Kawasaki Sportsbike Riders Club - Australia - Online Forum

ok the arrow should go in the direction of travel of the wheel right? ie on the front tyre it should face backwards when its down the bottom back half of the wheel.

i think it was put on the wrong way when i got new tyres

Wouldnt be the first time ive heard this, know someone who had the same thing and it was a tyre specialist would you believe.

I used to be a tyre fitter.. it happens..

only takes a small distraction.. You've got the tyre in the right direction before you sit it on top of the rim, you do something else and befor eyou know it you've put it on upside down and it's facing the wrong way... not something you do very often, but easy to accidently do.. Take it back, i'm sure they'd happily acknowledge their mistake and fix it up for you.

Will the tyre be damaged if u had travelled some distance wif it fitted the wrong way?

Well it wouldn't be as safe to ride in the wet at the very least, the tread having been designed for water dispersion & possibly grip in one direction & not the other. If you dont flog it or ride in crappy weather and are just putting around lightly i couldn't see the harm in it if it was minimal distances.

So no GOR or Putty rd 'eh?

Mate, I wouldn't even worry about it. Get it turned around and get back out there.
Historically, you should never run a radial tyre in the opposite direction to what it had been previously. This is in reference to rotating tyres like we used to with the old cross plies.
However, it doesn't seem to be an issue nowadays. You see at every track day people who have shagged one side of a tyre, turn them around to get some use out of the other side. It is not uncommon, and is recomende by such reputable organisations as ASBK.
So dont lose any sleep over it.

thanks guys. nah wasn't too worried, will take it back to get it fixed this week.
it was fine for the GOR :)much better than what i had previously.

i got a new worry now though, the bike is making a weird squeaking noise.
sounds like a bird chirping. frequency of the chirps increases as i go faster. does it with bike in neutral and with engine off. can't feel anything loose. sounds like its coming from the front.

Speedo cable ?

oz4x4 wrote:Speedo cable ?

that's what i was thinking actually

Try spraying some light oil (or WD-40) into the cable and see if the squeak continues. If you pull the nose cone off (3 screws down each side + remove mirrors) you can easily unscrew the speedo cable from the speedo unit and will have the advantage of gravity helping to take the oil along the cable.

HTH

i forgot to ask u if the bike handled any differently with the tyre on backwards.

mrmina wrote:i forgot to ask u if the bike handled any differently with the tyre on backwards.

Wont go as fast

hehe.

well its not the speedo cable. took that off and it still cheeps.
took off the calipers and everything looked ok. have to see if it still does it on the way to work. one of the bolts was really fuggin tight, dunno if that could have been a problem.

shagged bearing maybe?

Do you hear the noise if you put the bike on the centrestand and spin the front wheel ? You might need somebody to hold the back wheel down.

If the calliper / disk is OK then I can't think of anything else in the front end which would cheep.

Does the noise dissapear or change pitch when the brakes are applied?

If so its a slightly warped disk or even a bearing, although it could a budgie is stuck in your fairing but unlikely