OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums Repairs and Maintenance Questions On Ride On Mowers Questions on Rover Ride On Mower Tyre upgrades

G'day guys,
I recently bought an old rover rancher 2 with a 12.5hp single cyl briggs in it.
It has what looks to be the original turf type tyres on it, and they have seen their shift out and some...

I am planning on putting some more agressive style tyres on it. Somewhere along the line of small quad bike tyres or tractor type tyres.

I was just wondering whether anyone else has done this, and what they used. Also whether they had to get different wheels

Thanks
Tyson

I suggest you avoid increasing the outside diameter of the wheels. Larger driving wheels means taller gearing, which means more wear when starting off, less ability to start on steep grades, and less convenience when manoeuvring at low speed. You need all the wheels to be the same diameter to keep the deck level when mowing.
If you put block pattern tyres on it you will improve traction but the tyres will tear up the grass when mowing. If you need to work on steep slopes or wet ground you may need to do it, but the job won't look all that great when you finish it. You might reduce the damage by using wider tyres, to spread the load.

No worries mate. I'm not worried about deck level...as its been removed as i do not need the deck for mowing

Wasn't planning on going massive tyres, just same/similar size as current (standard) just with a heavy tread.

Bought the rancher for a little project to fiddle with...use it to move trailer around and bit of rough-ish terrain work...nothing major, lumps, bumps, humps
Plan to put same size on front as rear

Thanks for quick reply grumpy
Tyson

We had huge atv tyres on a rancher 2 we scrapped.

BIggest problem we had was the front axles bending due to the extra forces, once we had new hardened ones made it went like a champ. The engine had plenty of grunt to push it still even with a trailer on it.

As for making the hubs, it required some imagineation, you cant use the original rims (as we found) because the cast alloy will just fall apart. (this really hurts)