The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk Tires

Who has good prices on tires for old trucks?

Any tire dealer should be able to get the size you want. Most are competitive in price. An on line source would be Wallace Wade.

Universal Tire has a nice online catalog with sizes widths. I don't know how their prices are compared to others but they have a large variety and attend a lot of the larger shows and if you preorder they will bring to show. Hope this helps.
Dan

Thanks Tiny and Chev4T6. I suppose maybe what I'm fishing around for is what are most people willing to shell out for tires these days? I know there are alot of places on line that cater to the vintage car and truck lover and it seems as though they are a bit on the higher end price wise plus shipping all that weight adds on to the final costs. Is there an equivalent for...lets say, a 6.50 X 16 inch tire that is mass produced today that is not defined as vintage that I can just go down to my local tire store and purchase? Or are you going to be stuck paying a "higher" price because of the vintage nature in order to get it to fit on your truck? What are you folks willing AND not willing to pay for a new tire on your Stovebolt? $100 bucks a tire? More? Less? Whats reasonable in your mind? Were talking "new" here...not used or freebies.

One more thing. Tube or tubeless?

About $120 per tire with inner tube and mounting and balancing (plus tax) - radial LT high profile tires (LT215/85R16 - Cooper Tires)

Stock size on Sweetie is 6.00x16. Your 6.50x16 would face the same situation of supply & demand. Due to accidents, vehicles being modified to use modern running gear, etc. not many vehicles use that tire size any more so each production run is smaller. The cost of each production run has to be spread evenly between the tires produced in that run. Because of that the cost of OEM size tires is a bit higher than one would think it should be. I buy Columbia 6.00x16 bias ply blackwalls locally and pay $100 per tire not counting the tube.

Tim, how tall would those tires be? 29"?

A little more than 30"

A 225 70 R16 or 225 75 R16 Would fit the bill quite nicely and are little bit cheaper than the 215's. Alot of smaller SUV's use this size and it is quite common. My Father's shop sells Mastercraft tires, they are basically a generic Cooper, I've had quite good luck with them and they are about 10 to 20% cheaper than most name brand radials.

i buy the traction tires for the rear and a highway sytle tire fot front, i bought mine at Orscheln's for about $80.00 or $85.00. i haven't had any problems with them. Orscheln's is only in the midwest through. i don't know if they'd ship.

http://www.orschelnfarmhome.com/

The 215/85/16 is 30.3" tall, a 225/75/16 comes out to 29.2", and the 225/70/16 comes out to 28.4". The last 2 sizes are fast becoming obsolete, most fitment on those are base model pickups pre-'98 fo the 225/75, and japanese suvs for the 225/70. We almost never sell any of either size, as most of the vehicles that the fit have the option size on them. A 245/75/16 would be a better fit hight wise, and is far more common. They would require a wider (7" ) rim for proper fit.
Also, not to stir anything up, but as a tire and alignment professional, I do not suggest running tubes in a tubless tire. It is not safe, especially if you run at highway speeds. I've seen many tire failures caused by doing this.

Good comments guys!! My heads a spinnin'! Nice safety tip about the tube in tubeless Longbox55!! Who would have known?

What is on "Lucille" right now are four "Firestone Deluxe Champion" 6.50-16's. Gum Dipped - Tube Type with an approximately 3 3/4" whitewall showing. As these tires sit they are ~28" high and ~28 1/2" in diameter on the horizontal. Does anyone have a guess as to their age? I hope to keep this style on her because it just looks so good. Hopefully I'll be able to get something close to these in the future. The thing I'm missing is a spare, thus the reason for this post. I've got a '46 standard 16" rim coming to me and I want to identify a tire size which will work as a spare and and fit on the '46 rim. It really doesn't have to be a white wall. So can someone help me identify the proper size in todays tire terminology that will be close to a 28 1/2" diameter on my old rim? Make sense? I'm such a novice at trying to understand all this tire jargon! I just want to be smart enough so when I go out to get that tire I'll at least sound like I know what I'm talking about!

Oops, That reminds me to get to the post office to let you know what shipping will run!!!! Hold tight. I'll get back to you tomorrow on the shipping for that rim. I loaded it up on Sunday and have completely forgot it was in the trunk.

Tim

Can't say what year those Firestone tires are but my brand new Firstone Deluxe Champion 650-16 tires also say gum dipped and made in the USA.
Incidentally I love them and for my need and driving would not change to a radial.

Tim,

Don't worry, no problem! Your busy and probably still dealing with winter up there!

BTW, what size tires were on the rims of that '46 of your and what is your plan for new ones?

olblu49, say same as mine! Do you remember where you got them and roughly what you paid for them? Did you get them over the Internet? Do you have a spare?

