Anyone put 14" tires on 1300 Trillium?

[H. Fred Fuller]

Anyone put 14" tires and rims on a 1300 Trillium? What has to be done to make it work?

I need a new axle and thought if I'm going to do this, this would be the time. Yes I'm ordering elect. brakes 10"ers.

Thinking on a Dexter #10 series, 2500 or 3000 lbs. range. Do I need to order the axle with more degrees for more clearance in the wheel wells? if so how much.

To those of you who did this, was it worth the cost? what results / performance did you notice. Any negatives the this?

Anything else I should know.

Thanks: FRED.............................................. .

[Doug Mager]

turns out the wheels on our 13 Trillium are 14 inchers and bolt pattern is a clone to Mazda/Ford Ranger so we (at first) added Mazda 'Mag' style wheels to the look, as we had an extra set of 4 from our 97 Mazda P.U) but recently changed over to American Racing's Torque Thrust aluminum wheels to better match up with the same wheels on our 1937 Plymouth!!!

N.B. ... proper backspacing IS important!

[Bill F.]

Anyone put 14" tires and rims on a 1300 Trillium? What has to be done to make it work?

I need a new axle and thought if I'm going to do this, this would be the time. Yes I'm ordering elect. brakes 10"ers.

Thinking on a Dexter #10 series, 2500 or 3000 lbs. range. Do I need to order the axle with more degrees for more clearance in the wheel wells? if so how much.

To those of you who did this, was it worth the cost? what results / performance did you notice. Any negatives the this?

Anything else I should know.

Thanks: FRED.............................................. .

This spring I had a 13' Trillium with 225/60R14 tires and wheels on it. The height of 60 series tires is 60% of their tread width(60%*225=135mm) so the overall diameter of the tire is much less than a 75(75%) or 80(80%) series tire. As aresult if you use 60R14 tires they can be only slightly bigger in diameter than 80R13 tires, which likely means you shouldn't have to modify your axle height. I vaguely remember seeing a chart on a tire company website which gave the overall diameter for each of the common tire sizes. If you can't find one of these you can calculate the overall tire diameter yourself, by adding the wheel diameter to 2* the sidewall height(eg 60%*225). The 225 dimension is metric(225mm) and the 13 or 14 is imperial(inches) so you have to do some conversion to get everything into the same format.
225/60R14= 2(225*.6)+14(25.4)
=2(135)+355.6
=625.6mm or 625.6/25.4=24.629" overall diameter
175/80R13=2(175*.8)+13(25.4)
=2(140)+330.2
=610.2mm or 610.2/25.4=24.023"
The difference is only about 5/8" so the tire will be half that(radius is 5/16") closer to the wheel well. I don't think you will find any ST tires in 60 series but these bigger 60 series
(P)assenger tires should have a higher load rating than the original ST tires.
Bill

[Lee Hillsgrove]

Excellent resource for anyone considering a tire size change:

http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html

Bookmark it!

[Joseph Olajos]

About a month ago, I did exactly what you are planning.
My 73 Trillium 1300 came with 14' tires when I bought it, a few yrs ago..P185 75R14 on the axle, and a 14" bias-ply tire for the spare !! I got new P tires in the same size shortly after for the running gear, using one of the originals for the spare.
After the trailer acquired a "lean" to the street side last season, I decided a new axle was in order; so, in May, I had a new axle installed:
#10 3000Lb Dexter axle w/10inch brakes

I don't know if they changed the starting angle ( 0 degrees) which the specs call for, but I now have 2 inches tire clearance in both wheel wells.
With the high capacity axle, it did not ride stiff, nor bounce on the 25 mile trip back home from the installing shop. There is NO indication whatsoever of tire contact with the wheel wells.

Joe/Peterborough, Ontario

[H. Fred Fuller]

A little math, a chart and a man that did it, now I now where to start. Now it's just gitt'n to it.

Thanks for the help.

Now if I could only find out how hard it is to take off the "shell" off the frame. Can four people , one on each corner lift it off the frame?

FRED

[Ed Harris]

I put 14" wheels and tires on my 1300 when I had the "Wheel Launching Incident" as I like to fondly remember it.

I went to a junkyard in Atlanta( the scene of the scene?) and bought Ranger steel wheels.
They fit fine and I got new radials and off I went.
I think it handled better after the switch but then anything handles better than an Egg with just one wheel.