Protecting spare tire (1 Viewer)

[Pascoscout]

That would be awesome. I cant even do donuts on ice with the damn xsfer case doing its thing...but its not 1/2" of tread depth, its 1/2" of total circumfrence. So string around the outside of the tire is 1/2" difference in length between the two. Much smaller difference.

Sorry I missed the part about circumference. Probably cause the next post mentioned diameter.

So, assuming you stretched the string at the same tension and followed the same path around the tires for both measurements, you're looking at about 1/16" of an inch of wear. Since we are concerned about differences in angular velocity of the tires, and the change in radius of 1/16" would result in an insignificant change in angular velocity except at linear speeds not achievable in a 25 year old car with an anemic engine, you're fine.

 

[mudgudgeon]

To expand this topic slightly, what do people do about protecting their spare tyres on rear tyre carriers? Most 80's I see (including mine) that carry tyres on the rear don't have covers, like this:

I didn't bother too much with the idea of covering the spare on mine, but I recently had an incident that's making me re-evaluate that. I bought three spare wheels for my 80 from a guy here locally a few months back, with used but serviceable tyres on the rims. Since my rear tyres were shot, I swapped in two of his for mine to get me through until I can replace all the tyres with new ones. I drove like this for weeks around my local area. First time on the highway though, it drove fine for around 30 minutes or so. Enough to get me where I was going and start the trip back. About 10 minutes away from home though, I noticed a slight wobble developing. Being close to home, I decided I'd continue on and check it out when I got there. Then it got worse. I pulled over. I couldn't immediately see what was wrong, but I inspected my drive train, satisfied myself it wasn't anything serious or mechanical in nature, and decided to slow down a bit and limp home. It got worse and worse. By the end, it felt like I was driving over a brick every tyre rotation, but I got into the driveway. Then I saw what the issue was. My rear passenger side tyre was no longer round:
View attachment 2807757
View attachment 2807758
View attachment 2807759

Best as I can figure, this was used as a spare on the back of the 80 of the guy I bought it off, and it was parked in the sun. The UV hitting the top of that tyre day in and day out for years did a number on the rubber. The top section which was most directly exposed here fared the worst. The tyre looked perfect, and drove fine at first, but as soon as I got it up to a good temperature from a proper highway run, with a decent hill climb and descent, the uneven weakening of the tyre from the UV exposure caused it to let go in this odd way. The tyre didn't blow out, it still holds air, but I deflated it as soon as I caught the problem to make sure it didn't explode, because it wasn't looking healthy. As a result of this, I'm reconsidering one of those spare wheel covers.

What's the date stamp on that tire?

I had BFG ATs on a long term project that sat for about 3 years. Tyres were rock hard at the end of that period, (maybe 5 years old since manufacture) and when driven, the tires squeaked and squealed on every corner

 

[MoJ]

I didn't bother too much with the idea of covering the spare on mine, but I recently had an incident that's making me re-evaluate that. I bought three spare wheels for my 80 from a guy here locally a few months back, with used but serviceable tyres on the rims. Since my rear tyres were shot, I swapped in two of his for mine to get me through until I can replace all the tyres with new ones. I drove like this for weeks around my local area. First time on the highway though, it drove fine for around 30 minutes or so. Enough to get me where I was going and start the trip back. About 10 minutes away from home though, I noticed a slight wobble developing. Being close to home, I decided I'd continue on and check it out when I got there. Then it got worse. I pulled over. I couldn't immediately see what was wrong, but I inspected my drive train, satisfied myself it wasn't anything serious or mechanical in nature, and decided to slow down a bit and limp home. It got worse and worse. By the end, it felt like I was driving over a brick every tyre rotation, but I got into the driveway. Then I saw what the issue was. My rear passenger side tyre was no longer round:
View attachment 2807757
View attachment 2807758
View attachment 2807759

Best as I can figure, this was used as a spare on the back of the 80 of the guy I bought it off, and it was parked in the sun. The UV hitting the top of that tyre day in and day out for years did a number on the rubber. The top section which was most directly exposed here fared the worst. The tyre looked perfect, and drove fine at first, but as soon as I got it up to a good temperature from a proper highway run, with a decent hill climb and descent, the uneven weakening of the tyre from the UV exposure caused it to let go in this odd way. The tyre didn't blow out, it still holds air, but I deflated it as soon as I caught the problem to make sure it didn't explode, because it wasn't looking healthy. As a result of this, I'm reconsidering one of those spare wheel covers.

