Continental road attack..first test completed...

[smitty141]

Well boys I mounted a fresh set of road attacks for my weekend trip to southern Mo, NW Arkansas. I know a few have talked bad about them. After 3 days and a thousand miles later heres my take. They grip VERY well, front and rear... I was not in the wet so first rain I will up date this report. They warm up fast and are good at holding a line. They also tip in a little fast, but I like. I had them scuffed edge to edge within 60 miles or so. I could get the rear to break loose when going in to a corner hard and fast and using the engine to slow me down. But it was very controllable and predictable. This was when riding very aggressively... My only bitch is a bad front end wobble. It is from 45 mph or slower. It is about the same as my last set of Avon. The rear side walls are very stiff and a pain to mount . They felt well planted, and the ride was good.

I will double check my head bearings ect. to rule that out. I think this front end shake is just a FJR thing. I have had it do that with several tire brands. If push gets to shove I will fab a mount and put a Scotts steering damper on it, and forget it.

One more note.. I think I will be lucky to get 3000 miles out of these tires. The rear shows a lot of wear for one weekend. But that mileage is about right for me.

I will buy more... Just my take on these tires..... Smitty :yahoo:

 

[Scab]

Thanks, and keep us posted. I won't be needing tires for a bit but I for one am anxious for the results of this tire. And, if you don't mind, keep us posted on mileage for this tire as well as the mileage for other tires you have used. I know mileage is a hugely varrying thing between riders, but we could compare your mileage for this tire vs. the others and maybe get a little feel for what we might get out of em.

 

[ShinyPartsUp]

Thanks, and keep us posted. I won't be needing tires for a bit but I for one am anxious for the results of this tire. And, if you don't mind, keep us posted on mileage for this tire as well as the mileage for other tires you have used. I know mileage is a hugely varrying thing between riders, but we could compare your mileage for this tire vs. the others and maybe get a little feel for what we might get out of em.

+1

And very interested in performance in the wet as I am in the Northwest.

 

[teerex51]

My Contis ("Z" and "B") are wearing out pretty fast, too and I concur with Smitty's impressions. I'll probably get 3,500 miles (5K Kms) from my set.

Definitely a good tire and the relatively short life is a trade-off for outstanding grip when riding aggressively.

No front-end wobble from mine, though (pheeew... ).

Stef

PS: and they're rain-repellant, too . Never got to ride them in the wet.....

 

[user 213]

I agree with the observations on tip in and traction. Wet traction is quite good as well. No surprising drop off in the wet. I'm more of a touring rider compared to you boys, though I do use nearly all of my tires. (< 1/4" chicken strips) I saw 10k from the rear and 14k+ from the front. I normally see 9-11k from rear tires and around 12 from the fronts.

I did leave the front Conti RA on longer than I should have. As it wears the large tread blocks cup, but due to their size it's not really that noticable until it gets nasty. By the time I was ready to change the front, it would go into a tank slapper on decel at most any speed if you took both hands off the bars.

Long ago when these first came out, there was a lot of talk about the front squirming under hard braking. I never noticed that myself, but didn't attempt to make it happen either. Conti's response at the time was that the FJR was heavier than this tire was best suited for, but I believe they still list it as an FJR application on their site.

I mostly run Avons, just because I like them better than anything else I've tried and I have not experienced issues as some have. If the Road Attacks were cheaper, I'd probably run them again, but for the same cost as most of the other tires, I keep buying the Avons.

One other important issue here is that due to the construction of these tires you need to run more psi than you normally would for other tires. I found that 2-4 psi over my normal levels worked well for me. Conti has stated this as well, saying that the design differences allow the tire to have a greater amount of contact patch, but also require the higher pressures to avoid issues. I normally run 42/42 and was running 46F and 44R on the Conti's.

 

[Warchild]

The rear side walls are very stiff and a pain to mount .

This is the third time I've hear this statement this year, so if is quite evident to me that Continental did some serious redesign on this model tire.

When I mounted that one disastrous set of Conti Heart Attacks that I tried in 2004, the sidewalls were alarmingly pliable.... I push the first bead on the wheel rim totally by hand, and even push all but the last 3" of the second bead all by hand as well! That last little bit was easily seated using a regular tire spoon and almost no effort. I could never, EVER do this with the Avons, Pilot Roads, Dunlop D220's, etc.

Hard to say whether my feedback to Conti at the time had any effect on this new re-designed tire, because I know it got a lot of attention both here and in Germany. In fact, I had several email exchanges with the German Continental web site about my findings.... they wanted several digital photos of the tire after I dismounted then after 500 miles. I provided about a half dozen photos to them.

Regardless, I'm not overly keen to try them again, even if they've fixed the squirming issue. This is not because I have it out for Conti; rather, it's the fairly consistant reports of an abbreviated tread life for this tire, making it a sub-optimal choice for LD Riders....

 

[Fjroamer]

I was mixing it up w/ Conti's N.A. rep as well, at the same time as W.C. (perhaps in a slightly more civil manner ). I got 7,500 miles out of my set but admittedly don't ab..., er..., use them to the full extent as Mr. W.C. Fact was, the front sidewalls were flimsy and as OCfjr mentioned, did squirm when diving into a corner under heavy front braking. As well, after 5,000 miles, with good useable tread, the front would go into a severe decel wobble, approaching near tank-slapper w/ hands off bars. It was the tire exclusively as the Mich P.R.s before, never did that and current Diablo Strada EMS have never done it. (my fav. so far!)

These orig. fronts were mfg. in Korea and it is my understanding that the newer fronts (current) are mfg. in Germany and of a "stouter" construction (for FJR apps. 120-70-17 Z). When riding in less than "full tilt mode", the tires seemed more than adequate, turned in very well, stuck and held line well and did great in the wet. I don't ride 2 up so could not recommend them for heavier laden bikes. They were stable and tracked well at 150+ clips in the middle of nowhere.....

I won't recommend or not recommend them but would concur w/ W.C. that these would not be a good choice for LDR types.