Tyre upgrades!(?)

[Hungry_Horse_1955]

Ok chaps, I’m thinking of fitting some 195/80R15 Kumho KL71s to my Golf Country. These are about 10% bigger than my 205/60R15s that I currently have. I’m not too worried about the 10% increase as they will only be used when I do some off-roading. It’ll give me a bit more ground clearance as well.

What I would like to know is;-

What wheel width I should use? I was thinking of 6.5″.

What wheel offset do I need to bring the outside of the tyre in line with the current 205s?

And, finally, where can I get a set of suitable steel wheels from? I can find lots of expensive alloy wheels on the internet, but no steel versions!

[gruppe_a]

195/75-14’s on a Country, FWIW… []

[no such user]

“G60 steels” to mount the tyres on?

[Hungry_Horse_1955]

Where can I get some from and how much??????

[Chris S]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Genuine-VW-Golf-Corrado-G60-15-inch-Steel-Wheels-NEW_W0QQitemZ170317142256

There you go

[Hungry_Horse_1955]

How did I miss them?

I’ve just emailed the guy to check if he has 3 wheels or 3 sets of 4 wheels as it is not clear on the number of wheels in the auction.

I’ll let you know if anything happens.

[Chris S]

BTW The rims are only 6 inch wide rims, but I don’t think that you will find 6.5 inch rims that easily,

At 140 pounds hopefully that is for a set! []

[Hungry_Horse_1955]

Just had a reply from the seller and he has confirmed that he has 3 sets of 4 wheels.

[simoncox77]

Did you manage to get these tyres fitted to your Country? I’ve just bought one and was thinking of fitting some chunky tyres like these.

[Hungry_Horse_1955]

Hi Simon,

I’ve decided to get some Insa Turbo Dakar tyres; size 195R14. These are the old BFG Mud terrain pattern. However, they are not available in the UK, so I contacted Insa Turbo in Spain.

They said that their importer, Micheldever tyres, would be happy to order them in for me and my local tyre emporium ASF Tyres can get them from Micheldever. I’m going to talk to ASF tomorrow to see how much they are going to cost. Otherwise I can get them from Offroadreifen Mayerosch @ http://www.offroadreifen.com for around EUR320 for 4, including shipping.

I’ll let you know how much ASF are going to charge!

[simoncox77]

Hi, I was thinking of fitting something like 205/65/15’s, or possibly 205/70/15. I’m not sure if the arches are big enough to fit anything of a larger diameter. I’m going to get some wheels with a lower offset to bring the wheels out of the arches slightly, maybe et20 rather than et36 on the standard wheels. I may also go down to a 14″ rim depending on the price and availability of tyres.

Have you seen a Golf Country fitted with larger than standard profile tyres? Did they fit ok?

What wheels are you using on yours?

[Hungry_Horse_1955]

I currently have 7″ x 15″ ET28 CalMaster wheels shod with 205/60R15 which I shall probably reshod with some Vredestein Quadtrac 3.

I also have a set of winter tyres which are 175/70R14 Vredestein Snowtrac on 6×14 ET38 wheels. These are bloody excellent in the snow!

Standard Golf Country are 195/60R15 on 6×15 (I think ET38) which have a calculated diameter of 615mm while the Chrom version has a diameter of 627mm (+2%).

205/65R15 have a diameter of 648mm (+5.3%) and the 205/70R15 have a diameter of 668mm (+8.6%). Whilst these tyres may fit, there may be problems with fouling when on full lock or when on full suspension travel, especially as they are wider than normal. I’m not sure if changing the offset will counter this.

Also it is usually recommended (I don’t know where from) that you shouldn’t go more than around 3% from your standard size. Also your speedo and mileometer (or kilometer) will be inaccurate and depending how inaccurate it was initially, it could be outside the 10% allowed by law!!!!

The 195/80R14 I want to fit have a diameter of 668mm (+8.6%) but as I only intend to use them on the rough stuff and will swap back to the standard size for ‘normal’ motoring I think that I can live with it.

Hope this is of some help.

[gruppe_a]

I always liked this pic:

Never really found out what the tires were… some kind of euro-only retread in the BFG style tread I think. Maybe the same tires as HH was mentioning.

[Chris S]

Do you think that they possibly look a bit like these?

http://www.offroadreifen.com/programme/reifenmarke_anzeige.php?bild=INSAAT.jpg&profil=Ranger%20AT%20Runderneuert&hcode=86&reifentyp=o

[Hungry_Horse_1955]

Those are the old BF Goodrich All-Terrain pattern as on the picture from gruppe_a.

The BF Goodrich All-Terrain and Mud-Terrain pattern are detailed here;-

http://www.offroadreifen.com/programme/reifenmarke_start.php?hcode=86&reifentyp=o&PHPSESSID=57d055785c0a01e82d7fcdbb4cbdf7d7

The Ranger version is the old All-Terrain pattern and the Dakar version is the old Mud-Terrain pattern. The Ranger version is only available in 195/80R15 size, whilst the Dakar version is available in 195/80R14 and 195/80R15.

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