BX1870 Front Tire Options

[Deleted member 43421]

I recently purchased a used BX1870. I have the stock 16x7.5-8 turf front tires on my Kubota. When I have a full load in the FEL, the tires flex heavily. I’m concerned about cutting down the sidewalls over time. I’m running about 20-22# in the tires with weights on my rear wheels.

Anyone have experience with a higher ply tire in this size? I primarily mow with this machine, so I want to stick with turf style.

 

[armylifer]

I recently purchased a used BX1870. I have the stock 16x7.5-8 turf front tires on my Kubota. When I have a full load in the FEL, the tires flex heavily. I’m concerned about cutting down the sidewalls over time. I’m running about 20-22# in the tires with weights on my rear wheels.

Anyone have experience with a higher ply tire in this size? I primarily mow with this machine, so I want to stick with turf style.

Unfortunately the stock front tires on the BX18xx are really too small for the loads that the tractor is capable of carrying. I looked for a higher ply tire and could not find one so I did two things to help me with load carrying. The first thing I tried was filling my original stock tires with windshield washer fluid. That worked well for a few years but when I got a blowout on one of the front tires I took that as an opportunity to change all the tires to a larger size.

I changed the front and rear tires to the same ones that are for a BX23xx tire, and loaded them all with windshield washer fluid. These larger tires fit the tractor perfectly. The only issue I experienced with the front tires is that they rubbed my 54" mower deck when making a left turn. I solved that issue by adjusting the wheel stop on that side to where the tire no longer rubs the mower deck when turning left. I have a little loss of turning radius to the left but the right tire does not rub the deck so turning right is not affected at all. I must say that the larger front tires handle loads in the FEL much better than the stock front tires did. There was absolutely no issues with the larger rear tires.

I bought the tires and wheels from the sales department at my Kubota dealer. I got them through wholegoods sales for less than $500.00 for all 4 of them, with rims. This made a huge change for the better, in the way that the tractor handles. In addition to the windshield washer fluid in all the tires I have 22 pounds of air in the front and 3 pounds of air in the back. You read that correctly, just 3 pounds of air in the back tires. Because the back tires are 2' taller than the original rear tires they need much less air to handle the same loads that the stock tires handle. I could put more air in the rear tires but I want the whole tire tread to squarely contact the ground. I get much better traction that way.

 

[Henro]

I recently purchased a used BX1870. I have the stock 16x7.5-8 turf front tires on my Kubota. When I have a full load in the FEL, the tires flex heavily. I’m concerned about cutting down the sidewalls over time. I’m running about 20-22# in the tires with weights on my rear wheels.

Anyone have experience with a higher ply tire in this size? I primarily mow with this machine, so I want to stick with turf style.

You might consider getting your front tires foam filled. Makes the tires stiffer but there is still a bit of flex. This week my son in law got his BX23S tires (industrial tires) foam filled. Cost was $63 each for the front. Not real cheap, but you will never get a flat either.

 

[armylifer]

You might consider getting your front tires foam filled. Makes the tires stiffer but there is still a bit of flex. This week my son in law got his BX23S tires (industrial tires) foam filled. Cost was $63 each for the front. Not real cheap, but you will never get a flat either.

What kind of foam do they use? Is it like that construction expanding foam?

 

[BigG]

No, to the box store foam. It looks good at first but it does not hold up for long. If you Google "foam filled tires" you can find several stories above how to use it and just as many , "it did not work' stories.

 

[armylifer]

No, to the box store foam. It looks good at first but it does not hold up for long. If you Google "foam filled tires" you can find several stories above how to use it and just as many , "it did not work' stories.

So do you know what kind of foam was used? Also, I was watching some youtube videos about this very subject and they showed the tire being drilled into with a drill bit to allow the foam to expand and bleed out of the drill hole. Is this the procedure that was used on your son-in-law's tires?

 

[BigG]

So do you know what kind of foam was used? Also, I was watching some youtube videos about this very subject and they showed the tire being drilled into with a drill bit to allow the foam to expand and bleed out of the drill hole. Is this the procedure that was used on your son-in-law's tires?

