter and bike are coasting, perhaps the differences are not so great. At least while descending, most extreme cornering is done while coasting, I think.

It seems not a bad way to find the limit of grip, which should not be much affected by the CoG etc. However the issue on a real bike is how close the bike feels to sliding, ie how much confidence do you get? If tyre A starts giving warning messages at 42 degrees and lets go at 48 deg., it would probably lead to faster cornering than tyre B that warns at 48 and crashes at 50...

Also, as noted by the poster from Greece, wet is not so simple. Depending on the surface, adding water may have a small or large effect. It could be that they found some combination of amount of water and surface texture that favoured the Conti.

[alexedge]

We need our resident SkEpTiC to come over and tell us why ad dollars directly translate to good tests. Paging..........

Starnut

I love how everyone really believes this. As a professional journalist for some years now, I can say with certainty that this is very, very rare except possibly among small, start-up mags from no-name publishers that hire no-name journalists and simply create what we call an "ad book".

From personal experience, I can tell you if I am running, say, a Kawasaki ad, and a Kawasaki wins a shootout, I will get more than 1000 emails calling me a shill and damning me for selling my soul. None of these 1000 people notice that (example again) Kawasaki was running the same ad, and was already the largest advertiser, when they finished last in three shootouts in a row....

I could say much more on this topic, but it's late and I'm tired. I'll probably come back to this thread tomorrow.....

[thasle]

This is the standard discussion when a more or less scientific test are published. I think we also can raise a lot of questions about tests performed by individuals and journalists, claiming test winners based solely on feel.

Whats wrong about testing tires on a "test rig" made as a kick bike? Tour are testing tires at different baseline-speed into a curve and pushes the kick bike through the same curve over and over until it slips. I dont think they modify the speed while going through the corner, so no strange forces going into the bike while in the curve. I would much rather prefer such test results, compared to a test pilot "feeling" how a tire performs. I doubt that anyone can claim to feel a small diference in terms of grip between tire A and B.

Tour only gives you the numbers, and the kick bike test is only part of the total judgment. Its up to you to interpret these data. And finally I dont think most of the members of WW are more objective when reviewing equipment than magazines are. People have their own favorites, connections and expectations, that are more or less objective and independent.

How many of you have been pushing your bikes until it slips out of the corner, at different speeds and with different tires? Tour actually did, and I appreciate the information it provides me. By the way unlike what PezTech claims, Tour actually test ride frames/bikes with riders as well. Personally I dont get much out of reading a report from someone claiming: "this is the lightest and stiffest bike that I have ever ridden. It climbs like a goat and descend like a submarine" Entertaining, but not very informative.

[zebragonzo]

A quick note; tread on tyres comes from peoples perception that tread = better/grippier. This is the case with car tyres and others that can aquaplane, but makes no difference on bike tyres which naturally cut through the surface water.

* I was told this by someone, but they are a trustworthy source.

[theremery]

Wine guy....you'll find the vittorias a shade faster on our roads...the 4000s stick like he proverbial * * to a blue blanket and are pretty unbeatable over a bit of rained-on greywacke road...but they just don't roll that fast. I've never managed to get a 4000s to slide badly in summer here, but they WILL let go in the wet if you push them VERY hard.
The vittorias really are noticeably faster but they cut up sooooooo easily over the ch.ch. bogan-laid glass trail I laughingly refer to as my training track (mind you.....I'm currently feeling a bit bitter about yesterdays 3 punctures that required a pick-up from my G/F....so take this with a grain of salt).
The 4000s is more comfy to ride, the vittoria open corsa evo Cx's I've got ride more harshly but faster (errrr...yep...not overly sensible....but there you have it).
Christchurch is a punture test-lab......
I'm going to try the prorace 3's next.
Re the tests being stupid....whichever MORON decided that running all tyres at the same pressure was a good idea is simply a dickhead*. Run them at the manufacturers recommended pressures....and don't even pretend that curved roller surfaces give an even vaguely sensible result c.f. a non-curved road. As a Scientist....when I read those tests it really does make me quite grumpy.
I like data...but I have yet to read a single tyre test that I really felt happy with. Please...if people disagree with this...point me in the direction of one that I won't pull the methodology to pieces on almost immediately (genuine request....I really DO want the info)

* classic example look carefully to what happens with one of those (horrible) TUFO tyres when you pump them up hard.....one of the tests does it almost as "an aside" and actually puts it in the middle of it's pressure range.........it kicks the butt of well respected tyres!!!!

