Which tire Warmer's work best on the Panigale

These are... Capit Maxima Vision

Your kid's got a nice aero riding position. Just adjust that footpeg for him and he's good to go....

He'll love to here this, thanks! He has got a real race attitude...
Here's an other pic from the rear.
They've got a digital interface

Yep - those Capit Maxima (with Digital Gauge) and the KLS TST pro-x TCU are what I would consider the two best tire warmers made at this moment. The CHR's are decent but probably not in the same league as those two - but they are also not in the same price category either. ., .

KLS Pro-X TCU

I've done around 10 track days without warmers and I've used DOT as well as Slick tires. I'm not going to say that this was the best idea now that I have warmers. My tires I'm running right now are Pirelli Pro Slicks. Made to be used without warmers if you're just a track day guy and not a racer...

In the morning taking the bike out with tires only warmed by sunshine on a cold track can be very sketchy to say the least. On my last day without warmers I used a IR Temp Gun and tried very hard to heat the tires to check the amount I could get. I could only get around 4-5C per lap and I was trying as hard as I felt I could...

It showed me that in reality I'm having to nurse tires for at least 3 laps before I was up and running at a safe temp.

Now I dont know about you but my idea of fun track riding is NOT to spend half of a 15 min session warming tires. Now that I have warmers the tires are fantastic right off the first turn and if I do spend a long time waiting at the start line due to a delay I take the first two or three turns ( in both directions) to confirm I've got the temps still and then its off and running...

Now I've heard that beginners or new track riders dont need this but I'll say this: I know what a cold tire feels like and what a warm tire feels like and I had to learn this without crashing my bike and possibly ending up in the hospital. I think that a new track rider needs warmers more that an experience rider...much like abs or traction control...a new rider will tend to under shoot or over shoot his ability and that of his bike...

I'm convinced warmers are the way especially if you have 15min sessions and dont want to waste track time babysitting tires. This is the main reason I've got them now. Warming tires sucks and if you dont know how to warm tires its going to cost you way more than a 200$ set of warmers will...

What about different compounds? In my Porsche racing days, we would choose compounds based on the conditions present. We did get a lap to scrub them in, though.

I'm not sure a student would benefit from warmers. It is my contention that part of the learning curve should include knowing when the tires are coming into proper temperature by the "seat of the pants-o-meter". Meaning; the proprioception one develops wrt tire responsiveness is a valuable sensory ability.

It makes all the world of a difference when your tires start "going away" also as they have reached their maximum heat cycle tolerances. Side wall deflectivity changes and overall grip changes and the ability to feel when they are coming in and going away are extremely important and students should "learn" this as their curves of experience increases IMHO.

Otherwise, when the tires start to go away, he or she might not be able to recognize that and get into more trouble than anticipated

I think the advent of other driver contol modalities such as TC,ABS also minimize the "driver/vehicle feedback" aspects and makes for a less experience driver/rider. We have always told our students to turn all of the "nanny's" off so that they can obtain the proper feedback from their inputs and react accordingly.

superfly - you make some good points as well, especially in reference to cold days. The pro slicks are race compound tires which /supposedly/ don't necessarily need warmers but usually used with.

But I think the ambient conditions are frequently more telling than anything else. If its cold - all bets are off. It's going to be warm up the tires before doing anything crazy. However, with beginners you aren't talking knee down type of traction either. Most "beginners" are not at knee down type of angles. But you need to weigh the capability of the rider vs the tires he has on. With Pro slicks, that wouldn't be a good choice of tire regardless. Even on a warm day - they won't be able to ge that tire to its desired operating range. It's not the weather/temp at that stage, but the equipment on the bike.

I know when its 50 out at Laguna, I better have warm tires before I am at pace, whether thats laps around or tire warmers.

But I agree with you that its annoying to take a couple laps to warm the tires up if its cold outside. But at the same time, most beginners operating on OEM type of tires can be at 100% with those same times because they just aren't pushing it hard enough yet (in normal temperatures). Not in Canada

I think the biggest danger for beginners (and not sure ART/TPM) teach this, but almost every high performance school does - is that you crack/get on the throttle when you're steering input is in/complete. But NEVER add lean angle while you're adding throttle. . . Most beginners losing it is not a loss of traction because of temp, but a loss of traction because they added lean angle while adding the throttle and broke the tire loose, or they added brakes while still leaned over (just as bad as adding throttle).

I vote CapIT.

I've got Capit and woodcrafts. Capits are easier to put on the tire but heat up slower than the woodcrafts. Their warranty also sucks, you have to send it back to Italy if you have any problems. I've been waiting 2 months for my front warmer to come back after the element burnt out.

One thing to also consider. When you take steps like using warmers youre companion equipment grows. Warmers require either a generator or a dependable source of wall current which some tracks wont provide or that require long cords to reach (not to mention a spliter to share access)

Phil said:

race tires - warmers. (helps tire life)

street tires - no warmers. (or if you like the show)

Click to expand...

+1

I'm no expert but I thought Warmer's serves 2 purposes 1 to lower the time to get tyres up to temperature and 2 to reduce the number of heat cycles and increase tyre life.

For street tyres which perform reasonably well when not at optimum temperature Warmer's will give less of an advantage than over race/race oriented tyres which can be dangerous if not up to temperature .

Is the 1 - 1 1/2 laps it takes to warm the tyre on a track day going to hurt?

After taking off the Warmer's will you be queuing up prior to going out? This can take 5 or even 10 min. So even when you have Warmer's for a track day you need to do minimize the time between taking off Warmer's and being on track to realize advantage.

Assuming you're on a panigale and using oem tyres I would say you wouldn't get much benefit.

With regard to brand I've heard great things about chicken hawk. whichever brand you choose make sure you are able to get them repaired or replaced if parts go bad.

Hope this helps and did not offend anyone.

At NJMP, after 2-3 laps, my Dunlop NTECS are usually very hot to the touch on the RIGHT side and somewhat less so on the left side. This is directly related to Thunderbolt track having only a few LEFT turns and the majority of turns going RIGHT. So, if you are on your 4th lap or so, and the weather is cold > you transition to a left turn > get greedy on the gas > forget your tire carcass is colder on that side- you may have a traction problem.