Posted by Charlie on Thursday, May 03, 2001 at 1:39AM :
In Reply to: Re: What price for Michelin XL and ZXL tires? posted by mike stone on Wednesday, May 02, 2001 at 5:58PM :
Listen to what Mike says; if a salesman looks at you like you are a Martian, and then says ummm, ummm RUN AWAY. Go to a truck tire dealer.
I have sets of XLs in 7.50, 9.00 and 11.00R16, and XZLs in 8.25 and 9.00R16.
If the truck is going to be used literally more than 50% of the time offroad buy XLs. They have the very best traction and self-cleaning ability. But they wear fast when driven at high speeds on pavement. A 4spd non-repowered 5.83 vehicle will be good to them. But as long as you are buying XLs, spend a bit more (they won't be more than 15-20% more) and get 11.00R16 XLs. they are 2.6" taller (38.7" vs. 36.1") and 0.8" wider (10.9") and therefore improve the ride, ground clearance and give you 4 mph higher top speed.
If the truck is going to be used mostly on pavement, but driven offroad often, 9.00R16 XZLs will be best. They are 36.9" tall and 10.3" wide. The tread is still aggressive but they run noticeably cooler at highway speeds, the tread rubber is harder and they are quieter. 11.00R16 XZLs may exist, they are in Michelin's spec database, but are apparently not available in North America at the moment.
Expect to pay in the range $325-350 each for these tires. Sounds like a lot, but if you can afford them they return value commensurate with their cost. They are super strong (all steel casing, very thick sidewall rubber, 4 tread steel plys), do amazing things flotationwise when deflated to about 15 psi on sand or other soft ground, and are lot more confidence inspiring on pavement than NDs.
If you get a set of these and live in the snowbelt and drive the vehicle in the winter, consider having the dealer sipe them in a siping machine. It costs only about $20/tire and tremendously improves traction on ice and wet pavement. You can have it done 5-6/32" deep and that way avoid much risk of "chunking" when offroad. When the sipes wear away you have the option of doing it again. And these tires are great Bandag recpa candidates. I have a set of 9.00R16 XLs recapped with the "Wastehauler Lug" tread which is very deep (28/32") with huge lugs. I use them on my M101 trailer and as a M37 spare (it has XZLs on it). It's perfectly safe to run cold process retreads on the rear and I may well do it on the front too since the loading on the tires is about 40% of their rated capacity. but I will have them siped; Bandag rubber is very hard and could easily go 100,000 miles, but might not be so good in rain and ice.
Charlie
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