Choosing the Right Tire--The Ag Elimination Rule

[cowboydoc]

Glennmac I agree with you 100%, especially on the validity of R-4's.

Shade you can get the tires with any type of tire and sidewall thickness that you want. I had never had a tractor except with R1's before the 4600 and never had much of a problem. Now I am used to their traction and I just don't have it with the R-4's. We used to run very thick plys and never had much of a problem in brush or anything else. My Massey also has the thick plys and I've cleared alot of ground with it and never any problems with tires getting punctured, same on the skidloader. I'm sure that the factory tires aren't the heavy duty ones though, but not sure there as far as R1's.

 

[Anonymous Poster]

It really depends on your ground, and whatever water or clay content you have in your mud. My L35 came with R4's which are much wider then the ags on my Ford 1710. The standard ags on my Ford I have punctured in the bushes a few times. I was worried on how the R4's would be in the mud from everyone's comments, but my recent use hauling logs on the front forks was an eye opener in that they did not let me down. It's true they don't shed the mud, but as I drove up and down this slowly sinking road bed I think as I drove the mud in the treds was pushed out by "new " mud or something until solid ground was hit as it just kept pulling.

They are more likely to spin on any buried rocks or wood, where the ags would probably act like flippers and push me along. This doesn't happen often, and little push with the hoe and I'm on my way.

Didn't Mark C say he had replaced his R4s with some "ag-like' tires from Michelin? that were as wide as his old R4s? The manual that shows the ag-tires for the L35 show Narrow ags like my Ford has. The wider footprint I think would help support the weight.

It's the old argument of truck tires, you see these guys with monster wide tires for their off road adventures. I know an old guy that goes off in the real bushes with his truck and camper that has narrow tires and says that's the only way to get traction as there's more weight per sq inch.

I suppose that's true as long as there's something solid SOMEWHERE DOWN THERE to hit! /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif

Anybody remember the "wide ags" that Mark C was talking about? They seem the best of both worlds.

del

 

[MarkV]

Glenn, missed having you around. Glad your back!

MarkV

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Del,

I have the "wide-ags" (Chalkley style) on my JD4700.
They are Michelin XM27 radials, size 19.5x24.

They are 19.5 inches wide with an overall diameter of 52 inches.
The 20mph max load rating is 7670 lbs., @ 39psi.
The tread is very "R-1" looking, and they are described in the catalog as "Multi-purpose high-load capacity R4 standard-lug drive radials" /w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif

I can't give you a user-report yet, since my tractor is still being finished-up at the dealer,...but Mark's enthusiastic reports were the reason for my decision to try them.
He praised them heartily and frequently! /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif (You can find his comments in the tractor customization forum somewhere in the "L-4310 enhancements" thread, I think.)

Larry

 

[gerard]

Don't know this for sure but I don't think wider is always better. I know in snow pros use thinner tires, not the big sand tires you see on monster truck types. I also can not get the pictures out of my mind of the old time model t type cars with the bicycle like tires plowing through a foot of mud with no problem. Can't imagine doing that with todays radial car tires!

 

[GlueGuy]

I'll second that comment. When I lived in Minnesota, I found that the "narrow" snow tires gave superior performance to the "wider" snow tires.

I think that that has something to do with the perceived performance difference between Ags and R4s. R4s are wider, so tend to "float" more. This isn't always good, especially if you need serious traction.

In my case, the soil is mostly sandy. I've found that the R4 tires scuff, scratch, and tear up the grass, the road, heck everything. If I had Ags, it would tear things up even more. That said, I run out of traction a fair amount. I didn't even consider turfs, as I really don't care about a "manicured" lawn.

I'm happy (so far) with the R4s that I have. I might be interested in something in between an Ag and an R4, but can't say for sure.../w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif

The GlueGuy

 

[RobertN]

Re: Choosing the Right Tire--The Ag Elimination Ru

I'll take a stab at this...

The Turf's should work better on ice and snow. The reason is the turf tire has all of those small biting edges. All of those little biting edges work better on ice than just a few large biting edges like on Ag tires.

This same concept holds for auot's/truck's too. If you look at a good snow/ice tire, it will not have a super agressive tread; it will have a mild tread, that has a lot of small grooves. The Swamper Boggers, or Mud Terrain tires will not work as well for on-road traction in ice and snow.

One of the 4wheeler magazines(I think it was Petersens "Four-Wheeler") did a article about this last winter. They did improve the performance of the open lug tires by having a tire shop put siping(small grooves) in the traed of the open lug tire. Generally though, they found the mild tread tires gave more traction in slippery conditions.

It is definitely the oposite of what you would think...

RobertN in Shingle Springs Calif

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Gerard,

Speaking for myself, The "wider" aspect of the XM27's was not a big factor in my choosing them. My last post was in answer to Del's inquiry about the "wider ag" tires, so I re-used the term. To understand the apparent improved-performance, read Mark C.'s posts.

I certainly agree that wider is not "always" better, ...I once had my fancy-fat-tired pickup pulled out of a muddy road by an older rig with "jeep" type knobbies. Both trucks heavily loaded with firewood. He was on the bottom, but I was just "floating"(and spinning).Horses for courses.

Mark's comments, about traction-in-particular, are well worth reading for anyone considering a tire choice.

Here is the address to one of the pages with several of his observations about these tires scattered throughout:

http://www.tractorbynet.com/cgi-bin/compact/showflat.pl...Number=3472

/w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif Larry

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by Muhammad on 04/06/01 04:21 PM (server time).</FONT></P>

 

[WVBill]

I'll chime in with another aspect.

When I got my B6100 it had Ag tires on it. Even at their widest setting the tractor still had a very narrow wheelbase and I felt it was too "tippy". This is the main reason I went to a "Wider" Turf tire - to widen the wheelbase not necessarily the tire footprint.

I would have gone to Bar Turfs or R4s but the cost was much more than the Ags I got.

 

[Boondox]

Re: Choosing the Right Tire--The Ag Elimination Ru

Gotta disagree with you on this one, Robert; turfs absolutely stink in ice and snow. Most tires do, but turfs are awful. Couldn't even back out of my garage with turfs with anything more than one inch on the ground. They floated right up on top of the snow and spun. Ags were a little better because they dug right down to the ground, but even then pulling or pushing any significant snowfall or trying to climb a steep grade they lost traction. Nothing works on ice unless you have chains.

And yes, my snow tires for the car and truck have tread like you mentioned, but the tires are way narrow. Again, the idea is to penetrate the snow, not to ride on top.

Pete from Northern Vermont
54" of the white stuff still on the ground in my yard
Eleven feet of snow at the top of the hill

www.GatewayToVermont.com