CMP 16" wheels

[George McKenzie]

I am putting tires on my Canadian F15A .Could some one tell me what kind of tires to get for this truck The old tires say for British wheels only .Some of the tires I have say for 5 de-gree rims only Any suggestions ? George

[Keith Webb]

Hi George

You may find this thread started by Mike Kelly helpful.

Keith

[sapper740]

Originally posted by George McKenzie
I am putting tires on my Canadian F15A .Could some one tell me what kind of tires to get for this truck The old tires say for British wheels only .Some of the tires I have say for 5 de-gree rims only Any suggestions ? George

This is a commonly recurring question here at MLU. Typing in tyres in the search bar will get you pages of threads that will take you days of reading to go through them all. Here's the short story: You'll be hard pressed to find WW II pattern tyres in any kind of roadworthy condition so you'll probably have to do what most of us here have done, bought US style 9:00 X 16 NDT's. These tyres are readily available at several places, the cheapest being Wallace Wade here in Dallas. I bought my tyres late last winter when oil prices were climbing and I had to pay $150.00/tyre, flap and tube inc. Just a year previous the same tyre was about $90.00. I don't know what they are today. Before you mount the tyres, trim about 1/8" from the inner circumference of the bead, as this will facilitate mounting and any removal down the road. Don't use silicon to ease the setting of the bead, soap is the preferred lubricant. Don't worry about whether the tyre says 5 degree or not, the US NDT's fit just fine. Hope this helps


CHIMO!

[George McKenzie]

Thanks for the information .I wasn't sure if you could get British tires or not .Now I can get to work on my two CMPS Thanks again George

Hey Sapper740, How do you go about trimming the bead as you mentioned? I've just been mounting some at the weekend, and used my 9" angle grinder. Very messy and smokey. Any handy hints out there????

[Gordon Yeo]

Or you can just us the proper tire lubricant and put North American tyres on British rims. Mine popped up onto the rims at 25 lb of air pressure.

[rob love]

I have, over the years, installed both British ferret tires and US pattern 9.00X16s on to the CMP rims. For either type, I would remove a bit of the inner lip on a US pattern tire, or a lot of the bead on the British. In both cases, a utility knife with a BRAND NEW blade was used. You can get a bunch of the blades for $1 at the dollar store, so don't be afraid to change the blade after each tire.
I think I tried the grinder once, but found it very messy.

While you can install the US tires by merely greasing (vegetable type grease) and inflating, they will be a bugger to take apart afterwards.

[RHClarke]

Originally posted by rob love
For either type, I would remove a bit of the inner lip on a US pattern tire, or a lot of the bead on the British.

Rob,

How much is a bit, and a lot? Do you have before and after photos? I face the prospect of fitting Michelins on 16 inch rims. Some folks in our neck of the woods just slapped them on and that was the end of it...other than trouble taking them off (I need examples of why you would do this), are there other pitfalls to mounting them up without carving?

[rob love]

Sorry, no pics, but on the US tire, I found that just skimming a 3/4" to 1" wide by about 1/2" deep strip of rubber from the inside edges of the bead gave good results. You would just be meeting the cords of the tire. The tire won't neccessarily fall onto the rim at this point...it will still require air pressure to seat it, but at least you are left with the possibility of repairing the tire one day.

The story of the CMP blowing it's tires after crossing a set of tracks during the Alcan run a decade back is a reminder of why you don't want to overdue it.

On the ferret tires, I used to remove a lot of bead , and actually cut in to the cords. These were runflat tires, and almost indestructable. I blew an innertube while towing my KL to Winnipeg a decade back, and the truck completed the tow in to Winnipeg, and drove all through town on a series of parades and events. All on the (run) flat tire. The KL was a very heavy truck, but you really couldn't tell there was anything wrong with the flat visually.

[sapper740]

Originally posted by Gordon Yeo
Or you can just us the proper tire lubricant and put North American tyres on British rims. Mine popped up onto the rims at 25 lb of air pressure.

It's not the getting on, Gordon, it's the getting off later if you have a flat. Calculate for a second the force that is pushing the bead out at 25 pounds per square inch. A quick guesstimate would be easily between 1200 and 1300 lbs. per side. I found out first hand how hard it is to remove a tyre when the bead hasn't been trimmed. Fortunately, the back side of the tyre came loose from the rim allowing me to effect repairs. I now trim all U.S. tyres with a very sharp hunting knife before installing them on CMP rims. Keep a stone handy, you'll need to resharpen the knife often.

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally posted by George McKenzie
I am putting tires on my Canadian F15A .Could some one tell me what kind of tires to get for this truck The old tires say for British wheels only .Some of the tires I have say for 5 de-gree rims only Any suggestions ? George

George, see new 9.00-16 tyres for WD split rim wheels. Instead of butchering up US spec tires, try asking around to see if the MRF brand of tyre is available in your neck of the woods. These tyres have turned up in Australia and Holland, so who knows why not in Canada?

