BT46's !

[moe_tunes]

When I bought the GS500 in August '19 it had clapped out Sport Demons on it. The rear was worn flat in the center and the chickem strips on most of the sides weren't even touched. How the old bloke I bought it off got it to go around corners without leaning it over is beyond me... The front was pretty much the same. I did some research and motorbike tyre shops are better value than motorbike dealers when it comes to tyres and the first tyre shop I used was only recommending Pirellis for the GS. I've gone through a Sport Demon and Angel CT on the front and two Sport Demons and half an Angel CT on the rear from them. I was never that confident on the Pirellis... I went 18000km's on the Angel CT front 'cause it has a hard center rubber for long life which just sends all the bumps through the poor quality front forks. The rear pirellis keep moving about for me when on the lean.
So I found another motorbike tyre shop. A bloke named Mick runs it and he likes talking about Suzukis from the seventies and eighties. Bridgestone BT46's or S22 Radials was his only recommenation for the GS. I had half the rear Angel CT left so I went with the BT46 front 'cause I was about three thousand km past illegal with the Angel CT. He fitted the front tyre Tuesday and I did about 100 km and did not like it. It was slow to turn in and didn't move about so i didn't really know what it was doing. Totally different to the Pirellis. I had taken a good look at the Amgel CT after it came off the rim and it was pretty much V shaped with it's hard center so i expected less turning in from the BT46. 100 km's on Wednesday confirmed my feelings about the front tyre from the day before. Today, with the weather being less rainy I went for a proper 'get to know your front tyre ride'. After about 250 km of curvy mountain roads I was still not feeling the Bridgestone in a good way. It hadn't done anything wrong just wasn't moving about and giving the Pirelli feedback I was used to. Then I came to a couple of hairpins with stutter bumps on the exit I know well. The Pirelli's would skip to the outside of the corner over the ripples but the BT46's still kept the same line. I understood then why the front tyre wasn't letting me know anything it was doing. It was just gripping the road like the Pirelli's wouldn't... For the rest of the trip home I went a bit crazy and enjoyed the GS through curvy mountain corners in a way I haven't since I bought it.
BT46 on the front end - two thumbs up from me.

[herennow]

I scrape pegs on all my bikes bit Avons roadriders on them. My trident does not have much clerance though so super easy to do. Wish it had folding pegs. Modern tyre grip is amazing.

My experience with old BTs was not great, apparently the new ones are different.

[Watcher]

Never been impressed with Pirelli tires, truth be told.  I feel like they really over exaggerate what you feel from the road (I tend to notice paint and road texture more when riding on Pirellis), and I don't think they give very constructive feedback in terms of grip.  In the words of a friend of mine who's more aggressive of a rider than I am, "Pirelli's don't tell you when they're at the limit, they just grip until they don't," and I tend to agree.  The last set I had (Rosso III) I felt them wash out on me a few times and they kinda catch you off guard.  If you really know how to handle your bike, know the limits you can ride, and really want to feel the road, they might be great tires, but for the average bomb around town type of rider I feel like they talk to you the wrong way.

I've noticed Bridgestones I'd ridden on also give me that sensation of being heavy to steer, or slow to turn in.  It must be the way they profile their tires or something, but I will say Bridgestones feel quite stable in corners.  I don't get the same squirrely sensation when crossing over paint and such with Bridgestones either, yet they do seem to communicate better than Pirellis when they reach their limit.  That same friend of mine that hates Pirelli almost exclusively rides Bridgestone.

I hope you like them.  Everyone's preference is different, and while tires aren't super cheap to be experimenting with tires do wear out relatively quickly (so long as you actually ride) so I always encourage riders to test and see what connects with them best.

By far my favorite tires are Michelins.  They have a way softer carcass and seem to absorb all but the worst of road conditions so you don't really feel paint or pebbles or anything like that, but I find I get really positive feedback from them as far as when they're starting to step out.  I've gone into slides on my Monster (wearing Michelins) and felt fully aware and in control, while the same scenario on Pirellis may have caught me off guard.  The confidence I get from them is awesome.
There is a downside to that soft carcass, though, as Michelins are really sensitive to tire pressure.  I can tell taking the first turn out of my neighborhood whether or not I'll need to fire up the compressor when I get home.

