New Shoes on the Unimog 404

I mounted a set of 2 1/2 ton tires 11.00 R 20 Michelin XL's on my stock Unimog 404. I had to remove the rear wheel wells for clearance but the front is fine. If your into heavy wheeling you might have clearance problems with the axle articulation but i dont so now i just have a truck that can easily cruise 60 now.

It really looks mean now. The first 5 gears arent underpowered at all but 6th is a bit soft. Make sure you get a good even stretch or a slight downhill to get up to cruising speed

WOW! Looks good! Shipping was fast. They just left my house......

Dave,

Radek in Pahrump, Nevada runs 9x20 NDT's on his 404. He said they are great for rock crawling but be very careful on wet roads.

Mike Pop
Ex Unimog Owner (U1300L)

Those look really nice on there David. Too bad about the rear wheel wells, though larger replacements would be easy to make.
How is the braking with the greater mass?

FWIW, even with the 10.5's the gap between 5th and 6th gear was too big, I found that mine actually drove/accelerated better with the larger 12.5s. I always thought the Mog should have a 5.5th gear. That would make it better for steady acceleration, but also allow you to downshift a whole lot sooner on hills without losing quite as much speed. The larger tires do let you downshift at a slightly higher speed without over-revving the engine, but it's still too slow.
The first time I went up a long hill (about 3 miles) at 23mph in a 60mph zone was the last time I did it without the yellow strobe on the back. By the time I got to the top of the hill I had figured out where I was going to put the light, what type switch to use and how to wire it!
Oh, and I now avoid those hills whenever possible.

The 9.00s Mike mentioned are another good choice, roughly the same diameter as the 12.5s.

Cheers

Glad you got them to fit David. Do they rub any at full lock? I'd say you might hear some rubbing off-road with the axles crossed up. They look great though.

yeah mike i dont think the driver stopped between your house and mine. He left your at 10 at night and was at mine in less than 24 hours. Thanks for shipping the tubes with them, i didnt know you were going to do that. I ended up making them tubeless as per the tire guys recommendation.

Im not sure on the stopping difference, the road and my drum brakes are wet so it was stopping crappy anyway. They dont work as well i imagine but they still work.

A nice 12000 lbs winch and ill be done with this one i think. All i have to do now is sit back and wait to see what the bigger tires break. Fix that then im golden.

Actually Chris i didnt think they were going to fit either, thats why i went ahead and removed the wheel wells.

i just tried out the new tires at highway speeds. with the speedo measuring 79 kmh (calibrated to the stock tires) which is the max recommended speed. I was doing 65 mph and i didnt feel it was straining the truck in any way. Its really odd passing people on the highway in a Unimog. It does take a LONG time to get up to speed but doesnt seem to have any trouble maintaining it. Its amazing what switching from a 36" to 43" tire can do to your cruising speed.