Wanted: tires; 11:00-16

[Bob Phillips]

Hi All: I have found a US source of NOS 1100x16 tires. They are not cheap, but my interest was to get as large a diameter 16 inch tire as I could in order to pick up the road speed a bit. The use of a 16.5 inch tire sounds interesting but...I always thought one of the issues with 16cmp rims/tires was the style of bead. It is essentially square in profile like a 20 inch tire. The US military 16 inch tires were like this although they had a 5 degree bead where it slipped over the rim so it helped to turn a 16th of an inch off the rims to smooth them and allow the tapered ( for want of a better word) bead. So what about the 16.5 inch wheels? Do they have a straight/square bead profile like a 20 inch tire or a tapered bead like a modern truck tire? Anybody know??...BP

[Bob Carriere]

Those are Hummer tires/rim.

The CMP rim with its slight 5 degrees taper is something like a 3/16 tighter near the rim. The modern 9x16 michelin will stretch quite nicely with proper rim preparation and lub. Not sure how loose or tight the 16.5 modern Hummer tire would fit but consider this...

Both the CMP rims and the Hummer rims are a two part assembly with the tire fitted from the center out then bolted together. I beleive that such rims have a much more agressive/strong bead that is not intended to be stretched over the edge of a one piece rim......CMP and Hummer rims also have a flat center section which does not provide room for a normal tire bead to be pulled in during the one piece rimming process. I beleive that a Hummer tire and a CMP tire are less likely to roll off the rim during a flat situation.... and both, with a proper spacer can be run flat.

I would suspect that the Hummer tire bead profile woudl be somewhat similar to the squarish CMP British tires.

I have a set of brand new 9x16 Michelin tires mounted on new Steyr rims...6 bolts metric..... the professional tire shop will not attempt to remove the tires as they cannot guarantee they will not damage the bead during removal..... they have suggested deflating the tires and cutting the rims...which is useless anyways ......using a thin blade grinder cutting near the center so the rim will split in two.

There is a surplus tire dealer/importer in Toronto/Bolton selling Hummer tires and rims.... on Kijiji.... may be worth paying him a visit.

Cheers