Michelin StarCross 5 Soft/Medium Compounds

What it is

• A new generation of tire technology from Michelin.
• The aggressive tread blocks vary in height, spacing, and size with a goal of increased grip and control.
• The full line comes equipped with a revolutionary design of horizontal ridges within the tread pattern.

The StarCross 5 is a new line of off-road motorcycle tires that uses a combination of Michelin’s older technology that was used in other tires such as its off-road rally plus a few bits of new technology that have come about in recent years. The StarCross 5 line is compiled of Sand, Soft, Medium, and Hard tire compounds each with their own tread patterns. Michelin engineers along with its top riders from around the world have put forth their knowledge and preferences in tires to come up with a range that has a wide span of usage while still having an area that each tire was truly meant to excel in.  The aggressive tread blocks vary in height, spacing, and size with a goal of increased grip and control. Michelin was able to lighten the StarCross 5 carcass by 15 percent over the 3rd and 4th generations of StarCross without compromising its casing using Comfort Casing Technology (CCT). This is the switch from 3 nylon plies to 2 polyester plies is a difference in material and thickness.  The benefit of this method of tire building is a reduction in unsprung mass on both front and rear tires. Michelin claims acceleration, braking, and straight line stability have been improved due to the reduction in rotational inertia.  The full line comes equipped with a revolutionary design of horizontal ridges within the tread pattern. They claim that with their being very little flat surfaces in the canyons between the knobs that the tread will be self-cleaning. The soft compound rear tire is the only tire in the lineup that is equipped with the mud-phobic bars along with the ridges to help the cleaning process. These are in place to ensure that mud chunks will only stick to the tire up to a certain size before flinging off.

Michelin has a full range of sizes for all full-sized bikes in 21”, 19” and 18” sizes.  

How it works

• I was able to feel so many different things that you could say had been masked with other tires I was familiar with.
• Under acceleration in square edge bumps this tire tracked amazingly--it stuck to the ground and didn’t do any side to side bouncing.
• You won’t get as much time out of the tire compared to some that are known to wear longer, but the time you do get will be 100 percent performance.

Not going to lie, I was a tad bit skeptical in our briefing at the tire intro. Not about all the changes they had done because that was compound evidence sitting right in front of our faces. It was the way they had claimed the tire would function was where I wasn’t bought so quickly. After my first few corners around Cahuilla Creek with the StarCross 5 Softs mounted up I was able to feel what they were saying--and it was true. It felt like I wasn’t even on my own bike, because the tires had such a difference in feel than previous models from Michelin and competitors. I was able to feel so many different things that you could say had been masked with other tires I was familiar with. Weather it was hard slick or wet hard and slick, or square edged and bumpy the bike just worked for the better. I actually had to make a few clicker adjustments to free up my suspension because of the way the bike reacted to these tires. I started spinning laps to get my first impressions. The trust instilled in me was crazy, as I felt at home with these tires very quickly.
I was confused leaving the track because I didn’t think a tire would win me over like that. When I was finally able to do more testing on both the soft and medium tire, there I noticed that these soft tires really excelled in a wide variety of conditions. I spent a few days each at Milestone, Glen Helen and Competitive Edge beating the soft tires up. Under acceleration in square edge bumps this tire tracked amazingly--it stuck to the ground and didn’t do any side to side bouncing. All aspects of turning were trusted at all 3 locations. Even as the tires would initially wear, it wouldn’t lose traction or tear knobbies off. Once the rear tire got past the point where you wouldn’t line up to race with it is where I saw its performance drop off. This required me really having to step on my outside peg when I went to accelerate because it would slide out. Now if I was cornering in ruts or going around a sweeper turn carrying momentum I had zero problems. Just the low speed turns with nothing to support your lean got tricky.
Later I did most of my riding with the Medium compound in both 18' and 19”-sizes in the mountains or desert. A lot of the terrain was pretty rocky and or hard terrain. And both front and rear tires held up well for a substantially long amount of time. I didn’t start ripping knobbies off until I was up in the mountains riding some advanced trails that had multiple types of rock sticking out of the earth’s soil ready to shear rubber and dent metal. Now just like the soft compound tire; the Mediums turned and tracked very well in the stuff we threw them into. These tires as well had a soft compound (works tire) like nature as well. We did get a couple of punctures from pinch-flats from slamming sharp rocks. Here we noted that running a bit more pressure than usual (up to 14 PSI from 12 PSI off-road in rocks) was a smart idea. But going too high in pressure will also have the tire lose its bump compliance bonus, anything higher than 14 PSI and you start to notice this, it is no surprise Michelin is the leader in mousse technology as well.
With the medium compound I was amazed at how well the bike would stay in balance and track straight. Also of note was the front not doing a typical side roll as soon as your front wheel put weight in an area of loose rock when it grabs. These tires also find the traction in areas like a fluffy rut berm that don’t have much to hold them together--areas where you don’t expect much traction is where these tires really excelled.
On the track the Mediums are not as grippy as the soft in most conditions but they are way more versatile when the ground becomes harder. And the durability is about double in time. They are as consistent performing as any tire out there but really stand out on the extra bump compliance they afforded every bike we tried them on.
Now the Soft back tire does take more of a beating than the front Soft. Mediums wear about equal front to rear. And with an almost factory or works like compound (very soft) you won’t get as much time out of the tire compared to some that are known to wear longer, but the time you do get will be 100 percent performance. In discussing the performance of these tires with other DBT test riders throughout their life, we quickly came to a conclusion that this line of tire performs fantastically up until a point where they just need to be replaced. We even ran them past that to be sure and they only get worse and start chunking right after the performance goes away.  Along with reading what the tires do on track and paying attention to the knobbies you will have no problem gauging when to replace them. On a side note I’d say I got a good 3 weeks of riding the Softs at peak performance, double that on the Mediums. And from a racers standpoint that's quite a tire life.
I was really impressed with these tires and from over six different riders we had trying them there was not one strong negative comment to mention aside from the flats which could be coincidence. They mount easily and bead up very positively. These tires have passed my personal test and you will see me with more Michelin's mounted up to my machines.

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