The Lone Ranger – Kage’s ’94 X-Cab Leaf SAS and Bed Bob

[4.0B2]

They're not really disappearing, there just wasn't that many to start with. The two big players are Pitbull and Interco for the larger tires (35"+). For smaller street stuff, there are some other manufactures as well. And there's a few retread shops, and gobs of .mil take off still coming in as well.

Whilre running a 16.5" limits your selection, its far from obsolete at this point. If anything there's actually a few more places that make 16.5" offroad tires than there were in the early 2000's. But its a drop in the bucket compared to the 15/17" rim sizes.

just get some treadwrights
idk. i'm looking into the mil tires b/c i have that parts donor explorer that's a frame/body waiting for a v8 and tons. would like to make it run some cheap 37's as it'll be a pizza and beer budget build. (later on.. when i'm out of college)

 

[Kage]

just get some treadwrights
idk. i'm looking into the mil tires b/c i have that parts donor explorer that's a frame/body waiting for a v8 and tons. would like to make it run some cheap 37's as it'll be a pizza and beer budget build. (later on.. when i'm out of college)

The only hesitation I have with the Treadwrights is that you don't gain anything in sidewall strength since they're using the .mil carcass. While I haven't killed a sidewall yet on my take offs, I would like a thicker/stiffer one than I'm currently running.

 

[cdawall]

The only hesitation I have with the Treadwrights is that you don't gain anything in sidewall strength since they're using the .mil carcass. While I haven't killed a sidewall yet on my take offs, I would like a thicker/stiffer one than I'm currently running.

I would grab a set of 38.5" TSL's or something along those lines.

 

[Kage]

I would grab a set of 38.5" TSL's or something along those lines.

That may be the road I wind up taking when I kill what I have. I don't know if the truck would be able to move the dang things down the road though as the "light weight" 36" bias tires are about 20 lbs heavier than the Goodyears I have on there now (so I'd be at 170 lbs a corner). The dang radials are about 50lbs heavier per tire . That would definetly put me in the "I need to regear" category

I do like that the sampers run about $160 cheaper per corner than the other things I've been looking at though.

I wish that damn money tree would start growing a bit faster....

 

[cdawall]

That may be the road I wind up taking when I kill what I have. I don't know if the truck would be able to move the dang things down the road though as the "light weight" 36" bias tires are about 20 lbs heavier than the Goodyears I have on there now (so I'd be at 170 lbs a corner). The dang radials are about 50lbs heavier per tire . That would definetly put me in the "I need to regear" category

I do like that the sampers run about $160 cheaper per corner than the other things I've been looking at though.

I wish that damn money tree would start growing a bit faster....

Keep an eye out on ebay and what not I picked up a pair brand new for $340 shipped. When mine is eventually done will throw some pics up.

 

[Josh40601]

Anyone know if they make TSL retreads?

 

[Kage]

Military Tire Take Off Update:

Now that I’ve had these tires on for awhile, I thought it was time for a bit of an update.

On Road Comments:
Snow - This year has been utterly disappointing for snow down in the St. Louis area. I did get to run them in light snow (less than 1") both ways (siped and unsiped). They really weren't any worse in the snow than the swampers I used to run on my Cherokee so I'm not sure why there's so many complaints about how they work in the snow Update 1/3/13 - I've recently had these offroad and on road in the snow. They don't suck as much as I thought they would, but they do leave a little to be desired. I think the fact that my truck weighs in at nearly 6k lbs when loaded help with keeping these things stuck to the road pretty decently.


Wet - See the comments for snow. I’ve driven quite a few ‘wet miles’ on these tires, and they haven’t scared me at all.

Dry - The tires are nice and quiet running down the road and have pretty decent road manners. Balancing has been a pain in the ass, but I think that has been mostly caused by my soft leaves out back which I need to fine tune a bit more (each tire/wheel/bead lock combo weighs in at 150 lbs).



Off Road Comments:
They aren't the most awesome thing offroad, but siped and aired down to 8-10psi they work well enough. No issues with sidewall strength, but they did start to chunk a bit after I siped them.

