Narrow tyres V Wide tyres

For what it's worth when I was a young fella I went on a weekend Suzuki club outing to Double Island Point in Queensland.

One guy had a 3 cyl 2 stroke with balloon tyres and another guy had the new 4 cyl 4 stroke with bar treads.

Back then there were three crossings over Double Island point and you also could drive up Kings Bore Track (as I said, it was when I was a young fella).

On the Saturday night we were bored so pile into the Suzuki's and up the beach we went. After using all available tracks and comparing vehicles with and without extra people in them, we found out which vehicle could go where.

At 12:30am I was buggered and just wanted to go back to camp and sleep. We were alongside of the Cherry Venture which was a ship high and dry on the sand, when one driver looked at the other driver's tyres and said "I wonder how they would go on my vehicle"?

To cut a long story short we swapped tyres without a jack and without any spares through shear man power.

We then repeated the tracks and to my amazement the results were the same.

I finally got to be at 3:30am and was up at 5:30am fishing. I don't know how I did it.

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Originally Posted by barryj

One guy had a 3 cyl 2 stroke with balloon tyres and another guy had the new 4 cyl 4 stroke with bar treads.

...we found out which vehicle could go where.

We then repeated the tracks and to my amazement the results were the same.

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So are you going to tell us which vehicle and which tyre performed better? Or does the last sentence mean both vehicles and both sets of tyres gave the same results?

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Originally Posted by vnx205

So are you going to tell us which vehicle and which tyre performed better? Or does the last sentence mean both vehicles and both sets of tyres gave the same results?

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Yes, both vehicles went where they went before even with different tyres. Sounds strange but that is what happened.

Of course mud and rock driving would be different, although a wide tyre on mud may not get enough weight and just spin when a narrow tyre would have to slog it's way through and the risk of bellying to the chassis is there.

I run stock 205 x 16 on my old rangy, they work fine for road work, dirt roads, gibbers and general off road. Very pleased with them.
I run 235/70 16 on my disco, excelent in sand, but no other benefit over the 205's in other applications.
The narrow tyres seem to have less rolling resistance, give lighter steering and better fuel economy.
I had 10.5 x15"s on an old series 3 wagon many years ago, they were good in sand and sloppy conditions, but made the old girl a bit of a handful in most other situations.

camel trophy disco's had narrow tyres but were slightly taller than standard. If you have ever seen what they drove thru if Landrover thouht wider was better they would have fitted them. Armed forces also tend to use narrow tyres or should i say close to standard width as would be the more correct term. I use 245 70 16s on my disco 1 and have found more than adequate for both beach and forestry tracks.

I run 245/75r16 Maxxis Mudders on my Disco. I love them, they run really well. But I get them REALLY CHEAP:D

My experience has been that wide tyres are puncture prone and increase fuel consumption, that is why I have 255/85/16 BFG Mudders on my RR, and when deflated to 15psi are unstoppable. I think Aquarangie also runs these tyres, he has had them for a lot longer than me and could probably give you some more of an idea.

JC

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Originally Posted by p38arover

It seems that the "wide" tyres we generally see are more for looks than effect. Note that I'm not talking of genuine balloon sand tyres.

Ron

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Bingo.. ;)

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Originally Posted by justinc

My experience has been that wide tyres are puncture prone and increase fuel consumption, that is why I have 255/85/16 BFG Mudders on my RR, and when deflated to 15psi are unstoppable. I think Aquarangie also runs these tyres, he has had them for a lot longer than me and could probably give you some more of an idea.

JC

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ME too!!! these are the perfect upgrade tyre for Defenders.

LRH

4WD Monthly did an article ages ago about Wide vs Tall tyres and the the tall skinny ones came out on top - its all down to air pressures.

When air pressures are reduced the "footprint" of the tall skinny increases more proportionally than the wide tyres, as the footprint gets bigger length ways and not width ways - if this makes sense?

LRH