I know I'm slow but............tyres?

[KarlT]

Hi all

Right then, have now got some merc C class 15' rims
Only 4 has anyone...erm... ....got a spare?

What, in your collective opinion, would be the best allrounder for road and a bit of greenlaning.

The colway AT looks abit tame and the Macho abit extreme ( plus you need six of them)

Is there anything inbetween?

What supplier would you recommend and what sort of price?

[syncroandy]

I've been very happy with my BFG AT's with the exception of muddy conditions (a bit common in the UK) in which they will clog very quickly and lose grip. On more grippy surfaces (rock/gravel etc.) they are fine, and obviously fine on tarmac too, very quiet in fact.

I have a set of Atacamas too (diamond tread) which are fab in mud or any other off-road surface. However they are positively dangerous on tarmac. The chief hassle is carting them to the event, swapping them over and back afterward.

If I were starting over I'd be tempted to get a good set of MT's and put up with a bit more road noise, and accept more compromised road handling. I'm not in touch with supplier info ATM, maybe others can comment ?

[Diamond Hell]

Actually if you give the Atacamas 40psi on each corner then apart from hearing every tread block hit the ground individually they aren't terminal on the road. I wouldn't want to live with them all the time though.

The issue with running cheap remoulds like Atacamas and Machos etc is they wear quickly and aren't terribly puncture resistant.

MTs are an elderly design and certainly people like Matt have been running their Machos all the time and haven't come a cropper. It's a much newer design and seems to fair very well under all conditions. If I had to have one set of tyres and rims only I'd go for Machos and revel in the tyre noise!

Get in contact with Sowden tyres (Google them) and see what sort of deal you can strike with them.

[HarryMann]

If anyone is thinking of ordering 15" Machos or Attacamas, I'm looking for another 2 Machos and would like to get some sort of deal on delivery.

If I'm more central to whoever wants them, I'll order them up... Herts.

Machos wear reasonably I'd say, I've got a second season in them yet I'm sure, not a lot of road miles at all, but have seen a few things, mostly in mud and rock.
Tried 40 psi for a time, now settled at about 35/37, good compromise once you know them. You can actually depend on them to be consistent and predicatble, having as much grip as one could reasonably expect on variations of the tarmac theme, sometimes more.
Daily driver tyres, not really

[Diamond Hell]

Further ramblings on tyres here

[bigbluebus]

I run colway AT's on the 16

they are a pretty close copy of Goodrich AT's apparently

if you look at the vids of Biggin and Coney, check out Marcus Merc doctors performance (yellow van), he's running Goodrich AT's (ignore the one of him sliding down the hill at Coney, he only had 3 drive shafts in at that point...nutter)

It is true, the AT's DO clog rapidly in mud, but do self clean quite quickly too

They are well behaved on-road, as good if not better than cheap commercial tyres fitted to most 2wd T25's

All comes down to what you want from the van, if you want to trial or abuse it properly in mud, you will need something better than AT's

If you just want to drive it to work in all weathers, toy around off road couple times of year or not get stuck on a campsite, buy some AT's

I'll be following SyncroAndy and buying a 2nd set of something more extreme(atacamas or possibly chacos) to use at syncro events in the new year . .or I might just buy another van to abuse

[Mudlark]

Biggest issue I had with remoulds was safety on road. As someone who wanted one set of tyres for all occasions i settled on the BF goodrich Mud Terrains for the following reasoning:

Remoulds have been known to be more prone to all manner of failures; punctures, blowouts and delaminating. Chances are that these things are going to happen when the tyre is being put to extreme use, be it off-road or at speed or hard cornering.

If i was going to hammer my tyres for the odd weekend on a hill somewhere i wanted to be able to trust the same tyres for a 200 mile journey home so decided against starting off with a remould and potentially sub-standard tyre.

If i were off-roading every weekend i d have no hesitation in fitting Greenway or Colways as a second set for that purpose; but for the half dozen off-road excursions im doing every year it was more important to go for a quality tyre manufacturer and a 'pedigree' tyre that could live on the van year round.

It is a fact that safety standards in retread manufacturing have improved over recent years. Colway for instance are reported to reject 75% of the tyres that they consider; but their biggest problem is still the absence of any knowledge of the first life of the donor tyre.

There is also a considerable environmental benefit to the processing and use of retreaded tyres with the retreading process using up to 4 gallons less oil in manufacture per tyre.

So if retreads have all these benefits and are considerably cheaper why are they not generally recommended?

The answer seems to be purely reliability, performance and safety for road users who generally ignore their tyres.

For enthusiasts and professionals who are aware of the issues and the risks and are clued up about the uses they put their tyres to they are fine, but not for me.

[Ye Olde Syncrospares]

if you can stretch to it go for a set of BFGOODRICH mud terrains,well mannered on the road,very good in mud,not as noisy as most mud terrains and a qaulity tyre that will last a very long time with hugely strong sidewalls and puncture resistance,cj.

[Diamond Hell]

Clive I could do with a couple more Atacamas as and when you get your Machos. Let me know when you will be moving on that and if the bulk order makes a difference I'll go at the same time.

[matt]

I ve done many miles on the machos....well 3000, and they havent worn as much as i thought.....

but

Tried 40 psi for a time

this is the talk of a mad man, it clearly states "never inflate above 35psi"

theres a bit of give at this pressure, esp on islands...sorry derbytalk,,,roundabouts

had a rim bead go, but got it tubed for a tenner

[Diamond Hell]

Pah, guidelines, schmidelines. It's an experiment.

In this weather the tyre is unlikely to heat up which would increase the pressure over what has been put in there. I HAVE been checking, including after motorway runs and I can confirm that they ain't getting even warm.

This means that 40PSI in this weather will be safe. The 35PSI in August could be far less safe, as the tyre could get one heck of a lot hotter and thus (fnar fnar) harder.

Rave safe, kids.

[Mudlark]

Does'nt running tyres at over or under pressure have insurance issues ?

and dont forget that tyres are a critical safety issue so while experimentation on this particular set or retreads may not cause you any problems, it cannot necessarily translate to the assumption that all retreaded tyres will behave the same way when similarly (ab)used

[matt]

nor indeed "new" tyres, retreaded tryes pass the same test standards as new tyres, and meet the same "ce" mark

[Diamond Hell]

They were at 35PSI last time I checked them, guvnor. I'm not recommending anyone run their tyres at any pressure. You decide what's good for your use.

Like I said tyre pressures are greatly affected by temperature (ask any track-day hero) and it's damned cold at the moment. What IS the recommended pressure for a 205 75 R15 tyre on a T25 anyway? (I know someone will be along with that answer shortly)

Naturally handling and ride are affected by tyre pressures. I'm aware of this and I've only run them at that pressure for a specific use and the tyres were inspected carefully prior to putting them on. Worked fine for me.

[matt]

actually, Thomas, yoiu have a valid point there, any non VW recommended tyre size could potentailly run into INsurance issuses