In the dry, they hook up without complaint, if things are a bit wet, I might have to work a bit harder, but I can still get to where I’m trying to go. I don’t really play in the mud but the little bit that I’ve wandered into, the tires seemed to clean out pretty well.

The biggest complaints I have with the tires is how much they squat as they air down, and side bite (Being able to climb with the sidewall). I know they're not a bias ply, but I was disappointed at how much ground clearance I lost when aired down (my heavy truck didn't help with things I'm sure). I am still farting around to try to find the ideal pressure to run the things at where I’ll still get a decent bite without losing too much ground clearance (Edit- I run them at 12-15 PSI depending on the terrain).. As for the side bite, the Nittos probably just spoiled me with those huge lugs hanging off the side, they made getting out of 'ruts' easy.


Would I run this setup again? All I can say is 'it depends'.
-If you're looking for a way to get a cheap 37" tire for 'mild' wheeling that will wear well on the street, then this setup makes sense. You’ll need to burn through two sets before things work out financially (I’ve got about $1500 wrapped up in wheels/tires right now, the trade off is that the next time I need to replace tires, it’ll cost me $500 for a set of 5, where as most other 37” tires are running $380-$480 each).

-If you're looking to get cheap bead locks and don't mind the 16.5" rim size then the H1's make sense.

-If you're looking for a 'turn key', cheap double bead lock setup that'll make you billy badass on the trail, look elsewhere.

Looking back I wish I would have gone ahead and bought a new set of Nittos and called it good, as I don't really need the double bead lock feature for the wheeling I tend to do. In fact, when I wear these tires out (or I get the cash together for something different), I'll ditch these and get something else. So take that for what it’s wroth.

One quick note about TWF. They did make things right by me in the end, but it was a bit of a hassle. YMMV.

Unsiped:

Siped:

 

[Kage]

Rear Bastard Pack:

In an effort to try to get rid of some of the vibes I’ve been dealing with, and to get the truck to sit level again, I hacked up another set of chevy leaves to wrap up my bastard pack. In the past, I had already added an AAL ”Boosting the Rear” (Link), but it wasn’t quite enough.

So I took the stock pack that looked like this:

Cut down the second to the top leaf of another chevy pack:

Squeezed it into the leaf pack so that the cut down leaf is not 3rd from the top:

And now the truck sits more level, and actually rides a bit better and still flexes rather well. Unfortunately, it didn’t solve my vibration that I’ve been fighting, so it looks like the next step will be to outboard the shocks. It’ll be pretty dang tight, but I think I can get it done.

 

[Kage]

6th Offroad Trip – 3/12/12

There was a pop up run this past Saturday out at Interlake. We didn’t get to wheel all day due to an early breakdown (at a gas station parking lot no less) when the 1 ton XJ managed to snap a ptiman arm. Even with the delay, we covered nearly 10 miles (including the new trail 19). The park continues to improve every time I go out there with signage and such. We were surprised at how dry it was out there as well, since the Greater St. Louis area has been getting hammered with rain the past week

Not to many photos, but here’s what I’ve go :
(Link to all the photos)

Random Shots from the day:

Random Vids (Click the Photo):

 

[Josh40601]

Looks like you all had a good time buddy!

 

[Kage]

Thanks to those who voted for me for TOTM!

 

[Kage]

Out boarding the Rear Shocks:

In the quest for better road manners, I went ahead and moved the rear shocks out as much as I could. The end result is a more stable ride, that didn’t limit the rear flex that much (who needs flex when you’ve got lockers anyway ). Unfortunately, it still didn’t cure my wheel vibe, but it did help calm it down quite a bit.

I went from my original setup:

To something like this:

But that wound up limiting my travel too much, so I laid the shock over a bit more and ran it like this:

This meant I only lost about 1” of travel in the rear compared to the way it was setup before:

Compressed:

Extended:

I still need to slap some limit straps on it to help save the shocks, otherwise its done. I’m pretty happy with how it turned out, and I’m looking forward to trying it out on the next trip out (should be 4/21/12).

 

[Josh40601]

where ya headed next?

 

[Kage]

where ya headed next?

Washita Mx near Farmington Mo. One of my favorite parks to play at around here, and its been too long since I've wandered down that way. Should be a good time.

 

[Josh40601]

sounds like a good time!