Why do you say that Rick? I am not trying to be a smart-ass just interested in your views on this.
At a defensive driving course I did almost 20 years ago they taught us that running on-road tyres at 35-40psi was better for several reasons:
- flatter contact of tyre to road surface
less road grip and can be dangerous if overinflated for conditions.
- better dispersion of water
as above, less road grip at high pressure, slow down to allow the tyre to disperse water. It is the tread pattern that disperses water, slow to a speed to let the tyre work.
- more even tyre wear [COLOR="rgb(244, 164, 96)"]and much greater potential to do tyre damage. At the correct pressure for the weight and speed a tyre will wear evenly. Over inflation causes crown wear and centralised heat buildup at the crown[/COLOR].
Maybe that was the case 20 years ago and is not any more due to changes/improvements in tyre design?
I appreciate that high-20's gives a more comfortable ride than high 30's on the road. [COLOR="rgb(255, 140, 0)"][COLOR="rgb(244, 164, 96)"]I am not interested in comfort. Just tyre life and road grip[/COLOR].[/COLOR]
For my off-road jaunts, I rarely drop much below 20psi on 255/85R16 BFG KM2's (or previous Maxxis Bighorn 255/85R16) and have never had any real problems. I have been afraid to drop to sub 10psi in case I pop a bead on my 16" rims. Heartened to hear the 16" P38 rims are rated well in terms of non-bead-popping
[COLOR="rgb(244, 164, 96)"]I have dropped to 6psi to get out of trouble and re-inflated immediately after. Low low pressure equals low low speed. At 10psi you should be able to idle out of most situations in sand. Big revs digs holes and spits tyres, but looks impressive.[/COLOR]
Cheers, Paul.
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