What tires and your thoughts why

Getting a set of these this week, glad to hear about the good winter traction, read a few mixed reviews.

 

I've had two sets of Duratracs 265/75R16 one set on my old 2003 Taco and another on my 2003 4x4 Ranger... Combined maybe 70k miles on them between two different vehicles and quite a bit of off road driving for hunting/ranch roads etc. Never used them in extreme off road (crawling type stuff) but they held up well durability-wise. The more recent set I had on the Ranger would go out of balance fairly quickly but Discount Tire would check and re-balance as needed. I will say the Duratracs were an upgrade over the Good Year MTRs I used to run on the Taco. .. The Duratracs got better traction on wet and icy/snowy pavement. After having read many criticisms of the tire on this site, I think I will try something new next time I decide to go aftermarket. I'm going to run the OEM tires until the pop even though I hear they are crappy.

 

set I tested was anything but quiet. I have run a lot of different mudders and the MTRs were as loud as any even the set of Nylon belted Buckshots I had. The Buckshots would get flat spots overnight that you had to deal with for a few miles but they were the toughest tires I have ever run.

 

Yep Duratracs, as far as pavement performance goes, were an upgrade over MTRs in my experience -- but I don't think I'd buy duratrac again. They're just a bit stiff and hard to maintain balance compared to other options I've seen recommended. Nitto Terra Grappler and Toyo Open Country AT2 seem to be preferred options by members here.

 

don't buy duratrac. they wear out like theyre made of eraser rubber, I have toyo open country mt and LOVE them. So toyo is a good buy. Theyre luggy and tough as hell but don't make much road noise.

 

Not knowing what caused this and you say there sidewalls suck. It looks like something sliced it clean. But I agree the sidewalls are soft but I run d rating duratracks and the side walls flex a lot but so far so good and I have done some crawling with them.

 

Yes, it does appear that something sliced them. But would another tire that's not notorious for weak sidewalls have had the same failure? Also, if you look close, you can see that something took a large chunk of the tread, then undamaged sidewall and then a split. I'm not a tire damage scientist, but by the look of the tire, something cut the tire, and deformed it enough that the object did not actually cut the sidewall, but the amount of flex of whatever took that chunk out, made the sidewall split.

I will be the first to admit this is all conjecture, but a quick google search of duratracs with split sidewalls will bring up a bunch of results of sidewall failure at the exact same spot as my tires.

 

Yes but most of them were due to off road driving or running to low or to high pressure. I had had several brand tires fail on the side walls. Most of which were because of age of tire. But you got 55k out of a tire that's good. If you wheeled them hard then even better. Most all tires fail on the sidewall because of heat.

 

My next set of tires only due there proven track record.

 

My vote goes to BGF KM2's, KO2's or Toyo RT's.

MTR Kevlars are awesome but don't look right until 35x12.5 IMO, even better in 37x13.5

 

I see what you did there.

 

does that size fit on stock suspension or need a lift? being that its just under a 33" tire, I keep hearing mixed answers on what fits and what doesn't. Some say 33s fit with no rub, others say they rub a lot.

 

285/70/17 that's 32.5" American .
Rubs a little with lift. On 4.5 back space the sidewalls rub the frame at full turn. And had to cut a little off the bottom fender smash the pinch weld and chop the cab mount so a don't rub when wheeling.

 

Ko2 ride like rocks and not as good in the snow.

Plus I got the tire warranty.

 

I had duratracs on my 2wd ram sport and ran them in Wisconsin and Minnesota during a few weeks of heavy snow with no extra weight in the back and never felt the need for 4x4, excellent traction. I had 25k on them when I traded in my truck and still had about 60% tread left. If you're not rock crawling the side wall shouldn't be an issue.

 

For the snow duratracs have been the best tire I have had. Toyos sucked unless sipped. Plus both sets I ran cupped the second yr of driving got less then 40k out of both sets with very little off road.
So far I'm going on my third winter with the duratracs and I have had zero issues with balance or cupping, and the traction has been great. Even aired down crawling they make me cringe when I see how much the side walls flex. But yet still keep going without issues. I really think that they get a bad rep from a few bad reviews. A lot of things on TW become trendy vs practical . like king shocks are the best. Tires can be tricky to find the right balance of off road and on road for each driver its different.

 

This review is a little old but will give you a good idea of how every tire is different.
http://www.fourwheeler.com/how-to/w...-sheet-33-off-road-tires-tested/photo-01.html

 

All I see are photos of tires, no review. Maybe my coffee hasn't kicked in yet.

 

Same here. I think the link is broken

 

I don't know what you're talking about. I really want to IROK Super Swampers now. They will look great on the highway