BFG A/T KO came out in 1999. I don’t see a “KO” designation on the tire which means it’s at least 22 years old.

 

[nakman]

I don't see mention of raising up the spare tire cross member... to the OP you can gain 1-2" of clearance for that spare under the truck fairly easily, which helps protect the spare considerably.

 

[DivByZero]

BFG A/T KO came out in 1999. I don’t see a “KO” designation on the tire which means it’s at least 22 years old.

Uhhh, yeah that's my bad. Didn't notice how old that tyre was. It's got a three digit date code. It was made in April 1996..... which is actually three months before my 80 was built. Whoops!

Still, I've got two of its twins on the rear of my 80 right now, both of them also made in 96, which despite the age are actually in better nick than the Hankook Dynapro's that were on there before (dated 2015). They went as hard as a rock and it was like driving on ice in wet weather. I'm limping through with the 25 year old tyres for another few months until I can replace them all with some new BFGs. Wish me luck!

 

[MoJ]

Uhhh, yeah that's my bad. Didn't notice how old that tyre was. It's got a three digit date code. It was made in April 1996..... which is actually three months before my 80 was built. Whoops!

Still, I've got two of its twins on the rear of my 80 right now, both of them also made in 96, which despite the age are actually in better nick than the Hankook Dynapro's that were on there before (dated 2015). They went as hard as a rock and it was like driving on ice in wet weather. I'm limping through with the 25 year old tyres for another few months until I can replace them all with some new BFGs. Wish me luck!

Good luck! Avoid highway speeds

 

[leonard_nemoy]

It was made in April 1996..... which is actually three months before my 80 was built. Whoops!

Still, I've got two of its twins on the rear of my 80 right now, both of them also made in 96

 

[DivByZero]

View attachment 2809301

Yeah, not ideal, but I'm the sole income earner for a wife and four kids, and I live in the second most unaffordable city in the world for housing (no joke, look it up). I'm perpetually broke. But hey, if you want to wire me a cool $2000 to buy a set of 5 new shoes for my 80, I'll send you the info right now! Otherwise I've got to save my pennies and work with what I've got.

 

[LINUS]

^^^ gotcha @Nemesis1207 - we all are in some struggle, be it money, health, birth or marriade family.

Just keep in mind those tires are a major ‘weak link’ & highway speeds are a real risky move - fortunately you can make monthly payments /tire dealer credit cards on new sets & if you carry your family / it has daily driver duties, new rubber donuts would be an exceedingly smart move.

Don’t get re-treads as they are false safety - lots of threads on that.

Even if you gotta get street oriented or smaller tires to save $$, new rubber should be a priority.

 

[DivByZero]

Thought I'd update from my last post to say I arranged some new rubber for my rig. I'll be paying it off for a few months, but the tyre situation has been bad for awhile, so it needed to be done.

Got four new BFG AT K02's fitted. The spare on the swingaway is a new BFG MT KM3. I've got two other rims with those prehistoric BFGs waiting for a later date to get the KM3s fitted too. The idea is I'll swap out the back wheels for my muddies when I'm going for some 4x4, and run the K02s when I'm using it as my DD and for simple trips. I also have a second spare in the factory location under the rear, a thinner profile on a split rim, but that's the emergency spare I can't be bothered doing anything about right now.

 

[LINUS]

^&^ Smart choice, and I like that idea.

My 37’s on the Tundra (well, 36.5’s tops - they run small) - but esp when on the FR I scrubbed some decent tread doing road miles this last Summer / hot pavement.

KM3’s have a real soft outer compound. Great in cold/rocks/etc - but wear like gumballs on hot asphalt.