slicks vs road tyres / general track advice

[tigerclaw]

Hi. So I'm looking for some experienced input. I've been riding my bike in the track now for a year on Bridgestone bt090's.
The bike is very solid / planted and I'm dragging my knee, toes and pegs (standard rearsets and pegswithout the little hero blob things). The dogbone has been shortened and a guy i know who races says I'm having to lean the bike to much so he says i must drop the front forks through 10 mils. He explains the bike will turn harder with less lean. This makes sense to me and at the moment i feel like I'm running out of lean angle not grip.... Now finally my question... normally. .. On bt090's when you are riding hard do you feel the bike moving around (I don't) if so it would make sense that slicks would give you more grip. Or is the benefit of the slick that you can lean it further before riding "off" the tyre (I have no chicken strips front or back) or is the benefit both of the above? Any setup or rider input would be great. Thanks

[richyrd5]

Dropping the forks will make turn in better but as your already dragging the guts of it have you considered rearsets......probally get better grip from slicks
edit:i dont find the bt090's move around on the limit!(but thats on the roads!!)i rate them.off or on track!but slicks will give you more lean!.try dropping the legs in yokes see what happens.go from there.

[skinnydog0_0]

Slicks will not help you. For slicks to work properly you need to be riding hard 100% of the time. The majority of crashes on track days are guys running slicks. They think the slick will offer more grip (which it will if you are very quick and use tyre warmers) but if you have to go to a holding area for a few mins then do 2 laps behind someone you have lost most of the tyre temp- try and push u end up in the gravel.
I think I am correct in saying all the 400 lap records in the UK have been set on treaded tyres like race compounded Pirelli supercorsa. If you run a 17 inch rear then use supercorsa's with a 120/70 front this will have a sharper profile and help with turn in. Also get fork upgrade kit and good rear shock setup for your weight. If you are running standard suspension you are probably bottoming out. Also jack the rear end up this will give you more ground clearance. Also try turning in later and getting on the gas sooner, this will reduce the amount of time you are leaned over. Also getting on the gas makes the bike want to go upright and shortens the wheelbase wich also increases ground clearance.
In short I would 1) upgrade suspension 2) read twist if the wrist 2. 3) put into practice what you read in totw2.
Hope that helps.

[tigerclaw]

Thanks guys. As far suspension is concerned I have rick o internals on the front. The rear shock is a standard but serviced shock (nc 30th remote reservoir) sitting on top of a shortened dog bone to give more height... so do you think an aftermarket shock will make a real difference? (Besides looking nice :) ) and if so what make is recommended / usual / good enough. I just bought a 17 inch rear so I will try the supercorsas and drop the forks in the meantime plus do some reading.

[tigerclaw]

Twist of the wrist. ... tick . I can see it's going to require a number of reads and attempts at implementation but it's a good book. Makes you aware of all the variables at play. Seems the major thing I need to work on is turning later and harder while the bike is upright and then slowly rolling the throttle on through the corner

[CMSMJ1]

Roll the throttle faster :)

get the rearsets higher as dragging them is a recipe for crashing when they dig in

[richyrd5]

Roll the throttle faster :)

get the rearsets higher as dragging them is a recipe for crashing when they dig in

he has standard rearsets.i suggested get aftermarket ones as the stock ones drag even on the road!!

[Dicky333]

Bridgestones £180 a pair supercorsas £300 odd I, am sticking with bridgestones and change them every other meeting. Plus I think they plenty good enough for a 400 at half the price also good in the wet.
Most people would love to be able to only pay that for race bike tyres

[tigerclaw]

Thanks Dicky, in terms of grip I agree that the bridgestones are good, what interests me (And can you confirm?) is that I think the profile of the corsa front tyre allows you to lean the bike over further before you run off the edge of the tyre (ie for lacker of a better explanation the useable rubber runs closer to the rim)

[skinnydog0_0]

Yes a 120/70 has a less flat profile than he standard 120/60
I ran a Bridgestone R10 front (used race scrub from eBay) and a Bridgestone BT003 RS 150/60/17 on my RVF 2 seasons back and found them very good, if you can get cheap BT090 rears go for that with an R10 front. If you do run the Bridgestone BT003 on the rear then only use a pressure of 19-21 psi max as they have a very stiff side wall.
Remember these 400 are over 25 years old and the new tyres available are made for 200bhp super bikes so we would never get to use the full potential of these new tyres.