Good luck in your search,
Hanno

[rob love]

Originally posted by Hanno Spoelstra
These tyres have turned up in Australia and Holland, so who knows why not in Canada?

For a tire to enter the North American market, it has to have the DOT certification built in to the sidewall. Or it can be an implement tire and marked as such, but then a guy could have trouble getting the vehicle safetied.
Customs is well aware of this and prvent tires that are not so marked from entering. A well known Canadian dealer found this out years ago when he salvaged a lot of M151 tires from the US only to find they could not be brought in to Canada. I had it hit home recently when a local garage wanted me to replace all the tires on my M38A1Cdn3 because they didn't show the required marking.

[Gordons]

I installed 900 x 16 NDT standard Goodyear tires by machining a slight amount of material from the rims, this enables one to R&R tires very easy.

[Harry Moon]

I've put the Denman 9X16s on the rims, had a flat and had no trouble at the tire shop breaking the bead.
5 rims no problems. I had 12 different types of tires on 15 rims that I accumalated. less than half of those military tires.

[sapper740]

Originally posted by George McKenzie
I am putting tires on my Canadian F15A .Could some one tell me what kind of tires to get for this truck The old tires say for British wheels only .Some of the tires I have say for 5 de-gree rims only Any suggestions ? George

As you can see from the many posts to this question, there is no definitive answer to the bead trimming question. Some of us have had problems removing tyres from our rims, others have not. The question you need to ask yourself is this: Do I want to take the chance that if and when I get a flat I may not be able to remove the tire. If you don't mind taking a chance, then by all means install the tyres with the bead untrimmed. If you're concerned about future tyre removal, then by all means, trim the beads.

CHIMO!

[Phil Waterman]

I think that the real difference is in whether you are talking about the 16” rims with 6 lugs as used on the HUP which will take the US ND tires without trimming very easily. Or if you are talking about the 16” rims with 8 lugs as used on C30 or C60 which are wider and in my experience will only take the US ND tires if the edge of the bead. I’ve taken tires which came off the HUP rims and had problems mounting them on C60 16” 8 Lug rims.

[Bob Carriere]

I had NDT CDN surplus tires removed from M101 trailers..... they were almost brandnew..... andhad them installed on a Cab 11 16" rims by a tire shop and they had no problems whatsoever.


I attribute the ease of installation to the rims being sandblasted and painted with POR 15 which provided a very slick surface. Will they be hard to remove...... possibly ..... but it cannot be worst that the 60 year old rusted tires that were originally mounted on these rims.

The Caldwells had Michelin mounted on 16" rims and were very please the the performance...... I wonder if they care to comment on the problems at installation......????

Bob

[J Caldwell]

We did trim the bead with an angle grinder on the michelin tires in order to get them seated on the rim. However I donnot think that we really had to. We have taken a tire off since as we had a bad tube and it was no problem. I think one of the big things to look at is if the inside of the rim has had any rusting and flaking as some of ours had. After cleaning up and sandblasting you have actually removed some of the rim material which will make it easier getting the tires on.
Phil is correct in that the HU rims are much lighter in construction that 15cwt rims and the tires will go on and off with ease. Our HUP rims where rusted badly and after cleaning and sanblasting, the tires we had pretty much fell onto the rims.
I guess the biggest thing would be to look at your rims and the type of tires you are mounting in order to make any desicions on trimming. We asked our local tire place about trimming and/or machining the rims and he did not recommend doing either.


Jeff

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally posted by rob love
For a tire to enter the North American market, it has to have the DOT certification built in to the sidewall. Or it can be an implement tire and marked as such, but then a guy could have trouble getting the vehicle safetied.

Yes, we have the same problem here - tyres need EU certification, otherwise they cannot be sold. Some retailers have circumvented this problem by selling inner tubes, and giving a free tyre with every inner tube one buys...

Anyway, in Phill Innes F15A with Chev axels, Phil notes he found a shop selling the MRF tyres!

H.

[George McKenzie]

Originally posted by Hanno Spoelstra
Yes, we have the same problem here - tyres need EU certification, otherwise they cannot be sold. Some retailers have circumvented this problem by selling inner tubes, and giving a free tyre with every inner tube one buys...

Anyway, in Phill Innes F15A with Chev axels, Phil notes he found a shop selling the MRF tyres!

H.

I have just put on 8 tires 4 were run flat 5 degree Dunlops. I trimed off 1/4" x1/2"W of rubber from the beed with a reciprocating saw . Then used clamps to start it on the rim. The iner liner was a problem as it was hard to get it over the rim .25- 35 lbs of air would pop it out .One of my old tubes had " Military Goodyear DO not use in RF tires ". Two were RED color rubber. I have a hammer that will take off most tires,great tool .Also if you do your own always put a good chain aroud the tire in two places before you inflate it .Its a job that you will be glade it's done George