Outer Limits 4x4 Board

hey all

if i have a set of play tyres that i trailer to the trail, is there much benefit in filling them with water to help with truck stability? i.e. keeping the weight down low

also, if it were to work, how do you get the water in there in the first place?

Benefit is not only CofG but in stopping you bouncing off obstacles - so depends on what you drive if it would help.

To put the water in - deflate tyre, remove valve and fill.

Your rims will get rusty...

the troopy in the sig line.

i estimate about 100 litres in a 35inch tyre that is filled to 80percent capacity. so that's about 400 litres/kilos at ground level to help

gonna try this when i get home.

would kill acceleration though i think

I meant depends on what sort of terrain you drive - rock ledges, etc...

Forgot to add that it makes life much harder on CVs and axles!

ok i get ya.

so how does it affect different terrain? i've already worked out that on hill climbs the large weight of the truck helps with traction till you reach a certain angle of steepness where it starts to work against you.

A lot of farmers fill their front or rear tractor tyres for ballast depending on what work they are doing.

Just remember when you hit bumps hard though: air compresses, water doesn't!

so if ya pop a tyre from the rim you have to clean off all the mud now from the rim to re-seat it

Have tracrto with water in tyres and it makes a huge differnce to traction. If you leave at least one-third of the tyre empty and fill this wil low air pressure, eg, no more than 10psi, the ride is fine. It is hard on tyre structure and drivetrains though - all that extra weight has to be carried and driven and whilst for a tractor this is little addtional stress cause they are designed for pulling, a 4wd will be affected and more traction/weight to drive will result in more breakages.

Ive watched tractors tyres being filled. Pretty much as Reddo said, but maybe only fill 1/4 of tube volume.( yes you have to use tubes ) Ive often wonder about this, so try it and let us know.

My tractor tyres are filled with water. I take out the valve thingy inside and fill them up with a hose. Usually to the top of the rim as you still need some air for "bounce" My tyres are about 20psi. Tractor tyres have like a extra large valve stem so filling with a hose is easy. It could be a pain doing it on a car. Make sure you use tubes and DON'T get the old tyre water on you. If you have ever smelt old tyre air you will know what I mean.

Tractors do it for weight gain because they are usually pulling huge loads and need to get weight to the ground. you are comparing aples and oranges. Tractors need the weight up front to keep it on the ground because of the massive loads they are pulling that would normally make them wheel stand.

You should use lead shot in the tyre...

many people in the buggies do that

Busiboy it is not usually for weight - tractors are heavy enough and use steel or concrete blocks when they need weight in certain places. It is to make C of G lower and inprove stability.

Funny what you guys are saying about ride comfort... My uncle is a farmer in an extremely hilly area, and he fills the tyres on all 3 of his tractors about 99% full of water. The ride was OK last time I rode on one - but then I drive a series land-rover...

we used to run full water in steiger rims. There huge if you know the tractors im talking about. we were towing laser buckets

The foreman told me to get into it, so hour and a half later of jumping the old girl , She was sitting in the middle of a paddock with 4 busted tubes.


SO, maybe only go 75 percent or similiar.

I was tring to keep the water in tyres thing quiet from the city guys, but i guess the secret is well and trulery out now.

tractors run water in tier tyres to to keep weight to the ground when on angles and for more traction, i have talked to some oversea guys and they all run 1/4 water in thier tryes but are all on alloy rims they made up a hose for thier vaules and used a remove tool to put water in.

I'm a bit confused over why you would use a "91 Troopcarrier, 2" springs/shackles, L/R tank, storage draws, PTO winch" for a trail rig?

Don't most ppl use lilttle suzuki's etc?

the tractor benefit relates to weight on the ground which = traction, not stability. Though stability may be helped a bit provided the water is below axle height, it is more than offset by slidability, ie, the additional weight causes more side-slip on hillsides - which can be a very scarey and interesting ride.

Additing weight thru other means, eg, weight racks is way more expensive that water, and much more difficult to locate especialy in the rear where there's no convenient place to put them. Ever bought cast weights for tractors? They cost thousands for a full set!

I'd imagine a 2-thirds full rear tractor tyre adds about 180kg per tyre or more in additional weight. That's a serious weight gain at no cost. We found taking some out improved traction on our wet clay ridden land cause it bogged down less. You need to play with it a bit.

Can't see anything but trouble for a standard 4wd though!

Cossie wrote:I'm a bit confused over why you would use a "91 Troopcarrier, 2" springs/shackles, L/R tank, storage draws, PTO winch" for a trail rig?

Don't most ppl use lilttle suzuki's etc?

because he can, he drives it to the place he wants to wheel puts his bigger tyres on and wheels away this will help with defects and tyre wear

[quote="Cossie"]I'm a bit confused over why you would use a "91 Troopcarrier, 2" springs/shackles, L/R tank, storage draws, PTO winch" for a trail rig?

Don't most ppl use lilttle suzuki's etc? [/quote]

the truck started out life as a tourer and is slowly being evolved as a crawler harder rig.

sheesh - why does anyone wheel the type of truck they have? coz it's the one they got that suits their purposes. Why do guys wheel unimogs when it's supposed to be a military cargo vehicle. coz they want to.

Water in the tyres does aid with traction and also helps in a few other areas aswell.

I use over 100kg's of steel shot in EACH front tyre in my buggy.

Im no expert, but coming from a mechanical engineering background, having water in the tyres, either 1/3 , 1/4 or just under full, would mean you have a hell of alot of inertia in those water filled tyres.

They would be great for very slow rock crawling only, but anything higher that 20kph, and the water would be a huge load on the wheel bearings if ya had to stop quickly, or even slowly. Great for tractors, cos they cant get up to any decent speed that may cause inertia/weight problems.

Id say more trouble than its worth!

John Butler runs water in his XWC 73 Series in QLD. He's run all four full in the 2004/2005 XI and only in the front in the QLD winch challenge. He found that the car takes off alright as the water slide sin the tyre but trying to stop is where the issue is because you have to stop moving water. But it's kept the middy on all fours for years and it helped even more when he did the coil coversion.
Brad

We remove the valve and use an attachment that a hose connects to and also has a air vent to allow trapped air to escape as the tractor tyre is filled up to the valve level. The valve is then replaced and the tyre pumped to the correct pressure.

One caution.... from personal experience, at higher speeds (tractor speed - eg out of gear down a hill, and we would never do this!!!) the tyres can get very out of sync and the tractor begins to hop, which can be very dangerous.... So could be worth considering if driving the vehicle at higher than rockcrawling speeds.