New summer tyres (AT, for Iceland)

[bvddobb]

Some questions on the sizes of these tyres.
I thought T5.2 4motion always comes with 17 inch wheels, due to larger brakes (4 motion). Do you have a T5.0 of .1? Or can 16 inch alloys be fitted?

We have a 5.1, so standard with 16" wheels. If you have a 5.2, I don't think you can change easily to 16"wheels: your disc brakes are also 17", aren't they?

In this Seikel table you can see which tyres give which bottom clearance, and what modifications (lift kit, shorter transmission, wheel arches, steering stop) are necessary or not.

The way I read this table, according to Seikel:
235/65 R17 needs steering stop
225/70 R17 needs shorter transmission
235/70 R17 needs shorter transmission, modified wheel arches and steering stop
245/70 R17 needs shorter transmission, modified wheel arches and steering stop
They all need the lift kit.

We changed from 215/65 R16 to 225/70 R16, which are 5% bigger in circumference, but we didn't have any issues with the transmission: the 4Motion has a slightly shorter axle anyway, and we didn't feel we missed any torque, also not on steep pebble hills or in deep mud.
The 225 are not that much wider that we needed steering stop or wider wheel arches.

 

[zeratul]

I'll call the garage to figure out if 16 inch steel wheels could fit.
bvddobb are your 16inchers steel? can't really tell from the pictures.
The way I read the Seikel table is also that 225/70 R16 can only be done on automatic transmission (AT) and not on manual transmission(MT) and I can't really understand why that would be.

 

[HugoFar]

My reading of this is ;
AT = all terrain tread.
MT =mud terrain tread.
MT tyres have bigger blocks of tread so are possibly wider?, hence far more tyre options with AT tyres than MT tyres.
Happy to corrected if wrong.
There's also HT = Highway terrain.
Don't think the gear box comes into it.

 

[bvddobb]

bvddobb are your 16inchers steel? can't really tell from the pictures.

Ours are alloys. Our winter wheels are steel - alloys don't like the salt on the roads!
AT = All Terrain, MT = Mud Terrain in this table.

 

[Bigted]

I've just had a look at our 4 Motion brakes and I can't see how a 16 inch wheel would fit. There's about 6/8mm clearance between the calliper and the inside of the wheel. However, this is with alloys so perhaps the inner diameter of steels is Ok due to the steel being thinner than the alloy. I've got some 16s that we use in the Yeti in winter so I'll try one when we get home from France.

17" is the smallest wheel that will fit a 180. The 180 came as standard with upgraded front discs and 16" won't go on.

 

[bvddobb]

We have now one of our Michelin AT's for sale. New, still in the wrapping it was delivered in. We took this with us to Iceland as a separate 2nd spare and luckily we didn't need to change any tyres. The best AT tyre we have ever had.

Michelin Latitude Cross, 225/70 R16 103H, € 80 upon collection in Utrecht (NL), shipment to be discussed.

 

[zeratul]

We have now one of our Michelin AT's for sale. New, still in the wrapping it was delivered in. We took this with us to Iceland as a separate 2nd spare and luckily we didn't need to change any tyres. The best AT tyre we have ever had.

Michelin Latitude Cross, 225/70 R16 103H, € 80 upon collection in Utrecht (NL), shipment to be discussed.

Afraid I won't be able to use a 16inch one. Why don't you keep it and together with the regular spare, swap it with both front wheels when they're done halfway, then later swap 1 rear wheel just before they're done to become spare... you still got 600K kms planned right

 

[zeratul]

If it's any comfort: VB air suspension DO have an Icelandic dealer...

I cannot find any Icelandic dealer on VB's website. Do you have the contact info?

 

[bvddobb]

Hmm... I thought I had stored the details somewhere, but cannot find them now...

 

[phil38]

We just made our plans for the coming week, we will probably do:
F756, F35, F338, unnumbered road south from F338, F578, hoping all these stay open the next weeks.


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Hello,

We have a Reimo T6 with Seikel Desert HD lift. At the moment with standard tires. We plan to return in Iceland this summer. I will probably change my standard tires to the Lattitude Cross in 235/55 R17 103H. Changing tyres size and load is illegal in France and you can have big trouble with your insurance. I am interested in the following information: 1) how much did you deflate your tyres on gravel and what was the pressure? 2) which f roads have you finally followed in Iceland and how can you rate their difficulty? 3) apart from the suspension lift, which other transformation have you done on your Cali? 4) do you confirm that the air heater did not suffer from river crossing ? What is the brand and model of your air heater? Cheers.

 

[bvddobb]

I am interested in the following information: 1) how much did you deflate your tyres on gravel and what was the pressure?

See this thread on the pressures we use.

2) which f roads have you finally followed in Iceland and how can you rate their difficulty?

See this thread on our trip, also listing the F roads we did. The track book mentioned there has a new updated print, released this year, as yet only available in german.
For more details on our itinerary that trip, see this interactive map.

3) apart from the suspension lift, which other transformation have you done on your Cali?

See this thread for our off road mods.

4) do you confirm that the air heater did not suffer from river crossing ? What is the brand and model of your air heater?

We have a Webasto parking and additional heater, they did not suffer from river crossings. In one instance we had a bit of splutter and some white smoke when firing up the parking heater right after a crossing, that was all. Both heaters have run impeccably ever after.

 

[zeratul]

See also our Iceland writeup https://vwcaliforniaclub.com/threads/iceland-2017.19421/ on some of the F-roads travelled by us in 2017.
We did quite some F-roads with a lot of crossings, even some Super jeep only tracks using the track book.
Heater did fine.
We had Diff lock, VB Air suspension, raised air intake and bottom plate but I think when driven carefully a standard cali 4 motion can do a lot.