[aditya.bhardwaj]

Originally Posted by aditya.bhardwaj

Hey Neil,

Just checked the information. The size is indeed 100/90-17. And the manufacturing date is 1119, which I believe is the 11th week of 2019. I guess this would be a manufacturing defect.

Anyway, I have spoken to the vendor and he has agreed to replace the tire. I might opt for the Michelin Sirac.

Thanks

I think we can close the query now. Got the Sirac and all the issues are gone. She runs like a dream now.

[Urban_Nomad]

A quick update on the new tyres I installed on my impulse. Both tyres were installed together

Approx kms at the time of writing this review : 1000
Usage : 50:50 (Road : off road)

Front tyre: Timsun 819 (90/90-19)

As I started racking up more off road kms, I was looking for something knobbier than the Vee Rubber VRM 307. The vee was an excellent road tyre with some capability off road. But as you would start to get aggressive with riding off pavement; the limitations would become extremely apparent (Like any 80:20 tyre I guess). Even slight leans on hard pack dirt would make the tyre slip out from underneath without much warning. It was particularly bad on fine gravel, sand and slushy terrain

I bought the timsun from a dealer in Bangalore and it cost me almost 4K shipped to Delhi. It is expensive, almost Metzeler expensive. But the difference in performance was immediately apparent. The front felt planted off road and works well in almost all conditions (given my limited skillset) barring very deep and fine sand. lean angle is progressive off pavement and the tyre gives plenty of warning before it gives away. My confidence to ride dirt has increased immensely; thanks to this tyre!

On the road : I thought the tyre would not do well on road but I was pleasantly surprised here as well. The centre knobs are spaced sort of closely so thery aren't super noisy on road. The outer knobs are spaced wide, but the rubber is soft and provides excellent grip. We have received a bumper monsoon this year and I am happy to say that the wet grip is more than acceptable. The initial downside was that the front end felt slightly heavier (this is a heavy tyre. Full 900 gms heavier than the vee rubber / Ceat Gripp XL) but this feeling seems to have gone away after a few short kms

Summary:

+ Excellent 50:50 tyre. Does well both on and off road, including some very technical terrain
+ Good wet grip
+ Not noisy at all on road
- Expensive!
- Its significantly heavier than the stock tyre
- Is not as good a road tyre as the vee or Gripp XL

Rear tyre : Ralco Gripper (100/90-19)

Its probably the knobbiest tyre you can buy for the impulse. Although its a shorter tyre (stock - 110/90-19), it still works great!

Off road, the amount of "churn" you get (as opposed to a slide) is so much confidence inspiring. You can really lay it into a berm / groove with confidence and the tyre just holds. It does have its limitations though. It works great in slushy terrain, unless its that really slick, almost black ice like slush. Then you are going down if you aren't careful (like I did )! But at 2000 rupees, the tyre is immense value for money. Anyone interested in riding trails, but on a budget must consider these tyres for sure (as long as it can fit your rim).

On road, again - its surprisingly predictable. No unexpected fishtailing, you can carry a decent lean angle (not at high speed though and don't try to grind your pegs). Its an overkill for the regular commuter and tyres like the Gripp XL will do much better as jack of all trades. This is a proper 50:50 tyre, or actually even a bit more biased towards off road use. For the price, it cant be beat

Summary:

+ Predictable grip on road
+ Excellent grip off road in almost all conditions (not deep fine sand and very slick mud)
+ Very affordable
+ very lightweight. My mechanic mentioned that its at least half a kilo lighter than stock
- No matching front tyre
- Not ideal for max road usage. Better options available at similar price

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XENSd82eFpM&t=63s

Last weekend's trail ride was particularly wet, slushy and rocky. Below video should give you some idea of how the bike and tyres performed. I apologize for the blurry bits. It was constantly raining and it was a pain trying to keep the camera mist and water free. Hope you enjoy my first ever attempt at a YouTube video

[AtheK]

Originally Posted by sagarpadaki

Haha. I got fooled by assuming that since the earlier Made in Thailand Pilot Sporty were excellent, the Made in India ones would also be equally good. Had to live with them for 25,000 kms! I used to wonder why they are so bad and when i came to know they were manufactured by TVS, i got my answer . All TVS 2 wheelers come with their own tyres. I changed the TVS tyres on our wego to MRF zapper after 16,000 kms. They had turned hard and skiddy after 10K kms.

