Hot Rods Tires ~ not the tired old bias verses radial debate

Thank you sir. HRP

 

I like staggered sizes on pre-war rods and the same size for post-war cars.

And for the old bias/radial debate, Diamondback posted yesterday on Facebook that their Auburn radials will ship out January 1. Finally.

 

But it's STILL a radial...and do you really believe they will be shipping on New Years Day, most businesses like that are closed where the new years eve revelers cab sleep it off. HRP

 

I thought staggered was race car terminology......

 

Possibly in England & Canada it's just race car terminology but.....

Not here in the States the terminology of having staggered tires has been around for hot rods for many years and it denotes larger tires on the rear of a car/truck,It can also be used in racing terms. HRP

 

Here's a little pick up I always thought was kinda cool. It runs the same size all around which sorta gives it a neat look. Although I would have run a hair smaller tire up front but tall enough to still keep leveled out vibe going.

I stole it off of this thread about same size tires all around:

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/...-see-some-same-size-tires-on-hot-rods.309452/

 

Another from the same thread from back in the day.

 

I have 6.00 16 front and 6.50 16 on rear, seems to have been popular in the period pictures Ive seen. I might end up swapping to taller rears just for the gear ratio.

I like big and little tires when done right, and 60's style builds can go wilder with the sizes and pull it off. I'm not a fan of the 40's styled cars though that run a space saver spare size in front and ton-and-a-half truck sized tires in the rear, there's definitely an overkill.

 

You have one sweet Corvette.

 

I prefer the big and little rubber rake look.
195/65-15 on a 15x6 and 235/70-15 on a 15x7

 

I totally agree

 

I like taller, wider tires in back. I'm running radials simply because the set I have on the car I kept from the one I traded off. Have 255/60/15 on the rear, with 215/60/15 on the front. That's a 26" tire on rear, 24" on the front. Next set will be even bigger, probably 275/60/15 and 225/70/15 fronts to lose a little width up front. My car is big, so it needs a big tire to fill up the fenders. And I've just always like wide tires on the rear, goes back to my musclecar days. Sorry, but something like a 78 series tire would make my car look like a fat woman on a bicycle.....

 

Gotta have big and littles 450 on a stock 16" up front and a 750 out back with a 2' widened 16" 155 on a 5" wheel up front and a 255 on a 7" wheel out back

 

Big and littles always !

 

My pal Dave used the same size wheels & tires on the confused truck that I used on mine. HRP

 

My old beater has 6 x 15 & 8 x 15 with 185's & 255's. HRP

 

One of the coolest vettes I've ever seen. Great taste in custom


Sent from my QTAQZ3 using The H.A.M.B. mobile app

 

36 has all 6.00x15, 32 has 5.50x16 and 7.00x 16

 

Avatar has 600 16 up front on 4 inch rims with 750 15 on 5 inch in the rear

 

Great looking car,who wouldn't want that in their garage. HRP

 

Big and littles on every vehicle I own including the daily drivers,usually 205-75 on the front and 235-75 on the rear.

 

I think we're dealing with one term and two different meanings.

Stagger is definitely a term used in racing in this country. In circle track racing it is the difference in circumference between a right side tire and a left side tire with the left side being smaller to facilitate making the car turn.

 

Had a great big and little look with Excelsior bias ply tires. Switched to Excelsior radials and lost the look as I never real researched the diameters when ordering. Even though I lost "the look", the improved handling makes up for it.

 

I don't know a whole lot about anything but
I have some theories.
I didn't live in the '40's but during that time,
if you were a kid with a jalopy you ran whatever
tires would fit your ride. This came from my old man.
Early post war East Coast many Hot Rods were heavilly
influenced by the look of the European imports. Mostly
they appeared on the East Coast first. They
were all very low slung compaired to American iron, so
you got the severe channeling on the Hot Rods,
but most cars ran level, still without bigs and littles.
On the West Coast after the war came the "lakes" look.
Everyoue was interested in top end, and the easiest way
to get more was bigger rear tires. So the West Coast sort of
"invented" bigs and littles.
When the little pages appeared, they came mostly from
the West Coast, so the bigs and littles look came east.
Then many of the East Coast cars that already were
channeled got the rubber rake look.
We all know how much our traditional influences came
from the little pages, and the early Hot Rod mage etc.
so this is why many like the big and little look.
Just my $.02.

 

That is a beautiful hot rod...

 

It is. What we are talking about here is rubber rake, aka: big-n-littles.

 

Here's a Stupid Thought Take a FWD car and put the biggies on the front for superb traction. And tiny wheels on the rear for tail-dragging. Gosh the mental picture of that hurts! But someone will PhotoShop it.

 

In fact early Citroën DSs came from the factory with 165R400s on the front and 155R400s on the back. The spare was a 165. In the mid-'60s some up-spec variants went to 180R400s on the front. But the DS was always visually about its front-drive, with a lot of front overhang and visual emphasis on the front wheels, and a correspondingly visually anaemic rear axle.

It's the opposite of hot-rod thinking but it might actually work quite well on a custom, provided the rear wheels are thoroughly skirted.

We're getting a lot of Korean light COE trucks here, which come out with 14" wheels on the front and 12" duallies on the back, to lower the load bed. It just doesn't look right to me.

Every so often the idea of two or three narrow tyres on one combined wheel crops up again. It seems to be quite workable but no real advantage in it, whatever the next person pushing it claims. Nevertheless I'm waiting for the show circuit to discover the huge, skinny front tyres which are now something of a craze on a certain style of motorbike, and running several of them on each front wheel of a hot rod. It could go donk-wise or it could open up new, though deeply OT, horizons ...

 

Must be a Harry Mann Corvette. All of the ones from his dealership in LA had 3 tail lights.