Another variant available at the launch is this Michelin Pilot Street Radial. As the name suggests, this Pilot Street Radial is made with radial-ply type compared to the Pilot Street that is made using bias-ply. What is the difference if you might ask. Here I embed a video to explain about it and you can watch it for better understanding of the differences:
Radial-ply tyre on the other hand is very good on absorbing the shocks and bumps on the road. On high speed the tyre is less prone to be deformed and can maintain its contact area at this condition. The contact area of the radial-ply tyre are much wider compared to the bias-ply tyre, but the bias-ply tyre have a longer contact area.
Michelin is targeting this bike for bike enthusiasts that needs high performance tyre for safety, stability at high speed and at the same time providing long tyre life.
Michelin is targeting the Pilot Street Radial to be used on the roads and also on the city. Higher end bikes from 150cc-300cc are the main bike target for the use of this radial-ply tyre. In the picture above, we can also see the Honda CB300R but that one is nowhere to be found in the 5 countries that we have seen before.
Michelin shown us the DEKRA results of the wet grip test of the Pilot Street Radial and found out that it is the best among all the competitor in its category. It even beat the lovable Bridgestone Battlax BT090 which we all know has been used in Malaysian Cub Prix.
Silica integration is one of the reason the wet grip is perform very well. What Silica can do is that it makes the tyre grips well in wet condition, but at the same time still having a great durability for the 30% more tyre life.
The radial-ply architecture of the tyre is made slightly sharper to ensure handling precision under normal riding positions. Common sense dictates that the sharper the tyre profile, the less contact area it can have, but you should remember that radial-ply tyre have wider contact area compared to bias-ply tyre. Again, the radial-ply tyre ensure that the tyre can stay in shape even in high speed riding condition.
There are 3 SKU (Stock Keeping Units) available. All of the SKUs bear the H speed index which means that it is rated for 210km/h maximum speed stress. With that sizes from 130-140 width, this should be a great one to install on the Kawasaki Ninja 250R and Honda CBR 250R.