The 185's will be taller than the Michelin 205/70. The 195's are slightly
taller than 215/70's. With the 205/70's you are not going quite as fast as
you think you are.

Dennis

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
Bill Bowman
Sent: Friday, August 10, 2007 2:36 PM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Help! For anyone with Hankook tires on a Vanagon/Bubble Bus

Hi all,

I'm trying to decide on the purchase from the Bus Depot of a set of
Hankook RA-08 195 series (not the 185's) tires for my '87 Vanagon Westy.
Perhaps - OKAY! - I'm definitely getting anal about this.  I'm hoping that
the outer tire diameter of the 195 series Hankook's is a bit bigger/taller
than the Michelin MXL 205/70R14" tires currently on my Carat alloys.

Is there anyone out there that has a new to fairly new set of
mounted/inflated Hankook RA-08 195 series 14" tires on their Type 2???  If
so, I'm hoping that you might quickly jack the tire off the ground and run
a tape measure tightly around the outer diameter of the tire in the center
of the tread width and then e-mail me the exact measurement (example: 81
1/4 inches around, etc.)  Yeah, I know, I know...

I'll be doing the same on my older Michelins later today and I want to
compare the numbers to see if the 195 series Hankooks might be larger in
diameter than my older 205 series Michelins.  Right now, in my auto trans
Westy I'm doing about 3,900 rpms at an "indicated" 70 mph, and I'm looking
for a tire that'll get me a little more top end for the same rpms.  I
already asked at the Bus Depot and they didn't have any tires there that
were mounted and properly inflated - let's say for comparison purposes at
32 psi.

Anyway, thanks in advance to anyone out here that can help out in this
tire size comparison.  If there is interest, I'll post any results that I
recieve afterward.

Bill Bowman
http://www.bnnta.com - it's almost here!