Tires

[garm]

Thanks for that. Since I live in SoCal (no wet, no ice) and will only be driving short distances, I think they should be ok for me.

 

[rosco]

Take them to a grungy nasty 18 wheeler truck tire repair place on the side of the road to be dismounted. Then take the rims home and paint them well. Then mount the new tires yourself, it is child's play. As long as the ring snaps down and the ends are about 1/8" apart, all is well.

NDT nailed it. Putting new tires on 60+ year old wheels deserves a little care - not necessarily that which is dispensed in a tire shop. Besides, if they were mine there would be new tubes in them too. Doing it yourself, you would know the tubes aren't pinched when mounted. Its best to do a little research & the work yourself in "self-defense"!

 

[CMPPhil]

Can someone describe what the original tires feel like? What's so bad about them?

Hi

What the normal nondirectional feel like sort of depends on how old they are. My experience with 900x16 is that they can get hard with age, the seem to last good but they have almost not traction on pavement stand on the brakes and they will lock up on wet road if you push at all it is like driving on ice, you can spin the wheels in 3rd gear if you stomp on the throttle. Same tire same preasure brand new will have reasonably good traction wet and dry. Non-directions in deep snow work fine. On plowed snow you may have to put it in four wheel drive to back it out of the garage on level ground. As soon as the rear tires hit the snow, the drag on the cold front end is so great the rears just spin.

Hope this helps,

Cheers Phil