The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk radial tires on AD 1/2 ton truck?

I was wondering will the 215 85R16 tires be okay on the original rims? Wasn't sure if the rim might be to narrow for the tuires or not? Original rims are 4.5" width. Can they be run tubeless since the rims are riveted? Can I seal over the rivets with something or weld around each rivet? Thanks John

I don't think they will ever seal properly with the radials and welding on a rim is never a good idea.

see here, for a refresher

Bill

I have a set of that size radials on original 4.5" 1954 rims, but they have tubes (they might not need tubes). These have had no problems in 8 years (under 10,000 miles.

I plan to mount another set of the Cooper SRM II 215 85R16 LT tires on another set of original 16x4.5 rims that were in excellent shape and have been "trued" for balancing and powder-coated. I will try these without radials - if they leak, I'll again use radial inner tubes.

The rims are not too narrow. The narrowness of the rim results in two related benefits (as far as I am concerned): a higher profile that looks more like a bias-ply tire; and, a loaded radius of about 31.5" (resulting in about a 10% decrease in RPMs). This put no significant strain on the sidewalls.

best way to deal with the riveted rims is to squeegee RTV or PlastiDip liquid rubber around the depressed center of the rim, cover the rivets, also a good paint job externally, I've always run tubeless on the riveted rims without problems

Bill

I've got tubeless radials on my '50 using the original riveted wheels and have had no leaks. I didn't use any silicone on the rivets.

I had my old rims sand blasted, Power Coated & Painted through Les Schwab for around $ 25 a piece then put 215 85R16 LT 10 ply tires on them...

I'm running '37 Chev wheels on my bus, many, many rivets on the artillery wheels. I sealed my rivets by spraying them with a can of rubberized undercoating, as I was too cheap to buy plasti-dip. I don't use tubes, and in fact, mounted the tires on the rims in my backyard. No leaks, no troubles. These are 205 60 r15 radials I'm speaking of.

John, I had this size tire mounted on stock 16" rims without tubes or concern for the rivets last year. So far they haven't leaked, but in all fairness, I have only driven it once for a test run a few weeks ago. They sure look a lot better than the 15" white spoke rims! Steve

It sound like by the opinions here that it should be alright then to mount this size tire. I had debated between 215 or 235/85R16, but was reading somewhere of trouble with the tire rubbing on the bigger size.
Somebody here has a better memory than I do.... LOL.
Thanks John