Date:         Thu, 22 Sep 1994 09:13:16 -0500 (CDT)
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         dakhlia@wuecona.wustl.edu (Sami Dakhlia)
Subject:      Re: Need Vanagon Tires

>this time. If you can offer any insight, opinions, recommendations, please send
>them to me by E-mail as currently my only access to Internet is through
>Compuserve (mail only).

For that I would need your address :)

>I currently own an '86 Westphalia. 
Which means that you need reinforced tires (to reduce sway due to the
top-heavy van)

I have the original equipment Continental
>Transport tires that need to be replaced immediately (one has already begun to
>separate). I have surveyed the tire stores and they recommend ply tires as the
>reinforced tires are hard to find and not much cheaper. 

But they can be found. In fact I'm having new Michelin XZX reinforced
installed today. They are $85 a piece. I had to call a lot of places
around town and all but one claimed that the tire was discontinued. One,
however, knew that Michelin was still producing them from time to time for
this particular market. So I had to wait 3 weeks for production to resume,
but now they are here. 

You basically have 2 choices: the Michelin MXL r/f or the Michelin XZX r/f.
(Many people on this list recommended against the Continentals.) The XZX
is an all-weather tire, the MXL is not. So if you live in, say,
California, go for the MXL: they last longer.

>the Bridgestone 603V (6 or 8 ply), the Michelin MX4, and a Sumitomo 8 ply.

They could be mediocre substitutes, but would have to be more inflated and
shouldn't take your corners too fast. 

>I've also considered taking this opportunity to replace the wheels with the
>alloys. Any pros/ cons to this idea?

Why would you want to do that? As I understand it, the only advantage is
the looks, unless you want to get wider wheels. Question to everybody:
would a wider wheel compensate for not having reinforced tires? 

Sami -- 
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