| Author | Message | ||
     Jaimec |
Just came back from the 35th Annual Finger Lakes Rally in Watkins Glen (a local BMW Rally). I'd heard that Metzeler is now building its tires in Brazil (not Germany) and that the new tires are nowhere near as good as the German-built tires. Several people told me their dealers even stopped carrying them because of the poor quality. This is the FIRST I've ever heard of this and I'm wondering what the Buell community might've heard? I've ALWAYS used Metzeler tires, pretty much exclusively over the years and I'd hate for this to be true... | ||
| Jramsey |
I bought a set of 880's for my cruiser bike back in '04 that were made in Brazil,when I sold the bike 4,500 miles later the tires still looked like new. | ||
| Panhead_dan |
I'm familiar with the situation having witness failures of the "Brazilian Marathon" on the road. The failure I personally saw was a delamination and was consistent with the rumors from consumers. Consistent with the manufacturer, the bike was overloaded and the rider had not checked his tire pressure before setting off on his multi thousand mile ride with his woman and practically every thing he owned strapped to the bike. Be that as it may, I don't buy them anymore. | ||
| Ft_bstrd |
Isn't Brazil good at rubber?  | ||
| Kyrocket |
Is this ALL of Metzler's tires or just certain ones? I have a set of M3's on right now, I'll see if they have a "made in" stamp on them or is there a set of numbers I have to decipher? And if so does anyone know right off? | ||
| Jaimec |
Hmmmmm... I use the ME880s on my K1200LT, and I've used them exclusively since I replaced the original Dunlops which came with the bike so I MUST have Brazilian-made tires on it now. I know I haven't had any issues. Interesting. | ||
| Ft_bstrd |
Could be a short run QA issue during the transfer. Happens often when plants are changed. | ||
| Jstfrfun |
In my store I have replaced no less than two dozen Marathon 880s due to delamination, half of those I had to rescue out of Death Valley, not a good place to lose half of your tire into the desert. The 880 marathon it seems dosen't like heat and abrasive surfaces. I have recomended the Continental milestone for these applications. | ||
| Jaimec |
Dang. I'm still getting 20K out of a set. I need to replace the front now (I replaced the rear "out of sync" due to picking up a nail... I used to replace them together at 20K intervals). | ||
| Ferris_von_bueller |
I used Sportec M3's and switched to a set of Michelin 2CT's and they feel "squishy" , in comparison. | ||
| Kyrocket |
Just checked, my M3's were made in Germany. I don't remember exactly when I had them changed but it hasn't been too long, last spring/early summer '08 maybe. | ||
| Jaimec |
Maybe it's just the ME880s? Now I need to check when I get home... | ||
| Aldaytona |
I keep hearing about those 15-20,000 mile Metzeler ME880s. Funny, I have one on the rear of my Sportster (front too), it has approx 7,000 miles and is 3/4 worn out. Do BMW LT riders (at double the weight) get double the life/mileage on their ME880s? I don't get it.  | ||
| Jaimec |
Beats me, but the LT was known to eat tires when it first came out. Rider Magazine's original 12,000 mile test indicated they went through THREE rear tires and two fronts. That was for the OEM Bridgestones. Mine came delivered with Dunlops and I got 20K out of the rear, and 10K out of the front... yeah... twice as many fronts as rears. Never did figure that out. When Metzeler came out with the ME880 I got pretty even tire wear... both tires replaced at 20K intervals. | ||
| Froggy |
Many factors determine tire life, with the main one being rider input. I get 18k miles out a Pirelli Scorpion Sync and 65mpg on my Uly. I can make that 1800 miles and 6.5mpg if I tried hard enough  | ||
| Thetable |
First I've heard anything of it. I have a couple Interacts at home that I have to take a look at now. First page of Google shows nothing, so I will take that as either Metz has done a great job keeping it under wraps, or it is so new, not even Google knows anything about Brazilian tires other than the 880s and some of their other older tires. | ||
| Jaimec |
http://www.google.com/search?q=metzeler+brazil&sou rceid=mozilla-search&start=0&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=u tf-8&client=mozilla&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:unoffici al | ||
| Thetable |
Checked my Interacts this morning, made 12th and 15th week of 2009 in Germany. | ||
| Jaimec |
Guess not ALL of their manufacturing has been off-shored. According to the Google link I posted above, most of the complaints seem to be about the ME880 Marathons (which I'm assuming NOBODY here uses on their Buells). If they've been manufactured in Brazil since at least 2004, then I guess I've been lucky as I KNOW I've gone through at LEAST three tire changes since that time on my K1200LT. | ||
| Bbbob |
I work in a BMW dealer in Southwest Fla, the ME880 is the recommended tire for the LT. We have never seen a problem with any. We have the the "heat" but the "heat & dry" that Jstfrfun is dealing with. There are 2 versions of that tire, they make both a bias ply & a radial. I wonder if the the problem are limited to one or the other... |