If you take it to the tire shop they will drill holes in your tires for 2 reasons. One they need to let the air escape from the tire. Second reason is they want to make sure the foam fills up the tire. The ones that I watched being done were filled up and left laying on their side for 24 hours. The resting of the tire allows the tire to cure without forming flat spots around the tire.

 

[Deleted member 43421]

Thanks for the information!

Armylifer, sounds like you conducted the similar search with the same results. No higher ply in this tire size. Hoped to spend around $200 vs $500.Thank you for confirming the larger tire sizes will work with minor tweaks to mower deck. Is your deck 54”?

Henro, my local tire shop mentioned $70-100 for poly foam fill. Sounds a little high for the smaller BX18 tires. My only concern is traction during mowing on sloped property.

Does anyone know how a slight front tire height increase (say 2”) would affect the driving / handling of the machine. If I can get away with it, I’d like to hold off on upsizing rears until rear tires wear down.

 

[BigG]

I recently purchased a used BX1870. I have the stock 16x7.5-8 turf front tires on my Kubota. When I have a full load in the FEL, the tires flex heavily. I’m concerned about cutting down the sidewalls over time. I’m running about 20-22# in the tires with weights on my rear wheels.

Anyone have experience with a higher ply tire in this size? I primarily mow with this machine, so I want to stick with turf style.

Maybe I miss this but you say you are run weights on the rear wheels. Are you also adding weight off the three point hitch? That will make the front lighter and take the weight off the tires.

 

[armylifer]

Thanks for the information!

Armylifer, sounds like you conducted the similar search with the same results. No higher ply in this tire size. Hoped to spend around $200 vs $500.Thank you for confirming the larger tire sizes will work with minor tweaks to mower deck. Is your deck 54”?

Yes, my deck is the RCK54P-24BX. BTW, I did not do anything to the deck to accomodate the larger tires. I adjusted the front left wheel stop bolt. Take a look at the bolt in the attached picture.

Does anyone know how a slight front tire height increase (say 2”) would affect the driving / handling of the machine. If I can get away with it, I’d like to hold off on upsizing rears until rear tires wear down.

You cannot change the front tire size without changing the rear tires too. If you attempt to do just the fronts you will ruin the driveline when you put it in 4WD. As a side note if I had waited until my rear tires were worn out before changing to the larger tire size, I would still be waiting. The rear tires (Turf tires) just don't wear quickly. The ride difference between the old tires and the new larger size tires was a great improvement, at least by my perception. I am very happy that i upgraded. I wish that I had done so much earlier.

 

[Henro]

What kind of foam do they use? Is it like that construction expanding foam?

They use the kind of foam that is designed for the purpose. It is quite heavy and can be cured at different pressures to mimic the air pressure you would have in your tire. It is not like construction foam.

It has been a long while since I got my tires foam filled, but I remember the tire shop had a display with samples of the foam cured at different pressures. They had different levels of stiffness. I remember them being blue in color.

Last week the cost for the front tires on a BX23S was $63 each locally.

 

[armylifer]

Thank you Henro.

 

[Henro]

Thanks for the information!

Armylifer, sounds like you conducted the similar search with the same results. No higher ply in this tire size. Hoped to spend around $200 vs $500.Thank you for confirming the larger tire sizes will work with minor tweaks to mower deck. Is your deck 54”?

Henro, my local tire shop mentioned $70-100 for poly foam fill. Sounds a little high for the smaller BX18 tires. My only concern is traction during mowing on sloped property.

Does anyone know how a slight front tire height increase (say 2”) would affect the driving / handling of the machine. If I can get away with it, I’d like to hold off on upsizing rears until rear tires wear down.

You have to be careful with front/back tire circumference ratios if you have a 4WD tractor. You need to do the calculations but my gut is telling me increasing the front tire diameter on a BX by 2 inches would not be a "slight" increase.

 

[Deleted member 43421]

I decided to start with Heavy Hitch knockoff (Titan) for suitcase weights. I really like how nimble the tractor is, didn’t want to add length with a ballast box. Hopefully this will be a good solution.