New TS250 Owner

[Prusakowski-Ost]

New tires on the TS250 since 1974...the DDR original tires looked good....but were very dry.

[Puffs]

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[breakwellmz]

Chuck them!
They were bloody awful things when they were new especially in the wet, even worse with age!

[Blurredman]

I don't think they're all that bad performance wise.

20 year tyres I would ride on and have, sure. But 40 no. Well, maybe on a car I would.. It's not so much cracking that's the issue but if you can see the carcas that makes up the tyre. As for tubes, I don't replace them unless the stems break... or in the case of one of my Pneumant tubes years ago I had tested it between changing the tyres and it pumped up to the shape of a square!

These days even really cheap tyres are very good at their job though.

[Puffs]

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[breakwellmz]

That`s all good and fine until some idiot pulls out in front of you, you brake and the tyre locks up rather than grip the road!
As you said "I never had any Pneumant tyre". I have!

[Puffs]

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[AlanJ]

Hi Guys,
First off, I hope you all had a great Christmas and the new year gets something sorted with these blasted viruses, although the way our
governments are dealing, or not,and, sadly I doubt it. Anyway, that's another subject.
Tires/tyres, when I was working, I seem to remember that our tyre man at Ford research engineering centre, said that tyres should only be used for 7 years
always assuming there is no damage during this time. If you ask any person using a caravan, you will find that most will have had a blow out at
sometime or the other ( not much fun) Ultra violet is the biggest problem with age, the tyres harden and dry out somewhat, and as mentioned
the tyre loses grip. The odd thing is in GB if you go with a car for an MOT test with 20 year old tyres, it will fail the test, even if the tyres still look ok,
but, if you do the same with a bike it will probably pass the MOT test. Perhaps the bike testers don't look at the tyre wall indicators, I don't profess
to know that much about tyres but at my age I can't chance a flyer on the corners, so I stick to inside 10 yrs.
Wish you well Alan.

[Puffs]

Agreed & hope you had a good one Alan!

[AlanJ]

Hi Guys,
On the previous post, I mentioned that Ford Engineering recommend the life of a tyre as 7 years as I said, providing no damage
but that is of course, for a car tyre, and when I looked up the recommended lifespan for a bike tyre it was 5 years and to be honest
the reasons are obvious. Flexibility is high on the list and age and stiffness brought on by ultraviolet is obviously a problem to that flexibility.
Anyway Guys it's up to you, of course.
Stay safe Alan.

[Puffs]

Yes UV radiation causes all sorts of effects. It can tan our skin, it can cause skin cancer, and also cause many plastics & rubber types to decay & microscopically decompose. With bikes being kept indoors, out of direct sunlight & UV, the effects on tyres might be less, but I suspect that the rubber also hardens just with age. Temperature will also play a role, as it is a common view in road racing that tyres that were kept too long in the tyre warmers perform poorly.

[Prusakowski-Ost]

I knew the fun wouldn't last long....old seals...bike sitting for decades...the old seals finally perished. I got a whole ten miles on the bike from start-up to shut down because of losing compression. Can anyone give me a hint on what seals I need to replace to get this bike up and running again?

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[Prusakowski-Ost]

The MZ TS250 in question was stored inside for 40 years...with all fluids drained out of it....including the case oil. I'm sure once I started it up after its long slumber, the seals (item 14) failed. One other variable I forgot to include is once the bike stopped running, and I parked it for the evening, there was a small puddle of oil coming from the left side of the bike. I understand both seal 14 are only accessible by taking the engine case apart....or can they be removed from outside the case?

Many thanks for the diagram!

[Puffs]

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