Will 34" "Pizza Cutter" tires fit Gen4 on stock wheels without cutting? (255/85R17)

[fredygump]

As the title says, big pizza cutter wheels on a Gen4? As far as a "no cut" fitment, what works?

I've seen a lot of videos saying 33" tires, typically 285 width with a +25mm offset, will fit without trimming. So I'm optimistic that a narrower 34" tire, on the stock wheels (~+60mm offset) will fit without trimming?

The only tire I can find in this size is the Mickey Thompson Baja Boss A/T. Is anyone else running them on a Tacoma? What do you think about it? Is there a better option for a pizza cutter tire?

My goal is a tire that fills the wheel well, and I would prefer not to do any cutting. It is a new truck, after all!

My vision/dream for the truck is for it to be more race truck than rock crawler. I'm considering lowering it a little, making the control arms level. With the larger tires this keeps ground clearance about the same as stock. (roughly...I'm just estimating!)

The idea is to also get "up jacking" shocks and dual rate springs, The effect I'm hoping to achieve is the truck rides low when driving on smooth surfaces, but when the suspension is cycling on rough ground, the up jacking suspension literally lifts the truck and increases ride height, almost like a "floating" effect.

I'm curious what you guys think. I've been a Tacoma owner for literally days, so I'm just trying to absorb as much info as I can! I've done some research already, but I haven't found any examples of the "race truck" concept.

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[MT-Taco]

There was someone here that had them on OEM offroad wheels +50 offset that fit well. He sold them because of the MPG hit.

Edit @GMak621
Was the member

 

[Dutchman4]

Like you, I have only owned my Tacoma for a month and I am also new to the Pizza Cutter tire approach.

After exhaustive online research I stumbled on this video and this guy appears to very knowlegable on every thing related to off-roading:


Based on this video and other research, I am convinced that "Tall and Skinny" was the way to go for me. I don't do rock crawling and and super technical trails but I do explore the deserts and get on to some pretty rocky jeep trails once in a while. My priority was to get a more off-road capable tire with some extra ground clearance over the 30.5" stock highway tires that my Tacoma came with but also not take a big mpg hit. So for me I wanted to stay with load range C to reduce the weight of the tire and also have a side wall with enough flex so it would benefit from airing down. I also wanted to keep my stock 17" alloy rims.
This left me with 255/75R17 as the tallest (true 32") tire in load range C. A spare tire in this size also fits well in the spare tire location with very little drop below the hitch.

For your case you want to go much taller and I don't have much advice for you since I have no experience in that area but maybe the video will give you some anwers.

From a quick look at tire sizes, all I can tell is:

Mickey Thompson Baja is the only choice for 255/85R17
Load Range E
65lb
34.5"

For tire size 255/80R17 you have Lots of tire choices and might be a better way to go and this tire will probably fit in the spare tire location as well.
Load Range E
53 to 58lb
33"

Regards, Ceril

 

[Wife bought my 24 TRD]

I run 255 80 17's, which is the largest tire? You can get in the spare tire compartment. +20 and there 's plenty of room for more tire without rubbing

 

[fredygump]

There was someone here that had them on OEM offroad wheels +50 offset that fit well. He sold them because of the MPG hit.

Edit @GMak621
Was the member

I'm curious what the change in MPG was. The larger tire size will skew the indicated MPG on the dash if not compensated for.

I've noticed that my stock 30.5" tires indicated 5% higher speed/ distance than actual, which inflates indicated MPG. Five percent is like 3mph at highway speeds.

A 33" tire is 5% larger circumference than a 30.5, so with 33s, speedo and MPG are accurate. (I have seen posts and videos confirming this.) But with a 35" tire, the difference is 12% larger circumference than the 30.5. So larger tire reduces indicated MPG by 2-3mpg. Then add the increase in rolling resistance.

 

[fredygump]

Something I found interesting is this video from "Tyre Reviews" youtube channel (not to be confused with "Tyre Review" channel..) about wheel weight. He ran the same tire, but mounted on 3 different sets of wheels. One set of wheels was hilariously heavy at 52#! This was an a BMW M3.



He found that the heavy wheel was a little slower, but the margin was small enough you wouldn't notice without a thorough test procedure and precise measurements.

I don't know if his results translate when changing tire size, but if performance measurements only show a small change, then I suspect fuel economy isn't massively effectively either. That would mean the marked reduction in MPG on offroad rigs is not about the weight/ size of the tire? Maybe it is more the lift kit, roof racks, removing the front air dam, and the tire tread?

I'm curious what you guys think!

 

[MT-Taco]

https://www.tacoma4g.com/forum/threads/mickey-thompson-baja-boss-ats-35x10r17-255-85-17.8441/

 

[Dutchman4]

You can't change physics, tire weight and size do matter. A wider tire also pushes more air going down the road so that is another factor that favors a skinny tire. Then you have extra rolling resistance as well from a wider and heavier tire. Why do you think road racing bicycles run skinny, high psi tires and not 4" wide fat tires.

It's one thing to just compare mpg difference from only a tire change but all the other modifications, like you mentioned, are often done at the same time and will reduce mpg also so that can confuse the situation about mpg.

 

[fredygump]

Here Kai is basically proving that the tires by themselves don't have much affect on fuel economy. It is a Tundra, so not a Tacoma, but same story I am sure.



This one tests MPG with and without the stock air dam. It is on a Ford, but I'm sure the principle applies to a Tacoma. The Tacoma may have a bigger air dam even!

According to the data from this video, there was a 13% decrease in fuel economy when the air dam was removed. That's crazy!

 

[Dutchman4]

According to this one test there was a 0.7 mpg loss from removing the spoiler on Tacoma 4G.

 

[fredygump]

Interesting. We need more data! I'll try to replicate the experiment. I'm not sure how many miles I should have on my truck for break-in to not affect the results? I'm just about at 500 miles right now.

If it is just like 5% reduction, that makes it easier to remove it. It would be cool to have an active air dam like the Tundra...best of both worlds.

 

[Dutchman4]

It's the first thing I removed since there was no way that I was going to give up that much ground clearance for off road.
Once it's removed the lower A-Arms start making a whistle sound around 40 mph so I installed the 8 OEM plugs in the bottom of the arms to stop that.

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