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I have written a running review on other forums, but wanted to do a complete review here as I recently replaced this tire.
With price matching I purchased the tire from Discount Tire here in the Springs. The total cost was $160, at the time that was $60 cheaper than the Stone G704 it replaced.
As this was my first venture to the Darkside, I was cautious and concerned about handling differences. And as it was November winter was in full force (meaning snow one day 80 degrees the next
).
My first impression was yes, it does take more input to corner. I got used to the difference in about 100 miles and forgot about it at about 1000. I had two slight handling issues when the tire was cold, at a very aggressive lean (read peg scraping), and banging the throttle in 1st, I spun the tire a bit. But just a bit. Both times it took me by surprise for a pucker moment. Both times nothing bad happened. Overall handling was superb. Dry roads, wet roads, gravel roads, I even road 15 miles in slush (carefully) the tire just worked. Other than the two incidents already mentioned the tire stuck like glue, much better than the G704 in all cases.
I did pick up a tack nail at about 9K miles. It was in a repairable spot, so I plugged it. Never had another worry.
Now I only got 14,200 miles out of it but I know this was my fault for playing around with tire pressures. I had handling issues that turned out to the over torqued stem bearings and had nothing to do with the tire. I believe I would have gotten at least another 6K out of it had I left the pressure at 30lbs. Best I got out of a MC tire, was on the GW, with 11.5K.
The bottom line is it is a good tire, looks good, handles great. Would I buy another one? Probably not as there are cheaper alternatives that (so far) provide equal or better performance.
...gene
With price matching I purchased the tire from Discount Tire here in the Springs. The total cost was $160, at the time that was $60 cheaper than the Stone G704 it replaced.
As this was my first venture to the Darkside, I was cautious and concerned about handling differences. And as it was November winter was in full force (meaning snow one day 80 degrees the next
).My first impression was yes, it does take more input to corner. I got used to the difference in about 100 miles and forgot about it at about 1000. I had two slight handling issues when the tire was cold, at a very aggressive lean (read peg scraping), and banging the throttle in 1st, I spun the tire a bit. But just a bit. Both times it took me by surprise for a pucker moment. Both times nothing bad happened. Overall handling was superb. Dry roads, wet roads, gravel roads, I even road 15 miles in slush (carefully) the tire just worked. Other than the two incidents already mentioned the tire stuck like glue, much better than the G704 in all cases.
I did pick up a tack nail at about 9K miles. It was in a repairable spot, so I plugged it. Never had another worry.
Now I only got 14,200 miles out of it but I know this was my fault for playing around with tire pressures. I had handling issues that turned out to the over torqued stem bearings and had nothing to do with the tire. I believe I would have gotten at least another 6K out of it had I left the pressure at 30lbs. Best I got out of a MC tire, was on the GW, with 11.5K.
The bottom line is it is a good tire, looks good, handles great. Would I buy another one? Probably not as there are cheaper alternatives that (so far) provide equal or better performance.
...gene
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