tire shredded by friction kit-advice?

[demolition_dave1]

I just put a Station friction kit with a HondaGX35 on my Catrike Road and it is a lot of fun but it SHREDDED right through a new tire in about an hour running time. I know they wear out tires fast but that can't be right.

Any advice?

[The Busted Nut]

Try adjusting the pressure on the tire with the quick release...

[demolition_dave1]

More, or less, pressure?
It is on there pretty tight, but pressure in the tire was a bit low.

[happyvalley]

Several years ago when I first got the same set-up as you have I had more tire wear in the first 100 miles than I did in the next 1000. There is a slight learning curve and I found excessive tire wear is caused by one or more of the following factors:

*under inflated tire--best to run a hard tire near the psi limit on the tire sidewall.
*insufficient down pressure on the roller--too little the roller slips but too much bogs the engine down, about 3/16 deflection is good.
*jackrabbit starts--pedal start to 7 or 8 mph then feather the throttle up to cruising speed, pedal assist when you accelerate after slowing down.
*a misaligned installation--drive spindle needs to be 90 degrees perpendicular to the plane of the wheel and parallel to the rear bike axle.
*hard rubber slicks are best for friction drive, no knobby tires and the less cross tread the tire has the better.

I rotate tires front to back occasionally and get over 2000 miles out of a set with fd.

[donutguy]

Totally agree with happyvalley.....been running FD for several years on the same set of tires. I have about 2500 miles on the set of Schwalbe Big Apple 29er tires. I rotate them every 6 months.... everything happyvalley said is critical to making a set of tires last.