Rocket III Touring tire recall (USA)

Your dealer is repsponding.. and that's the way it should be. I wouldn't expect an answer to your e-mail to Peter. Can you imagine how much e-mail he must get a day? If anything, your dealer should be doing what they can, and if they can't help you, THEY should be contacting Triumph, not you as the owner. Triumph and Bridgestone are doing what they should. Replacing the defective tires with "hopefully" improved models. If you don't want the free improved Bridgestones, than you should be on your own to replace with another brand.

By the way, why, if one model of a particular brand of tire causes a problem, do people all of the sudden label the entire company as not making a good product? I've been through 3 sets Metzeler ME880s (stock tire) on my Rocket and they pretty much sucked. But, I've also ran Metzeler MeZ4's on my Thunderbird Sport, and I thought they were the best tire ever made. I'm running Avon Cobras on my Rocket now and I love them, even after 9,000 miles. I also run Avon Storms on my Trophy 1200, and I'm not really impressed with they way they handle. Just because one model of Bridgestone is found to be defective (which Bridgestone admits and is replacing for free) doesn't mean all of their tires suck.
 
I don't believe for a minute weight (bike that is) has anything to do with it. Harleys and Goldwings both weigh as much as the R3T (or in the ballpark, at least) and they run smaller rear tires. I'm inclined to believe it is torque related. My reasoning is I know how *I* ride (soft and easy) and my bike has just over 5000 miles on it and the rear tire looks great and has a LOT of life left in the tread. I really don't think I'd have any problem getting 10K out of it, frankly speaking.

Back to weight, I think load weight plays a part. I have a friend that rides 2-up with his wife pretty much all the time. They're are on the heavy side and he goes through tires fairly often on his Road King. I weigh around 145 and rarely ride 2-up. I got almost 15K out of the rear on my old Heritage Softail Classic and it had 28K on the front tire when I traded the bike and the front still had a little life left (not at the wear bars yet).

But, I really think the Rocket tire woes are mostly rider induced. I was talking to the dealer Friday and he says there are plenty of Rockets that come in that do not have tires wearing out at 5k, but he also knows how those guys ride. He went onto to say he knows that some of the guys ride their bikes pretty hard and they go through tires pretty quick as a result.

I'm not saying this tire doesn't have issues and maybe it wasn't the best fit for the bike; apparently, it's not. I just wonder if Triumph was banking on a different type of rider buying the Touring model than the guys that buy the Standard model. If they did, that may have been a mistake. At least from reading posts on this forum, I get the impression that I'm an anomaly and that most of the R3T owners are just like the Standard owners, meaning they can't resist the urge to twist the throttle hard on a regular basis.


If Goldwings are using the same Bridgestone tires ( I don't know if they are or not) you might convince me weight isn't the real issue here.

I wonder if Triumph missed the mark or if they adopted Detroit's attitude. You know, we don't care what they are as long as they're black, round and cheap and we're not real concerned about the black and round part.
 
If Goldwings are using the same Bridgestone tires ( I don't know if they are or not) you might convince me weight isn't the real issue here.

I wonder if Triumph missed the mark or if they adopted Detroit's attitude. You know, we don't care what they are as long as they're black, round and cheap and we're not real concerned about the black and round part.

After thinking more, I think I misunderstood your first post. I talked to the customer service guy at Bridgestone and he's of the opinion that the Rocket is too big for a 180 size tire. I thought you were implying the same thing. Thus, I made my Goldwing and Harley comment. That said, I'm not convinced weight is the sole reason for the Bridgestone failures, which by the way have not been a high percentage (according to the rep I spoke to). Of course, I can only go by my own experience, but it just seems to me ALL of them would fail if it were just a weight problem.

I really do think it has to do more with how the bike is ridden. Don't get me wrong, I don't think that's cool. The bike should have a tire that can hold up to whatever the bike is capable of, IMO. The Bridgestone rep pretty much alluded to the fact that the tire wasn't designed for the kind of torque the Rocket puts out. That's a little disturbing even though I don't personally have to worry about.

"Hey, I think I'll put some street tires designed for the Honda Civic on my 8000 hp rail dragster". It makes sense if you put around like me, you'll not have an issue. Naturally, if you try to make a pass on those, you'll burn them off the car before you get out of the box.

That's basically the message I got from the Bridgestone guy.
 
Your dealer is repsponding.. and that's the way it should be. I wouldn't expect an answer to your e-mail to Peter. Can you imagine how much e-mail he must get a day? If anything, your dealer should be doing what they can, and if they can't help you, THEY should be contacting Triumph, not you as the owner. Triumph and Bridgestone are doing what they should. Replacing the defective tires with "hopefully" improved models. If you don't want the free improved Bridgestones, than you should be on your own to replace with another brand.

By the way, why, if one model of a particular brand of tire causes a problem, do people all of the sudden label the entire company as not making a good product? I've been through 3 sets Metzeler ME880s (stock tire) on my Rocket and they pretty much sucked. But, I've also ran Metzeler MeZ4's on my Thunderbird Sport, and I thought they were the best tire ever made. I'm running Avon Cobras on my Rocket now and I love them, even after 9,000 miles. I also run Avon Storms on my Trophy 1200, and I'm not really impressed with they way they handle. Just because one model of Bridgestone is found to be defective (which Bridgestone admits and is replacing for free) doesn't mean all of their tires suck.
I was responding that I would not put the same Bridgestone tires on my rocket..now that they admit that the tire was inadequate(G-85),I would be willing to use their tire that has been improved.I believe that it is a tire quality issue and not weight issue..otherwise Bridgestone would be telling us to lose some pounds!!!I am also disappointed in lack of response from Triumph..I refuse to believe that this tire issue surfaced on April3..I choose to believe that they knew of problems back in late feb and march..they came clean for fear of law suits...it appears that tire failure occures at 4000+miles..why not when Triumph tested those 3 "mock-up"rockets prior to production???Perhaps they used other than the G-85 Bridgestones!!
 
Triumph and Bridgestone replaced my rear a couple of months ago. I called the dealer when I felt the change in the ride and they put on a new one as soon as i could get the bike to them. It was not supposed to be a safety issue other than riding a little shaky. Almost felt like it was going flat. All I had to do was ask and it was fixed. Can't ask for more than that.
 
I think after the whole Ford and Firestone deal vehicle manufacturers don't want anything to do with tire issues. They leave the tire manufacturers on their own.
 
I am going to call my dealer in the morning and see what he knows about it, I would like to know when it starts and ends and what will replace the tires
 
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