Tire Advice

JIMNLIN wrote:

the tread on a St tire is designed to allow it to scuff sideways easier, as in when you a sharp 90 degree or more turn when backing into a site.

ST tires come with all styles of tread designs (AT types....AS types....and rib type tread patterns) so there is no design attempt for easier side scrubbing.

Rubber treading compounds (hard or soft) has much to do with any tires side slip abilities.

I can't agree with you there, I have been looking at st vs lt tires for 4 years now trying to decide which would be better for my 5th wheel. yes, there are different tread patterns, but the one common Theam of them is the lack of aggressive outside lugs which bite in and resist side movement like LT tires have. this enables ST tires to handle more lateral movment without increased resistance.

plus, another plus for the st tire is they are generally made of different rubber compounds that make them stronger than the equivalent LT tire based on a simular volume of air. Another side benefit of these is they generaly have a lower rolling resistance which equates to a fraction better fuel milage.

the other thing I have found also is to switch to a LT tire the closest thing in size to what I now have (235/80R16 ST) is a 235/85R16 . by switching to this I lose 500lbs (aprox) of capacity per tire.

Part of the biggest issue is dealers generaly put the cheapest tires on the rv's they can get so the weight of the rv is just covered by the tires and sometimes it is less as they assume the hitch weight as not being a load on the tires in some cases. for instance, my 5th wheel came with 10 ply loadmax tires so what I have found the best thing to do would be to just stay the same size in a st tire but go up to a 12ply or even a 14 ply if your rims can handle the higher air pressure requirements. I know a lot of people go to 14 ply then just run them at 90 which is probably fine, but they will run hotter than if they were at 110. When they design LT tires, they have less stiff sidewall and softer compounds, so they handle impacts from road hazards better (ie. potholes) and don't transfer it to the vehicle as much. This is great for a truck, but the downside is less carrying capacity for the same size of tires and more flexible side walls, and better tread grip. When combined with the more agressive tread patterens (usually the addition of shoulder lugs and deeper tread and such) this causes them to grip harder in tight turns which increases the lateral stresses on the belt layers.

the main issue is instead of looking at quality ST tires we are usually talking about switching from China bombs to LT, which ya, that is probably an improvement, but we should really be looking at actually weighing our setups (because we all know how accurate that tally plate is ;) ) and going with a quality ST tire that has the extra carrying capacity to cover our rigs and some breathing room