15" to 16" wheels?

[Lester]

My 5th wheel came with 15" wheels and I'd like to fill in the wheel well and raise the rig with larger tires and not have to move/change the axles. Have any of you guys done this? THANKS!

[Lester]

My 5th wheel came with 15" wheels and I'd like to fill in the wheel well and raise the rig with larger tires and not have to move/change the axles. Have any of you guys done this? THANKS!

[FatDog]

Lester,

Welcome to iRV2 !
Glad to see you here.

Out of curiosity, what kind of 5'r did you get? You can fill in your Profile here with info like that, and it gives us all some info on your particulars.

I also have a 5'r that came with 15's that i would like to replace with 16's,
although not for the same reason necessarily. I want the additional load characteristics more commonly available with the 16s - Load E rated tires as versus my current Load D's.

You mentioned your reason for switching sizes included 'raising the rig'. It would be cheaper to flip the axles if that was your primary motivation. Buying a set of wheels, and what for me will probably end up being Michelins, won't exactly be cheap.
And I would presume that the additional height of the tires would not cause them to rub together on your trailer, but i have measured some axles that seem very close to each other, while others give a handful of inches of additional space.
i flipped my axles because my 4x4 truck sits high naturally. But i still want those 16's.
There are a number of threads here currently discussing the 16's that you can search for.

Again, Welcome !
Mike

[Lester]

Thank you Mike and I'll add the info to my profile. My 5th wheel is a '02 28' Lakota that I "flipped" the springs to hook up to my F-350, SC, 4X4, DRW but now it looks like a Saltine box on a roller skate. With larger tires/ wheels I could lower the suspension 3" to the lowest of the three settings and hopefully raise the rig 3" to get the seperation from the truck bed rail and not look so dorky as it does now.

[FatDog]

So you have already 'flipped the axles" (flipped the leaf springs),
and now you want to UN-flip them,
and make up that 3" with bigger wheels and rubber? if i understood correctly

3" seems awefully ambitious for one wheel/tire combo, and that sure will eat up the space between the axles quickly as well, two axles each now sporting 3" higher rubber.

I don't like the idea of a "...dorky Saltine box on a roller skate..." though. That doesn't seem like something we want you hauling around.

[Grunt]

Lester..

I contemplated switching to 16" E rated tires from my 15" D rated ones. The only 16" wheels (5 on 5 1/2)that I could find were rated the same as the 15" ones, therefore the E rated tires would be overkill as the weak link would be the wheels. The expense of buying heavier axles with the six lug or eight lug was cost prohibitive, although the wheels do have a higher weight rating.

[K-Star]

Depends if you have enough room for the larger tires. My last 5er came with 15" wheels standard. I opted for 16" wheels when I ordered it. There was not a whole lot of room, but they did fit. I couldn't use any between the wheel (axle) chocks as there was only about 1" space between the tires

[Lester]

No I don't want to "reflip" the springs but want to maintain the same 5th wheel height by lowering the 5th wheel suspension a little bit and raising it back up with larger tires/wheels,while filling in that large wheel well gap, if you can see what I'm saying. Thanks for helping, everyone!
Matt

[knute]

Lester, I may be thick minded, but I don't see how changing to a 16" wheel will help much.

Wheels sizes are set on rim diameter. Changing from a 15" diameter (7.5" radius) to a 16" diameter (8" radius) will only increase the ride height of the rig by about 0.5", plus a small amount from tire profile.

Seems like a lot of trouble for 0.5".