My Michelin Road 5 review

GAmedic said:
Bike: '11 Hayabusa. Stock chain and sprockets. Only mods are slip ons, shorty levers, rearsets, and steering stabilizer.

Riding style: majority commute. Mildly aggressive mountain trips. Couple of high speed interstate runs less than 150mph.

So, most all of you know I ride my bike every day because I dont own a car at the moment. For this reason, I need the best tires I can get that will perform in all weather and last as long as possible. I bought my bike this year at the end of April and it had 88xx miles on it. I turned 21,000 this past Sunday. I am currently averaging 2100 miles a month on the bike give or take. Some people do that many miles in a year. When I bought the bike, it had almost bald OE Battlax tires. I've never had anything good to say about Battlax tires. I knew PR4s were what I wanted; until I heard about the Road 5s that had recently come out.

I read up on the Road 5s and one of the claims Michelin had was these tires would have the same wet traction after 3k miles as PR4s have new. Well, I'm sold on them so I placed my order for the 5s. Had fresh rubber mounted and I hit the road. Did a proper tire break in so I took it easy for roughly the first 250 miles. Tires did great for the break in period. Time for mountain trips.
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The second and third paragraph tells us all we need to know to yell PR5! It is the perfect tire for your exact situation. Me? I'm all about Q3+, but my bike is a fair weather friend.
I still say that yours is one of the best looking bikes on the site.
Now excuse me I'm going for a RIDE!!! Hmmm buzz down I75 cruse through Gville and lunch at Buffalo Wild wings, or maybe Red Robin, naw Conestoga? Maybe I'll have to hit a couple of them I love having the week off!!!!!!
 
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WuzzaCBXRider said:
I’ve always had PR2s or 3s and loved them. My new Z came with Dunlop Sportmax tires. Are they any good?
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I had Dunlop GPR300s. Was a fan for a while. Did have a couple of traction issues but I dont think it was 100% of the tires fault. I can say the Road 5s would not have had the same issue. I got 8500 miles out of those Dunlops when I wrecked the bike. Take that for what worth.
 
WuzzaCBXRider said:
I’ve always had PR2s or 3s and loved them. My new Z came with Dunlop Sportmax tires. Are they any good?
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There are several tires in the SportMaxx series. I doubt it came with Q3's or Roadsmarts.
It probably has another sport touring tire on it, but it will be quality for it's application.
Dunlop makes great tires.
Try s set of Q3's when the time comes, they stic
GAmedic said:
I reiterate that I am going for max life. I dont normally run them down that far.
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I have no room to talk, as I've ridden too long on many a set.
I usually come home with frayed wires showing(after burning off the white cord), that way I know I got my money's worth, lol.
But seriously, I don't do that on purpose.
Just that hot days and good roads can do in a sport tire quickly, even when we think they have a few more good miles left in them, that they really don't.
Bald rear tire, not so bad(I've had 2 blow out at low speed).
Bald front tire, not so good...I don't want one of those to ever blow, or be out of grip.
 
c10 said:
Sandow's link is a real winner of a explanation . Only thing that would be better is a Factory tour with a rep from XYZ brand tire Company to answer questions , and explain the different steps going on .
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Thank you!
Best scenario is to watch all those MC garage videos to get the theorie. And then look on the org for real life situations and you know everything there is to know!
 
The one other thing I forgot to put in my original post was I had one little hiccup on my last mountain run with a very slight traction loss on the Road 5s but I believe that was operator error.
 
Kiwi Rider said:
It's called 'silicone', there has been many many cases of riders getting there tyres changed/replaced and in damp or rain conditions turning onto the road, a little throttle and down she goes. . . . I have personally seen it happen outside a bike shop, and the tyre guy at the shop said he ALWAYS warns the bike owner to be very careful in the wet with new tyres.
That's my experience FWIW.
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My local shop is in a complex with a driveway that leads to the main road, like a big T. They always without fail warn people with new fitted tyres to take it easy. They keep a tally board on the number of riders, (new tyres fitted), who get to the top of the T, go to make a right hand turn and "whoops" down they go ..
So for me, careful break in and scrubbing is like running in a new motor - controlled and easy throttle for the first couple hundred..
 
ottafish said:
My local shop is in a complex with a driveway that leads to the main road, like a big T. They always without fail warn people with new fitted tyres to take it easy. They keep a tally board on the number of riders, (new tyres fitted), who get to the top of the T, go to make a right hand turn and "whoops" down they go ..
So for me, careful break in and scrubbing is like running in a new motor - controlled and easy throttle for the first couple hundred..
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you mean like that haha....


 
Funny I never liked those two in the Magazine as you cant get a vibe of who someone in print when its directed at the general public . After watching their video of BMW vs new goldwing , and they did two up on the racetrack my personal opinion was changed to ok these two are not what I thought .
I like them both now ;)
 
My first Road 5 - Today, with less than 20 miles on the ticker.
First, and foremost, I offer my apologies for not having taken photos of the tires B/4 and after.

The last tire (Front only) was a Road 4 and one of the first rides I did was on Mt twisties in a mild rain. I have to say the Road 4 offered much feedback and handled better than any other tire I had run on the Busa in wet conditions. Dry conditions were also as positive and I never considered that I would really need another type of tire in the near future.
Fast forward to the past 4 months - Riding up and down the Mt road everyday to work (new Job Down the hill) has proven to take a toll on the tires and the front was chewed up VERY bad on the sides and the middle was only slightly better.
Today I finally had the front tire replaced with a Road 5.
My first impression was WOW! I love new shoes and thought this was just another one of those A-Ha-moments. I was very careful the freeway and took it easy as I know (from experience) a new tire can be a little sliperishy, to a slight degree, and the conditions on the 18 were very windy with some slight debris in areas.
About 2 turns into the Mt road I noticed how easy the bike just Rolled over in the turns and kept a great grip.
Needless to say, I gained a great amount of confidence on the new tires and pushed a little harder than I prolly should have but had a great ride home and look forward to "Testing" the tires in the near future.

I will try to offer more data and wear time as I continue running this tire. Shouldn't take long to beat these things into the ground considering I am on the 18 everyday and not an "Easy Rider"!

Take care and ride safe my brothers!
Bubba
 
Back tire is currently at 13,333.2 miles with another 1000 at least left in them. Our trip meter gets to 10,000 and resets to 0 automatically.

20190128_090416.jpg
 
That’s great mileage. I normally got out of the road 3,4s around 7000 max. I did get 9000 out of a road 2 one time. I have the road 5s on the Concours now. We will see how many I get on it. I put the Power RS on the busa and love them.
 
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