Tire decision

[Chowder]

I hope this is the right forum I didn't see a specific tire forum.

The 265/70/16 Michelins that came on my new 02' Yukon are dry rotted and don't have much life left. I was thinking of going with a slightly more offroad geared tire. I do some weekend driving on my in laws ranch and while I have never been stuck the deep ruts and rocks have me wanting a tougher tire.

With that said, the Dick Cepek Trail Country have caught my eye. They seem to blend off road and mild road manners. Anyone running these on their SUV? Also, I was thinking of going up to 265/75/16 and leveling the front. A couple spots on the ranch I keep scraping the front end and I think a couple more inches of clearance will do some good.

Thanks in advance for the sage tire wisdom!

Pics... because the Costco commander needs a touch of all terrain influence.

 

[HiHoeSilver]

View attachment 204141 I hope this is the right forum I didn't see a specific tire forum.

The 265/70/16 Michelins that came on my new 02' Yukon are dry rotted and don't have much life left. I was thinking of going with a slightly more offroad geared tire. I do some weekend driving on my in laws ranch and while I have never been stuck the deep ruts and rocks have me wanting a tougher tire.

With that said, the Dick Cepek Trail Country have caught my eye. They seem to blend off road and mild road manners. Anyone running these on their SUV? Also, I was thinking of going up to 265/75/16 and leveling the front. A couple spots on the ranch I keep scraping the front end and I think a couple more inches of clearance will do some good.

Thanks in advance for the sage tire wisdom!

Pics... because the Costco commander needs a touch of all terrain influence.

Also check :

BFG K02
Nitro Terra or ridge grapplers
Mickey Thompson
General AT2
COOPER AT3
Goodyear DuraTrac

 

[Chowder]

Also check :

BFG K02
Nitro Terra or ridge grapplers
Mickey Thompson
General AT2
COOPER AT3
Goodyear DuraTrac

Thanks I will check those out, the general and the cooper seem to be in my price range also.

 

[HiHoeSilver]

Thanks I will check those out, the general and the cooper seem to be in my price range also.

Both get very good reviews.

 

[richs1]

I have the nitto ridge grapplers. They are great off road and very quiet on the highway. I’ve got probably 20,000 on them with almost no wear. Very aggressive looking tire.

 

[Chowder]

I have the nitto ridge grapplers. They are great off road and very quiet on the highway. I’ve got probably 20,000 on them with almost no wear. Very aggressive looking tire.

Those do look nice, probably outside of my budget it looks like but ill have to keep those in mind.

As of today it looks like I will be puting tires off for a couple months do to another unforseen expense . I am starting up school next one the GI bill so my budget might be bigger once that money rolls in, so maybe its for the best.

 

[Matthew Jeschke]

I found your post in a search. I bought my Tahoe from a guy who put BFG K02's on it. I HATE the tires. If I drove off road 100% of the time they'd be great. However, they are EXTREMELY heavy and am assuming they are decreasing my mileage easily by 20%. I get 14 MPG at best highway driving.

I do want the durability for off road but not the weight. I'm assuming I need to have 10 ply tires (there's a lot of rip rock where I live) / Load range E tire. But I want them to be lighter in weight so I can get decent mileage.

Any suggestions?

 

[Martinjmpr]

Two years ago when I was shopping for tires I was all ready to spend the big $$ on the BFG AT KO2's but came across the Falken Wildpeak AT3W for substantially less (about $200.) Almost 2 years on I'm very happy with them. Might be worth checking out.

I did do a small lift (keys up front, Z71 springs in the rear but no spacers, and Bilstein 5100's all around.) Tire size is 285/75/16 on factory "cyclone" wheels.

 

[Matthew Jeschke]

What was the effect on your mileage with the new tires?

 

[Martinjmpr]

What was the effect on your mileage with the new tires?

I track my MPG religiously, both on a notebook I keep in the truck and also on the Fuelly app on my phone.

I did not notice any appreciable difference in MPG from the new tires. I did, however, apply an adjustment due to the larger diameter of the tires. So when I calculate mileage, I take the miles shown on the trip odometer and multiply them by 1.024 to account for the larger diameter.

I got the 1.024 number this way: Set the trip odometer to zero, hooked up a GPS with a trip odometer, set that to zero also. Drove about 300 miles. At the end of the 300 miles I took the miles shown on the GPS trip meter (which I figured were my "actual miles driven.") and divided by the miles shown on the truck's trip odometer. 1.024 was the result and now I know if I multiply the trip meter miles x 1.024 I will get the actual miles driven.

Though as far as MPG goes, let's get real here: We're talking about a Suburban, so "MPG" is sort of a joke anyway. Around town MPG is abysmal, because every time I stop and start again I've got to get nearly 3 tons of metal moving. So 11 - 13 MPG is the norm for that.

Then, on the highway, I should point out that the primary purpose of my truck is to be a tow vehicle for a trailer. Our old trailer (a T@B Clamshell) was about 2,000 lbs and our current trailer (An R-Pod 179) is probably 3500lbs loaded.

Compound that with the fact that we live in Denver and usually go "over the hill" (i.e. over an 11,000' pass) to get to wherever we're going and yeah, MPG is pretty much the same 11 - 13 MPG no matter what.

Now, very rarely I will take the Suburban on a long road trip without the trailer (I've actually only done that twice in the 3 years I've owned the 'Burb.) On long road trips without the trailer it gets surprisingly good MPG. I've gotten as high as 18.5 MPG and that was on a trip from Denver to Craig, CO, that required me to go over two high passes (Eisenhower tunnel at 11,000' and Rabbit Ears Pass at about 9600')