Motorcycle Tire Pressures

I’ve found that having the right pressure for your rider weight, bike and tire combination is is key to get the most out of your tires. Since tires can be very expensive, making sure we get the most out of them by constantly checking pressure before and after each session to help avoid bad wear and mishap. The trouble with tire pressure is that it varies all the time. Internal and external conditions affect every aspect of tire pressure. There are even times when you would need to use different pressures for the same tire on the same bike.

Things that Affect Tire Pressure

Weight – A pressure that works for me will not necessarily work for a person weighing considerably more or less than me. Someone heavier is going to create a larger contact patch on the ground which could overheat it and cause nasty wear and vice versa, the lighter rider using the heavier rider’s pressures won’t have a contact patch big enough, so they won’t get enough heat into the tire, and again you’ll see another sort of nasty wear. This problem is made worse if your suspension isn’t properly set up for your weight. See my write up on suspension here.

Tire Construction – Some tires have much harder carcasses and sidewalls which means they don’t need to run as high a pressure as a tire with a soft carcass. Read more about tire construction here.

Ambient Temperature – The outside temperature is going to affect how your tires heat up and could change the pressures to use on the track. If you were to set your pressure to 30 psi on a cold day, it will not give you the same performance on a hot day, because on a hot day the tire will heat up quicker. I have seen some of the faster riders change their pressures throughout the day as the temperature rises and falls throughout the day just so they can maximize the performance of their tires.

Hot and Cold Pressures – If you set your pressure to 30psi when the tire is cold, the tire can gain around 2-6 psi through use on the track. Since the tire heats up, so will the air inside, meaning the pressure increases.

Road vs Track Tires – This is mentioned at the riders meeting every time, do not run road pressures on the track. It is very important to start by reducing your normal tire pressure since road tires designed to run at higher pressures than track tires because they are not expected to heat up as much.

As you can see, there are many factors that come into finding the best tire pressure for your bike and tire combination. Right now you may be wondering how on earth you get the right pressures, and I wouldn’t blame you, so here we go.

How can I find my best pressure?

What you want first is a good baseline pressure which you should be able to get from any of the below sources.

Manufacturer – Go direct to the manufacturer and get the pressures they recommend, you can usually find them on their website. If not, email them and ask what they would recommend setting tire ‘X’ to for use on the track. They’re usually pretty helpful with stuff like this.

Tire Expert – Speak to the tire supplier at the track, or talk to someone you know who deals with tires and setting up bikes for the track. They would have experienced many tire and bike combinations, so they know their stuff.

Other riders – See what other riders with similar setups are doing with the same tires. They too would have gone through the same process to finding the best pressures for themselves, so they should be able to set you off close to where you need to be.

Test, Check, Test, Check

Once you have your base pressure, try it out and see how you get on. Did you notice any unsavory reactions from the tire that wasn’t there before? Or the more common issue, is the tire showing any signs of unnatural wear? If you answer yes to these questions then it could well be that your pressure is not quite correct.