Masseter are a class apart and very under-rated. I have installed the Masseter at the rear on my Pulsar 180 UG3 in 100/90-17 size. I am very happy with how they handle. In fact, i had never imagined few years ago that one day the Indian market would have sticky tyres readily available in the 100 section. Most of the tyres in 100 section are medium or hard compound tyres and I always had to upsize to get a stickier tyre.



Since we both own same bike, i would suggest the below combo to you. It is the best combination available for our bikes in the market currently. I am using them.

Rear - MRF Masseter X 100/90-17
Front - Zapper FY1 90/80-17

Do not bother online since the cost of is pretty high.

Go to the MRF website and create an account. You can purchase the tyres at MRF online for lower cost than what you would pay at the store. Schedule an installation time and go to the store and they will install the tyres.No extra or hidden cost. I chose Saptagiri tyres in Chamrajpet since they are near to my area Vijayanagar.

https://www.mrftyresandservice.com/s...0090-17-tl/517
https://www.mrftyresandservice.com/s...9080-17-tl/492

RR310 comes with Michellin and i guess RTR also had Pirelli version.

[neil.jericho]

Originally Posted by Urban_Nomad

Last weekend's trail ride was particularly wet, slushy and rocky. Below video should give you some idea of how the bike and tyres performed. I apologize for the blurry bits. It was constantly raining and it was a pain trying to keep the camera mist and water free. Hope you enjoy my first ever attempt at a YouTube video

I greatly enjoyed the video, do keep them coming! It is good to hear more on the ground feedback on these not so well known tires after they have been used in their natural off road settings.

Timsun has two tires each for the 100/90-19 and 110/80-19 sizes. Out of curiosity, is there any reason as to why you didnt pick one of them for the rear and went for the Ralco instead?

[Red Liner]

Originally Posted by neil.jericho

I greatly enjoyed the video, do keep them coming! It is good to hear more on the ground feedback on these not so well known tires after they have been used in their natural off road settings.

Timsun has two tires each for the 100/90-19 and 110/80-19 sizes. Out of curiosity, is there any reason as to why you didnt pick one of them for the rear and went for the Ralco instead?

Its less than half the price of the Timsun.

We offroad guys will try to spend the least possible on rubber that is going to be wiped out on the trail.

[neil.jericho]

Originally Posted by Red Liner

Its less than half the price of the Timsun.

We offroad guys will try to spend the least possible on rubber that is going to be wiped out on the trail.

Red Liner, that is what I suspected but I wanted to confirm with the pros to be sure I was correct. At half the price of the equivalent offering from Timsun, the Ralco rear tire looks like a real steal.

[IshaanIan]

It has come time for me to buy a new set of tyres for my RC390 and having lived with the bike for over 3 years now, I thought I would write down my thoughts on the entry level sport tyres on offer in the market. I have gone through 6 rear tyres and 3 fronts. The first half being W rated Metzeler Sportec M5s, and the second half of tyres being H rated Pirelli Diablo Rosso 2s. I have extensively test ridden Apollo Alpha H1s on another RC390 as well as Ceat Rad Zoom X1s on my close friend's Duke 200 along with multiple rides on various bikes equipped with Michelin's Pilot Sport tyres.

First off, I would like to compare the Michelin Pilot Sports to the Ceat Rad Zoom X1s as I believe they both fall in the same category in terms of being longer wearing more touring friendly sport tyres: I feel the Ceats are the better tyre simply because of the way they look as well as how much cheaper they are. I also found the Ceats to have better dry weather grip than the Michelins (Although I have heard a lot of praise for the Michelin's wet weather grip, I have never tried them in the wet).

Now onto the Apollo Alpha H1: I found this tyre to be a very solid offering from an Indian manufacturer my only gripe with these are that they are the poorest option in terms of ride quality.

