Why when putting a rear motorcycle tire on the front of our rigs, is it suggested that the directional arrow be reversed?
Yup, It's no longer needed for pulling traction and it might increase the braking traction.
Lonnie
Northwest Sidecars
example: the arrow type like tractor tires for larger enduros:(I have in mind one that the BMW GS models use.)
The back tire has the tire oriented so that when you spin the back wheel that the mud will be pushed out to the sides so that the tire digs deeper and gets to solid ground. If it would be other way round it would suck the mud into the tread, get clogged up and spin without traction and control.
Now I guess it will appear logical that on the front tire the need is opposite. You need a clean thread for breaking not acceleration. Ain't it so?
Result: back tire contact with the ground => arrow showing back / front tire contact with the ground => arrow showing to the front.
So with many road tires (not all) there is a design in the thread to push out the rain water to the sides. And here you should mount them in the same way as described above for the arrow type enduro tire.
Those tires that have no orientation for the thread but still have a arrow mark on the sidewall, there might be still an orientation of the internal reinforcement nylon structure that is stronger in one then the other direction.
Best regards
Sven Peter
