Car tires on Motorcycles?

I ride a Honda Valkyrie. I therefore read a lot of forums dedicated to the care and feeding of said motorcycle.

In the past few years, there's been a growing number of people who put performance CAR tires on the rear of their Valkyries, citing more mileage, less cost, better tracking, and flat resistance.

Since a stock Valkyrie doesn't have a whole lot of lean capability, it works. Also known as " Going to the Darkside", putting a car tire on the rear of a big motorcycle is starting to spread, Vulcan 2000's VTX 1800's, and gold wings owners all have put car tires on their bikes. Older Boss Hoss bikes came from the factory with car tires, but I think it was a factor of there simply not being Big tires at that point.

I will never do it, as I value the handling of my bike, and the 200 series bike tire I currently have under there has huge amounts of stick and actually a bigger contact patch while leaned over than upright. Mileage? Who cares ? I'd rather have a soft, short-lasting compound than a hard, long-wearing one. But, that's just me.

One of the "common sense" problems this bring up in your mind is how a square tire leans. It doesn't. Someone finally took a video of a Gold Wing with a car tire mounted going through some turns, scraping pegs. You can see that while the tire runs on its outer blocks, it never tilts over onto the sidewall.

It's a little tough to watch, as it's filmed upside down and looking backwards, but it shows you can scrape pegs and run a car tire.