Pros and cons on replacing 17" wheels and tires with 19.5"

For me, it came down to off-road-ability. Although I don't do a ton of it, 19.5's just don't work well crawling over stuff or in sand.

I have 18's and considered going to 20's, but honestly, there seems to be more tire choice in the 18's. As you said, 20's are mostly bling. At least the aftermarket ones.

I went to 19.5's because I went 3 years almost never unloading the camper, but was only getting 8K-11K out of a set of tires (285/75/16/E). The weight of a camper and trailer was just too much for wear.

I wasn't worried about noise, so i went with an aggressive open shoulder drive tire on all 4 corners (Falken BI-877, 245/70/19.5) with Vision wheels.

I'm super pleased with the look.



Falken does not publish a load inflation chart for their 19.5 tires, but I found one for a similar tire and run 75/70 (front/rear) unloaded and 85/105 fully loaded. Unloaded the ride is very similar to my old 285's other than a bit of tire noise. I was initially concerned about the lower pressure on the highway, but the tires show even wear on the chalk test and are not even warm to the touch after an 80 mile drive, so I believe its fine.

With the aggressive tread I have found that I have no problems with dirt, silt, sand or mud to this point. I haven't been in the snow yet but the reviews on these tires commented that they were acceptable in the snow (They are M+S but not Three Peaks rated). I have noticed no change in economy, acceleration or braking - loaded or unloaded.


I'm super pleased with this setup and would not try and steer someone away from it.

IMO, if you need the load capacity of 19.5" wheels/tires...you need the load capacity and the other cons are just minor irritants. If you don't need the load capacity, then I wouldn't bother. The safety margin was too important for me and that's why I have 19.5's.

d3500ram wrote:
I went through this dilemma in trying to figure out the best options for me. In the end, I went with a one-size larger tire as noted in sig. The larger Load Index gave me the comfort I needed for the weights after a very thorough analysis. I could never find an actual documented capacity of factory wheels but I could safely assume that factory rims will be at least capable of the tires around them from the factory.

This is probably the most cost effective and reasonable solution. I did this on my F250 as well. Went form 275 to 285 tires.

Depending on what current wheels you have, you could very affordably buy some OEM wheels on Ebay from people that have upgraded their wheels.

I got a 5th OEM wheel to match my wheels, and bought 5x 285 sized tires for the truck when I got new tires.

Generally, you will gain a couple of hundred lbs if you go one width size up. Not shilling for a particular manufacturers, but I'm quite happy with the Nitto Terra Grappler G2 tires that I got.

I went from 275/70R18 to 285/65R18, keeping the weight rating at 3640 per tire. Went with the 65 ratio sidewall for garage clearance reasons and to have a stiffer sidewall. If I had gone to a 285/75R18 tires, I would have gained 400 lbs in tire weight capacity. Those are 4080 lbs each I believe.

However, there was no real point to doing that, as it would have potentially created garage clearance problems, the wheels are only rated to 3590 lbs, and I don't carry that level of weight.

In the end, it was a no-brainer. I'm pretty sure you can do the same thing with the 17" wheels also. ***Edit*** Upon looking further for you, it looks like the selection of tires for 17" wheels is limited, so you may have to search and do more research.

However, for the price of maybe 2 of those 19.5" wheels, you could more than likely get 4 OEM 18" leftover wheels for your truck on E-bay. Much better tire selection for 18" wheels than for 17" wheels. You could probably sell your 17" wheels on E-bay, or sell them locally. Up to you.

I put 19.5's on our 3500 DRW Ram with 10-2 SnowRiver before heading from Ohio to Alaska 3 years ago. I found more stable handling but when I hit a dreaded frost heave that had about a 8 inch square edge to blacktop at about 30 mph the 19.5 paid for themselves. It bounced our heads on the roof even with seatbelts fastened. I was positive I'd lost both front tires and likely the wheels too. No damage at all.

On an SRW with a heavy camper going to 19.5s was a no brainer. not so much a requirement on my dually. No way I would ever do an SRW again without 19.5s

I've got them on my 06 Dodge 3500 DRW. Of the 300K miles on my vehicle, I have had these on the truck for at least 250K.

One pro no one has mentioned is longevity. These tires last especially when compared to OEM E-rated tires carrying a very heavy camper. Helps justify the cost if you plan to keep the truck.

About a 3% speed and mileage correction due to size over the stock tires and wheels.

When I switched my 16" wheels to 19.5" the calculated drive ratio went from 4.30 to about 4.10.
It wasn't catastrophic but it was noticeable going up steep hills.

Unless you shave the 22.5s 1/4” then run super low profile 22s.
That looks extremely cool, and won’t mess up your final drive.

Most 18"-20" OEM wheel load specs I've seen on the truck mfg websites can be in the 3400-3600 lb range which doesn't offer some one with a one ton SRW truck much load gains advantage by going to a larger capacity 18"-20" tire. The gain is just a bit more reserve capacity above the lower OEM wheel loads.