33s M/T - Questions

[JHarris1385]

Alright had a little delay in getting my stock rims powder coated but everything is lined up for next week. Finalizing color ideas Friday.

Thread here: http://vehicross.info/forums/showthr...ghlight=powder

On the stock rims (powder coated) I want to run 33s M/T tires.

Right now I am pretty set on these: http://www.treadwright.com/p-72-285-...ard-dog-d.aspx

But before I bite the bullet I wanted to see what others thought and could share about a couple questions I have.

The tread looks similar to the older Wrangler MT-R, which if I remember right is what Jay Dunford ran?

I currently run 265/75-16 AT (Dakota - Pep Boys)

1. This will be a heavier tire but stiffer, how much performance will I lose, given that I have stock gears? These are 65lbs.

2. Anyone with a similar set up care to share how much it affected gas? If it does a lot I will probably be forced to start driving another car as my DD or split time instead of 100% VX (which I don't like the sound of!)

3. At $190 each it is a GOOD price for this style of tire but the 265/75-16 is almost half the costs $110. Not sure but I think in the long run I will not be happy with the 16 version and still want to go bigger.

4. With the stock rim and about an inch or so of tire, think I will have much more to trim or hammer out? I forget my offset now but it sticks out a bit but not much. (4.5 backspacing kinda sounds right).

- Really just trying to bring anything to the surface that I may not realize till I put them on. And I may get a spacer and crank a bit more (do have my diff dropped).

Thanks in advance.

[Grif]

Just pull the trigger already John! You won't regret it.

[Bob Barker]

Geeze 65lbs a piece??? That's a heavy *** tire! I don't know how much effect it will have on the performance, but there will some slow down in acceleration, and dropping of MPG's. The 33's I got from Pep Boys I have no idea what they weigh, but I could pick one up in each hand and load it, so not that much. They still had a slightly noticeable effect on performance and MPG's.

[pbkid]

do you want the honest answer or the answer that will get you to buy the tires?

if you are really concerned with gas mileage/performance. you are not going to be happy with bigger, heavier tires.

your performance is going to go down, and your gas mileage is going to go down.

but your VX will look awesome.

[RamAirZ]

Geeze 65lbs a piece??? That's a heavy *** tire!

LOL my 34's on the 15x6 steel wheels weigh in at 94lbs per rim/tire

[Bob Barker]

WTF!!! I'd die just trying to mount those


Forget about trying to rotate 4 of them with any kind of quickness!!!

[RamAirZ]

lol ya they aren't very light. I'm sure my tire carrier loves having the full size spare on it

[Riff Raff]

For comparison purposes, our OEM wheels weigh 28 lbs, and the OEM tires weigh 34 lbs, for a combined OEM wheel+tire weight of 62 lbs. Thus, an OEM wheel of 28 lbs + aftermarket 65 lbs tire = 93 lbs

Here's some possible options to lower overall weight using either 16" or 18" OEM wheels and achieving a 33" O.D. with an aggressive M/T or very aggressive A/T:



16" OEM Wheel with 285/75R16 (32.9" O.D.):

Yokohama, Geolandar M/T+ (51 lbs)



18" OEM Wheel with 275/70R18 (33" O.D.) tire:

BFG, Rugged Trail (46 lbs) - lightest of the A/T's
General, Grabber AT2 (54 lbs)
G/Y, Dura-Trac (55 lbs)
Firestone, M/T (60 lbs) - lightest of the M/T's

[JHarris1385]

What is the weight the stock 16?

I could not find the weight of my current set up either to compare.

I am for sure going to go MT this time, no more messing around. If the Firestone MT is the lightest and is only 5lbs lower, then it looks like this Treadwright is a good choice and is about $100 cheaper or more. Tirerack did not have that size. At least I did not see it from my small phone screen.

I have always like the Yoko Geos MT though! Something about that mid ridge down the middle.

- Would gearing be nessecary or needed? I am open to that idea, but have not followed it enough to fully know how hard it is to find them and from what vehicle(s).

[RamAirZ]

I ran the 33" MT's on mine with stock gearing and it did fine. If your going to upgrade, search for the 4.77's out of a '89 Isuzu Trooper RS, some 4dr Trooper's in that time frame came with them if they had the big tire package but they will be very hard to verify without pulling the diffs. If you don't do any extreme wheeling and don't travel up steep inclines on a daily basis, I'd keep the stock gears.

[LiquidVX]

I just got these 33" today. I like them so far but I'm sure the mileage will suck.

[JHarris1385]

What are those? What the numbers for the size or are they 33x12.5x16? Know the weight?

I still don't know what the weight of the 16 rim is? Can't find it.

Looks great!

[yellowgizmo99]

I'll see how much the ones I have are, you want just the rims right.

[Bob Barker]

Even with the heavy rims/tires I wouldn't do a gear change. It will make mileage that much worse! Mine performs "well" for 33" MT's. It's not a race car to begin with, or particularly quick either, so I wasn't too worried about that aspect.

[LiquidVX]

They are LT285/75R16 / 33X11.50R16 and weigh 56lbs each. In hindsight I would have got LT265/75R16 / 32X10.50R16 and saved a total of 12lbs.

I had the Baja Belted HP on my previous VX. They were 30x9.5x16, lightweight, quiet, wore well and looked great; best tires I ever owned. If you find something like them , get them.