When I win lotto.....I'm gonna quit my day-job and do one properly.

p.s. it will cost many thousands of dollars to do well and take years of serious research. Any curious philanthropists are welcome to sponsor me (no tyre companies need apply)

[rustychain]

Perhaps we should test our own tires in our own conditions and make up our own minds about what works best for us

[havana]

On the whole, this is nothing new. Magazines and other print media always favour their main advertisers, there have been plenty of cases in which this is proven already. Colnago stopped advertising in the Dutch magazine Fiets, because Fiets wrote the Christallo was not at all stiff. The Dutch footbal mag VI never published a highly interesting story on corruption at footbalclub AZ, because the owner (a banker) was one of VI's main advertisers. In Holland we say : "who's bread you eat, who's word you spread".

These days, a lot of magazines have a hard time making profit or even doing break-even, which makes it even harder for editors not to do so.

Conclusion: there is no such thing as objectivity. In a French mag, the Michelin Pro3 wil probably win every single test. Who cares? In the end they are both good tires.

[Taz]

Perhaps we should test our own tires in our own conditions and make up our own minds about what works best for us

And risk ridding a tyre that does not come out on top in magazine tests? You have got to be joking

[nexusheli]

We need our resident SkEpTiC to come over and tell us why ad dollars directly translate to good tests. Paging..........

Starnut

I love how everyone really believes this. As a professional journalist for some years now, I can say with certainty that this is very, very rare except possibly among small, start-up mags from no-name publishers that hire no-name journalists and simply create what we call an "ad book".

From personal experience, I can tell you if I am running, say, a Kawasaki ad, and a Kawasaki wins a shootout, I will get more than 1000 emails calling me a shill and damning me for selling my soul. None of these 1000 people notice that (example again) Kawasaki was running the same ad, and was already the largest advertiser, when they finished last in three shootouts in a row....

I could say much more on this topic, but it's late and I'm tired. I'll probably come back to this thread tomorrow.....

The key here is that in most magazines and television shows, ad dollars DO equate to favorable reviews. An advertiser may not "WIN" a shoot-out style test, but they certainly don't get hammered for the negatives of their product.

A perfect example of this is BBC's Top Gear. There's a reason everyone loves this show: The hosts can say what's on their minds. Because it's not an ad-revenue paid show, they don't have to worry about pissing off potential or existing advertisers and can tell you when a product is a total and complete piece of sh#&.

They're currently trying to translate Top Gear into an American spin-off, and I can tell you now it's going to flop like the fattest man you ever saw try to dive into a pool for this very reason. Car companies will advertise, their cars will get an unfavorable review and they'll pull their ad, or worse, the hosts will succumb and review a total piece of junk as being a decent car...

The best way to get a review of anything is to talk to your local groups and clubs to see what works best in your area. I would never suggest a slick tire here in my neck of the woods only because the roads are so poor. However I used to ride slicks near my hometown all the time.

What works for the editors of Bicycling, Tour, RBA or other magazines may not work for you.

[sawyer]

We need our resident SkEpTiC to come over and tell us why ad dollars directly translate to good tests. Paging..........

Starnut

I love how everyone really believes this. As a professional journalist for some years now, I can say with certainty that this is very, very rare except possibly among small, start-up mags from no-name publishers that hire no-name journalists and simply create what we call an "ad book".

From personal experience, I can tell you if I am running, say, a Kawasaki ad, and a Kawasaki wins a shootout, I will get more than 1000 emails calling me a shill and damning me for selling my soul. None of these 1000 people notice that (example again) Kawasaki was running the same ad, and was already the largest advertiser, when they finished last in three shootouts in a row....

I could say much more on this topic, but it's late and I'm tired. I'll probably come back to this thread tomorrow.....

well, i'm not a journalist, but my gf is, and i know a fair number from all sorts of publications here in london. while i agree that people view this issue too crudely, it is true IME that advertising revenue has some influence over editorial content. Editors would be loathe to really slate a firm that brings in big bucks through ads.

[HammerTime2]

Anyone who has visited and driven/ridden in Greece will have noticed one thing: our roads are extremely slippery.

What is it about Greece/Greek roads which makes them so slippery?