Is that a line of BS or what? Weight is more of an issue than "torque induced degradation". Somebody built a sub standard tire is what this boils down to IMO.
I don't believe for a minute weight (bike that is) has anything to do with it. Harleys and Goldwings both weigh as much as the R3T (or in the ballpark, at least) and they run smaller rear tires. I'm inclined to believe it is torque related. My reasoning is I know how *I* ride (soft and easy) and my bike has just over 5000 miles on it and the rear tire looks great and has a LOT of life left in the tread. I really don't think I'd have any problem getting 10K out of it, frankly speaking.
Back to weight, I think load weight plays a part. I have a friend that rides 2-up with his wife pretty much all the time. They're are on the heavy side and he goes through tires fairly often on his Road King. I weigh around 145 and rarely ride 2-up. I got almost 15K out of the rear on my old Heritage Softail Classic and it had 28K on the front tire when I traded the bike and the front still had a little life left (not at the wear bars yet).
But, I really think the Rocket tire woes are mostly rider induced. I was talking to the dealer Friday and he says there are plenty of Rockets that come in that do not have tires wearing out at 5k, but he also knows how those guys ride. He went onto to say he knows that some of the guys ride their bikes pretty hard and they go through tires pretty quick as a result.
I'm not saying this tire doesn't have issues and maybe it wasn't the best fit for the bike; apparently, it's not. I just wonder if Triumph was banking on a different type of rider buying the Touring model than the guys that buy the Standard model. If they did, that may have been a mistake. At least from reading posts on this forum, I get the impression that I'm an anomaly and that most of the R3T owners are just like the Standard owners, meaning they can't resist the urge to twist the throttle hard on a regular basis.