MCN Fleet: New tyres but my F800GS soon feels deflated

I managed a grand total of 26 hours with the new Metzeler Karoo 3s on my F800GS before they started feeling a little strange.

I had been getting on well with the tyres. Though billed as an off-road focused tyre, they felt quite good on the road. I was surprised to find that even at speed they remained stable, which is far more than can be said for the Continental TKC 70s I used earlier this year. 

On the way back from a bike meet, with fellow MCN staffer Tony Hoare in front on his SV650, I noticed that the bike wasn’t behaving well. The front started feeling really sloppy. Low and behold, I looked down and noticed that the front tyre had deflated. Not good.

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After briefly thinking the feeling may have been the tyre warming up, I was gutted to discover it was as flat as a pancake. I had managed just over a day on the tyres. I was gutted. 

The culprit was the inner tube, which had a small hole on the inner run where it is in contact with the wheel rim. 

After spending another £41 on a new tube and fitting, I’m back on the road and heading to Wales for some dirty fun at the Adventure Bike Academy this weekend.

It’s unlucky but these things happen, but it’s fortunate I spotted it in time and the consequences were minimal. It could have been a lot worse.

 

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