At the beginning of this year I fitted Karoo Streets to my 2018 1200 GSA, about a week before a trip to CT and back to JHB. We did Swartberg Pass on the way down and Tankwa Karoo on the way back. All in all about 400kms of dirt and 1200kms of tar.
I fitted them a week before so that they could get some heat cycles into them before the trip.
I found the following:
- They do make a noise at certain speeds. IIRC between 90km/h and about 118km/h. Im a slow rider and generally keep to about 125km/h on the highway but compared to knobblies they make no noise.
- Tar they handled very well but wet tar I was not as confident. I also found, on the highway just before Bloem, heading south that they were very scary and did not like the repairs where tar/bituman (?) had been used to fill in the cracks in the road. The road was wet at the time and the bike was sliding all over the place almost like when you cross white painted lines when they are wet. My mate who rode with me said he did not notice anything when riding over those repairs. (he had tourance's on)
- In the karoo the front end seemed to be all over the place on roads with course sand and stones on them. I did not have confidence in their handling at all.
- When I got back from the trip, having done around 3400kms the rear tyre was squared off and I would say about 50% worn - the cross tread/groove between the moon shaped tread was totally gone leaving only the moon shaped tread. (see pic below where i have circled in blue)
- I did not get any punctures.
I traded in the bike soon after I got back so cant say how long they would last but I doubt they would see 10k kms safely.
My next set of tyres will be Anakee Adventures based on feedback I have received so far. If I do places like Magadigadi or Namibia, I will fit knobblies.
Picture taken after about 3kms of riding only.