In the early days of radial tires, one of the car manufacturers, I don't remember which one, described the difference between bias-ply and radial-ply rims as having a different radius at the base of the bead seat. I don't remember which rim has a larger radius at that location, but a bias-ply rim allows more flexing at the bead when used with a radial tire, so the idea of metal fatigue makes sense in that case. I have seen a few cracked rims in the past, but at the time I didn't associate those with radial tires, and I couldn't say at this time if those wheels even had radial tires. But cracked rims at the base of the bead seat were a fact of life in the past. Beyond that, my experience with radial-ply tires on rims made for bias-ply tires is that full wheel covers need constant tightening and re-setting or they either come off and get lost, or they work around the circumference of the wheel and cut off the valve stem. It seemed to take only a few thousand miles for one or the other of those events to happen.
Harvester
