wide whites .... Diamond Back ,Coker , Konotia , Calli ...........excuse spelling on second to last . suggestion appreciated .
those are radial sizes. I am no help there. My 40 has 8.20-15's on the back and 5.90-15's up front... good luck
I installed a set of Diamondbacks last spring on my '41 Chevy sedan- 205/70R-15 fronts and 215/70R-15 rear. They really smoothed out the ride and they look great. Hope that helps. IMG_6710A by brokedownbiker posted Feb 8, 2025 at 3:06 PM
Two of the best reasons to buy DB wide whites. The last set of Cokers I had rode like those square wheeled cars in Canada on Southpark. Eh, buddy!
My basic understanding of Coker vs Diamondback is that Diamondback installs a new sidewall on someone else's tire (at least in radial sizes), for example one of their lines uses BFGoodrich Radial T/A tires. Coker makes their own tires using their own manufacturing and rubber compounds, to my understanding. A friend was buying "BFGoodrich" Silvertowns from Coker, and found they wore poorly compared to regular radial T/A's (essentially the same tread pattern). As others have stated, there are other concerns with Coker. I haven't heard a bad thing about a tire purchased from Diamondback.
I have had dozens and dozens of Coker’s with zero issues. All of them were bias plies. I have never had any radials on my cars
I don't know about DB's other tire offerings like those BF's but I have a couple sets of Auburns (both WW and BW) and they are built by DB, their molds...new molds, not worn out molds that produce less than round results. Call down and ask to talk to Bill, as well as all other men named Bill, he is wise, friendly and helpful. I do know he started building a 820 WW Auburns. He didn't make them when I bought me 720 rears as the mold was not yet perfected.
There are Cokers when Cory owned the company, and there are Cokers now..... Many reviews posted on threads here. I like Diamonbacks. I think they currently have free shipping. https://dbtires.com/eblast/2025/20250203/Blast2.jpg
Had a customer in the shop a couple weeks ago that had just changed out a set of cokers on his ride. He said the same as above, badly out of round and drove terrible. He said they were less than a year old and had about 7000 miles on them. Said he thought they might have gotten better if he just put some miles on them but said after 7000 miles he couldn't take it no more and ordered a set from someone else. Another customer came into the shop about 2 months ago that bought a set of used cokers for his 63 vette, again the same thing, he bought them cheap because the guy he bought them from said they drove like crap on the highway because they were so out of round. The customer said he didn't care because he just drives it occasionally and basically to the car shows so we went ahead and installed them. To be honest I'm curious if he starts showing up this summer complaining to us about it since we went ahead and installed them... ....
I’m a “Whitewall Tire Geek”. Have delt with both, Coker and Diamondback. Go with DB Tires. They by far have a better product and customer service. Not cheap, but usually run some type of monthly specials with percentage off or free shipping.
LOL! The problems some of you have with specialty tires is one reason I buy "Off the shelf". I forgo the wide white for rideability. I buy a LOT of gas from the $ savings. The Shurtrac [ china, I know] on it now have around 12,000 miles, and would go that many more I believe. I 1/2 inch ww. Around $100 per currently. Ben
I run Coker BF Goodrich Silvertowns black walls (Available in www ) on my 51 Ford Coupe. They have been great tires.
My 49 Buick has Diamondbacks on it, but they are radials and they ride great. Sounds like Coker can only make a good bias ply tire. All the problems I have heard about are with their radials.
I plan on the Diamond back Auburn premiums for my 48. Sometimes one wonders how many tires were made in the molds that Coker uses before the original manufactures tossed them in the corner because they were obsolete and they collected dust until Corky rounded them up and bought them. I remember that when I went to work for Firestone tire in the Company store in down town Waco in the early 70s that they were still selling 20 sets of bias tires when you could get a set of Deluxe Champions for 4 for 100 bucks in most cases. The Big L78 were a few bucks more though. I rotated and rebalanced a lot of those tires to try to get them as round as I could and Fred Freeman trued a ton of them on the tire truing machine. My deal is if I am going to pay over a thousand dollars for four tires I want tires that will go 40/50 thousand and not 15/20 thousand that bias tires get on a good day. Bias tires are fine for the guys who only drive the car a few hundred miles a year if that but when your plans call for a number of road trips that start to finish will rack up 5K on one trip and your pockets aren't deep enough to pay out that money every 15K the math shows what you should do.
Ewww radials. HAMB sinners! (It's a joke I don't care what you sinners run). I personally love the look of a bias ply tire and all of the reproduction bias ply brands look proper. My personal opinion aside, if you drive the car daily or very regularly and put a lot of miles on it a radial is a better tire, and I believe as somebody else stated diamondback starts off with a good carcass and they basically glue their white wall to the outside of it so the tire has a ton of engineering in it because it's designed for the modern road with the latest and greatest technology. Not to mention all radials absorb bumps better, they're usually more energy efficient meaning it takes less gas pedal to roll down the highway and they handle better and generally speaking they are better and wet weather. Again all the way around they are a better tire other than in the looks department and the other bad side of a radial is about five or six years you start questioning if they are going to come apart and tare off a fender because a radial when it blows out comes apart violently and it usually gives very little warning. When it comes to hobby type tires they are not cheap . A bias ply tire is also expensive but If you pay attention at car shows It isn't uncommon to see 15 or 20-year-old tires still being used and they look brand new and they tend to not come apart They just slowly dry out until eventually they leak or pieces of the tread start falling off. The downside to a bias ply They ride terrible and they wear out quicker and I believe they use more energy going down the highway but in my opinion and to quote somebody that I have no idea who originally said it "that is the cost of being cool" and a bias ply is definitely cool. You mix that cool factor in with the fact that I am a real cheap ass so I don't have a problem buying old used biasply tires for pennies on the dollar and I will drive a 40-year-old tire without too big of a concern (as long as I got a spare, If I don't have a spare I stay within a hundred miles of home so AAA can tow me lol) but I would never buy a radial if it was more than about 3 years past its date code no matter how good it looks because again you can't tell that the tire is separating at the belts it just kind of happens I've had it happen sitting at a signal and it sounded like fabric ripping in the tire had a huge bubble thankfully that tire did not explode and I just swapped it.
The Jalopy Journal