I got them last July and paid $607 all told for 4 delivered to my door. Don't forget I am in Canada so we pay more for everything.
I bought them from a hot rod/antique car parts place in Vancouver. The spare is one of the old Coopers I had on the truck before.
I think these originally came through Coker and on their web site they list dealers so there may be one near you.
I can send you a photo of how they look on my 49 if you PM your email address.

Saw your email addy in your profile so sent the photo already.

olblu49, Jeez that's a nice clean looking '49 ya got there!! Thanks for the pic! Those tires you show sure would do fine with me for my spare!! I'll check Coker's website and see if I can still get hold of one.

Your right, you all do "pay" extra for being in Canada. Taxes I assume, aye? Makes those tires want to last for a long time! Is olblu a daily driver or is she retired and on "lite duty"?

I just bought two of Universal's 6.70-15 bias ply tires for $104 ea. $53 shipping by Fedex to Anderson, SC. (I seem to remember that shipping for 4 tires was going to be about $93)
I love that piecrust look on the old tires...
BlueDawg

Welcome to the Bolt BlueDawg! Sounds like your not that far away from me in SC! Myself and Achipmunk say Hi!

Looks like tires are easily pushing over $100 bucks each no matter where you are! AND shipping is going to continue to climb because of the continued increases in fuel, especially diesel! OK, bias ply....tube or are they tubeless? I'm still getting edge-ja-ma-cated!!

Hey back to you and Alvin,
Lucille is a beaut! I've got a buddy who bought a '46 last year. He's not working on her yet. He says he just likes to see her smile through the front door of the barn. Love those Art Deco trucks - lots of chrome.
I think you can get the old bias ply tires either with tube or tubeless. I got the tubeless. Payday's comin' so I'm ordering two more on Friday.
I priced the COKERs also. The blackwalls were $123 ea. Universal also sells a 6 ply tubed tire for $74 each. They're called DENMAN HIGHWAY tires, I seem to recall. The tube is another $13.
BlueDawg

I just received 4 tires today from an antique dealer about 180 miles north of here and got them mounted also today. Thet are the same as Bill's [oldblu49] and they look great. I was looking into radials but they wanted another 100.00 each and I couldn't warrant that for the amount of miles that I would be driving. They are tube tires.

Brians40

Olblu is a driver, far from a garage queen. She looks nice from about 25 feet away. She is a daily driver from about March until November. I could drive her all year but it would be limited during the winter months and not worth insuring her for that time.
I have used her to carry rocks, heavy lumber, garden mulch, soil, truck parts including an old PowerGlide tranny. However I don't abuse her.
I had Cooper 650-16 on her before and liked them a lot but they cannot be had up here, hence the Firestones.

Brian and Bill,

Both you guys got great looking Stovebolts with the tires to match!! Looks like Lucille fits right between you guys style wise!!

I suppose I do have a partial garage queen, however I do make her perform "lite duty"! Hardware store runs, lumber in light loads, nursery type items, BUT....NO ROCKS!!! Had someone tease me about putting a load of rocks in her just to keep her in shape!! NO WAY!! Bill, I'm sure the rocks you haul are more pebble like!! Not abusive!!

Anyway, back to tires, like Brian, I'm not using my truck that much so I don't need to lay out the money for radials. A tube type would do just fine and right now I need to resolve my lack of a spare issue. After I'm able to correctly define and purchase this fifth tire then I've got the challenge of trying to figure out how in the world I can get hold of the parts needed to store the spare underneath the rear of the bed like it was originally intended. All those parts are missing!

BTW, olblu, what is the outside diameter of your tires? I need them to be 28 1/2" in my case. I'm just wondering if you have to be careful about defining the correct O.D. on a 6.50 x 16 sized tire?

So far, per this thread, it looks like the best three top sources for the tires needed for a Stovebolt of my era are either Coker, Columbia or Universal. Any other good sources out there just to stay competitive?

Just measured mine from the ground up and its a hair over 28 inches. Certainly not 28.5".
As to my cargo, they were rocks not pebbles. Spent a week with a hammer and dolly taking out the dents before I rattle can painted the bed with - are you ready - FORD Regatta Blue.

Bill, you know thats a four letter word around here!! But I guess if you live on a pacific island, that color blue would probably work out just fine!

OK, we must have the identical tire profile. As I said previously, mine measured 28" high from the ground as they sit on the truck and ~28 1/2" on the horizonal diameter. About a 1/2" flat as the tire squishes down from the load.

I hope your rocks went to good use considering the sacrific that olblu made!

You say that is a FORD letter word? Hmmmm!