Finally, onto the two tyres I have the most experience with; the Metzelers and the Pirellis: The Metzelers are strictly speaking, the superior tyre on paper. They warm up much much faster than the Pirellis, they inspire confidence by offering very progressive feedback and grip as you tip the bike into corners, they grip slightly better than the Pirellis on dusty roads and wet roads, and they last around 10% longer as well BUT here are my reasons for sticking to the Diablo Rosso 2s ever since I switched over to them. First and foremost, the tyre is more steeply curved and what that means on a bike like the RC390 where the weight is distributed more towards the front, is that effort needed to tip the bike over is so much less than any other tyre. This makes filtering through traffic a breeze. Secondly I found the ride quality on the Pirellis to be the best as the soft carcas soaks in mid corner bumps and undulations better. The tyre may not be as progressive as you increase the lean angles or instill as much confidence as the Metzelers, infact they squiggle on occassion when transitioning from a left hander to a right hand bend, but if you push through and have faith in them you will realize that they require minimal effort to lean the bike making the bike more eager to dart into corners, and mid corner stability due to the superior ride quality, is better. Lastly they simply look amazing and those are the reasons why I will be buying another set of what may seem to be the less superior tyre on paper at least.

Hope my short review made sense. I would also love to know if my thoughts resonate with others who might have experienced these tyres.

Cheers

[Urban_Nomad]

Originally Posted by neil.jericho

Timsun has two tires each for the 100/90-19 and 110/80-19 sizes. Out of curiosity, is there any reason as to why you didnt pick one of them for the rear and went for the Ralco instead?

In fact, Timsun has the exact stock size (110/90-17) available for the rear as well; the same 819 model

It would have cost me over 5K shipped. Ramana has explained the reasoning perfectly

Originally Posted by neil.jericho

I greatly enjoyed the video, do keep them coming!

Thank you so much for the kind words. Uploaded another one. Would love to hear more feedback if possible. Again a small video, less than 3 minutes... so wouldn't take much of your time

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDyvbEC0Yac

[neil.jericho]

Originally Posted by Urban_Nomad

Thank you so much for the kind words. Uploaded another one. Would love to hear more feedback if possible. Again a small video, less than 3 minutes... so wouldn't take much of your time

I have one big complaint, the new video is too short! Good work, keep the videos coming in

What tires are the other bikes running? Are they Ralcos? I am not fully clued in and couldnt make out from the video.

[Urban_Nomad]

Originally Posted by neil.jericho

I have one big complaint, the new video is too short! Good work, keep the videos coming in

Originally Posted by neil.jericho

What tires are the other bikes running? Are they Ralcos? I am not fully clued in and couldnt make out from the video.

The other bikes were running full knobbies barring the Himalayan (Stock ceat). Some have Pirellis, the orange Impulse had Vee rubber + Pirelli (and a 21 inch front wheel conversion - Aluminium Excel rim)

[sukiwa]

Originally Posted by freak

I have a RE TB350 2015 Feb make.

1) MRF Zappers
2) CEAT GRIPP XL
3) Ralco Speedblaster

Which tyres did you go ahead with for your TB350?

[freak]

Originally Posted by sukiwa

Which tyres did you go ahead with for your TB350?

Haven't changed yet, shortlisted Ceat GRIPP XL. There is still sometime left for me to change the tyres should be done in a couple of months.

[ashwinprakas]

Originally Posted by sagarpadaki

MRF ZAPPER FY1 ( R15V2 Front tyre)

Please do share your long term review of the tire, also if you've used Masseter then a comparo would be wonderful.

[sagarpadaki]

Originally Posted by ashwinprakas

Please do share your long term review of the tire, also if you've used Masseter then a comparo would be wonderful.

Ashwin,

Unfortunately , i have not got Masseter in 80/90-17 or 90/80-17 to do a comparo. However, having used the FY1 for the past 70K kms and running on the 3rd replacement, i can vouch that this is the best on road tyre in 90 section. The grip it offers is phenomenal in wet and dry and i have never felt the need to scout for a better replacement. It lasts for around 25K with aggressive riding. Go for it with eyes closed. Buy online at MRF online if possible. Costs 1350 bucks. Stores charge upto 3K . link below

https://www.mrftyresandservice.com/s...9080-17-tl/492

I would be switching over to Masseter once the current front wears out.I just hope that i get the tyre. The Masseters at the rear have impressed me mighty.

[ashwinprakas]

Originally Posted by sagarpadaki

Ashwin,

Thank you for the review, I'm currently running Masseter's at both ends on my P220, they're decent for the time being but do wear down at an accelerated rate, though I guess that it could be attributed to a few interstate runs I've done in the past.

Unfortunately we do not have MRF Online service in Kerala hence why I had to pay a whooping 5.5k for the pair of Masseter's.