I have far less experience with other brands but I feel like Dunlop is somewhere between Pirelli and Bridgestone in performance and feel, and Continental feels like a wannabe Michelin to me.  I have no experience with Avon or Metzeler, so I'll bite my tongue there, but I would avoid Shinko like the plague.

[mr72]

I have been very pleased with a Sport Demon as a front tire. I have found the sensitivity to tire pressure is more typical on radial tires than bias ply, so that may explain your experience Watcher, not so much Michelin vs. others? Also, I think the telegraphing-every-pebble feel is a bias ply thing for a front tire.

I like the Shinko E705s on my GS but they are not at all like the Avon Roadriders, Sport Demons or Michelin PSRs. I have no experience with Shinko's pure road tires except the one that came on my GS500 which was not nearly as good as the Sport Demon that replaced it, but I feel like their 50/50, 70/30 and 80/20 tires are pretty good, but they are extremely sensitive to tire pressure, which again I think may be a radial thing. Comparing 80/20 tires among manufacturers is kind of a crap shoot. Different tires have completely different tradeoffs, and once you are in the 80/20 or 70/30 tire types you are willingly giving up some strengths of a pure road tire in exchange for better performance on some types of non-pavement. My dad has Shinko knobby type tires on two of his bikes and they are surprisingly good on pavement and terrific on gravel. My own E705s on the GS handle like street tires on the road and kept me upright just fine on sand and gravel. I'd say as an 80/20 tire, they are 80% as good on the road as a 100/0 tire like those they replaced, and 20% as good off road as a pure knobby dirt bike tire. Where they blow away regular street tires is on water crossings with an inch or less of water which are frequent on back roads around here and a regular street tire will put you in the creek while the E705s will get you to the other side. And the E705s will also smoke a regular street tire once you have a mixed pavement/gravel surface like a road that's damaged or hasn't been maintained in a half century, or of course on extended bouts of road construction gravel surface. But I have no doubt a real street tire will out-brake and out-corner these E705s by some margin on good asphalt, and I would never attempt to ride my GS on a singletrack trail or anything with a very loose surface. Anyway, this just to say, avoid Shinko may be good advice for strict road tires but they are quite popular and favored for dual-sport and adventure bike usage.

I have the Pilot Street Radial / Sport Demon combo on my Bonneville and they are way better than the Avons that they replaced. I might try Pilot Road 5s in a couple of more K miles when this combo is shot, not sure. One advantage of this setup on the Bonnie is that they wear front and rear at about the same rate.

BTW I got a tire pressure monitor setup from Amazon (a gift) and put it on my Bonneville. It's fantastic. Basically goes on like valve caps and they talk wirelessly to the little handlebar mount unit which shows pressure and temperature. If you have very sensitive tires, I would recommend a setup like this wholeheartedly.

[Watcher]

I have found the sensitivity to tire pressure is more typical on radial tires than bias ply, so that may explain your experience Watcher, not so much Michelin vs. others? Also, I think the telegraphing-every-pebble feel is a bias ply thing for a front tire.

Possibly an "also yes" situation, but the three sport tires I have the most recent experience with (Bridge S22, Pirelli Rosso III, Michelin Power 5) are all radial belted.  The material does have something to do with it, as bias ply tires are typically firmer, but the overall construction can vary pretty far from one to the other within those materials.
As an example, I can stand on a Pirelli tire that is "on end" and it'll hold me up.  If I stand on a Michelin in the same way it'll collapse.
When I mount tires I can typically get one bead of a Michelin tire on the wheel without using a machine or any tool leverage.  Bridges and Pirellis both are far too stiff and require the machine for the whole job.
The carcass on Michelins are just that much more flexible by comparison.  Mounting them at home with spoons would be a cake walk with Michelins as compared to some other brands.