Cheers buddy, ill take a look at that! :)

Happy birthday Uber's Tenere! Looking good.
I hope mine passes its MOT as easy as yours......but somehow I think not :-(

Been changing tyres today, as I'm off trail riding tomorrow, and racing in two weeks time, and was looking a bit short of tread depth.

http://wildchild.org.uk/blog/images/...8_1000x665.jpg
Rear tyres. From left to right:

- Army Special at 1124 miles.
- Mitas E-09 at 5388 miles.
- Mitas E-09 at 3464 miles.
- Mitas C-02 at 3692 miles, just taken off the bike.
- Mitas C-02 at 0 miles, now fitted to the bike.



http://wildchild.org.uk/blog/images/...9_1000x665.jpg
Front Tyres, left to right:

- Mitas E-09 at 3464 miles
- Army Special at 4816 miles, reversed at about 3000 miles to even up the wear, just taken off the bike.
- Army Special at 0 miles, now fitted to the bike.


Thoughts:

I think pretty much everyone on here knows I rate the E-09s for general road and trail use. I've had four sets of them over the last couple of years, and only went to more aggressive rubber when I started rallying.

However I've been pleasantly surprised with the Army Special front. It's a bit 'flexy' on the road when it's new, due to the massive tread depth, and it's only rated for 80mph, but if you can live with that it's a much better front tyre than the E-09 for the dirt. Although it wears a bit quicker, there's so much rubber to start with that the life is comparable - there's got to be another thousand miles in the one I've just taken off if I was only riding on the road (and of course now it is worn down to that point, it handles as well as the E-09).

I'll put the Army rear back on at some point to finish wearing it out, but I doubt I'll buy another. It was possibly marginally better than the C-02 rear for rallying, but the C-02 is much better on the road, lasts much better, and is about �45 rather than �60, which makes a difference when I'll probably go through half a dozen this year.

If I wasn't racing, I think I'd probably go back to the E-09 rear, but keep the Army front. For now, I'm pretty happy with the Army/C-02 combo. About �90 for a pair of tyres which will do serious dirt riding and would last over 4000 miles (if I wasn't trail-riding and racing over the next few weeks they'd still be on there) isn't bad is it?

Interesting stuff fella. I have to say I am finding the e-09s a far better tyre than I had expected, and I wouldn't believe they came from the same factory as the horrid terrible e-07s.
They are noisy though, it's like being in a land rover with all the tyre rumble :)

I was wondering, how does the E-09 compare to an MT21 or Karoo in the mud/sand?

I couldn't say, as I've not used either of those.

Had the bike off the road for what feels like an age (due to commuting every day in the truck), but now back together with a few changes:

http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphot...28839270_n.jpg

Gold rims look good fella.

Very funny. :D

Anyway, to paraphrase someone on here - that's not gold, it's East Midlands Trail-riding Brown ;). I've given it a quick wash since anyway, so they're back to black-ish now.

Back in the truck for work today because I failed at tyre changing last night - front was flat by the morning. Pick up a new tube on the way home and try again.

You must have a firm pair of cahunas to do the Roof of Africa on a Ten! Most blokes run ultra light 250s & 450s. It's steep grass, rock and mud.